Rossow: Gophers haven't scored a TD on opening possession in non-conf in 21 games

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BleedGopher

BleedGopher

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per Rossow:

It’s been a while since the Golden Gophers offense found the end zone on its opening possession against a non-conference opponent – 21 games to be exact.

It was Sept. 24, 2011, against North Dakota State. Marqueis Gray was under center. Jerry Kill was in his fourth game as head coach of the Gophers, and the Bison were three-and-a-half months away from winning the first of their five straight FCS championships.

Pouncing on another FCS opponent, Indiana State, and scoring early and often would be a huge statement for Jay Johnson’s new offense at TCF Bank Stadium on Saturday morning.

“We struggled last week getting going right away,” Gophers tackle Jonah Pirsig said. “We know we have to come out right away and step on the gas.”

http://www.1500espn.com/gophers-2/2016/09/gophers-need-to-stop-coming-up-empty-on-early-possessions/

Go Gophers!!
 


Knew it was a while, but didn't realize it's been over 5 years. Glaring stat last year was scoring in the first Qtr.
 


Adam Rossow hasn't spelled MarQueis Gray's name correctly in one straight article.
 


I'd love to see an analysis of points scored by quarter relative to the mean. With this offense, not starting out strong is a huge liability.

Also, I hate this quote by Claeys:

If you don’t play the same non-conference teams every year, the first games are hard unless you know exactly what you’re going to get.
Click to expand...

We have bigger and stronger horses. Knowing exact schemes of our inferior opponents shouldn't play as big of a role as he's implying.
 

Perhaps Claeys who knows his players better than any of us does not perceive his players as certainly bigger or stronger.
 

Easy Leidner

Paraphrasing the cult movie Easy Rider tag line-


EASY LEIDNER

A man went out looking for the endzone
and couldn't find it anywhere.
 

Starting out at the other teams 45 yard line should be a big help, but it didn't matter. In fact, it didn't even matter 2 possessions in a row. I have a feeling it will get a little better though.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 



wait!what? said:
Paraphrasing the cult movie Easy Rider tag line-


EASY LEIDNER

A man went out looking for the endzone
and couldn't find it anywhere.
Click to expand...

You remind me of Robert De Niro's character in The Fan. But instead of obsessing over a player you obsessively hate a player.
 

wait!what? said:
Paraphrasing the cult movie Easy Rider tag line-


EASY LEIDNER

A man went out looking for the endzone
and couldn't find it anywhere.
Click to expand...

How are you going to repurpose this energy next year when he's gone? I'm worried for you, man.
 

If they are scripting the plays Johnson needs to anticipate what the defense will do; ie I know that you know that I know we want to run the ball. Andersen outguessed Johnson in Rock Paper Scissors, and the execution wasn't great to boot those first three drives. Can our receivers get open? Can Mitch take advantage of single coverage.
 

GophersInIowa said:
You remind me of Robert De Niro's character in The Fan. But instead of obsessing over a player you obsessively hate a player.
Click to expand...

dear rasslin fan, accusing another person hate? head into Winterset and take the morning off at the cafe.
 



Pompous Elitist said:
If they are scripting the plays Johnson needs to anticipate what the defense will do; ie I know that you know that I know we want to run the ball. Andersen outguessed Johnson in Rock Paper Scissors, and the execution wasn't great to boot those first three drives. Can our receivers get open? Can Mitch take advantage of single coverage.
Click to expand...

There were some open guys, and some interesting choices...
 




Pompous Elitist said:
If they are scripting the plays Johnson needs to anticipate what the defense will do; ie I know that you know that I know we want to run the ball. Andersen outguessed Johnson in Rock Paper Scissors, and the execution wasn't great to boot those first three drives. Can our receivers get open? Can Mitch take advantage of single coverage.
Click to expand...

I wondered about timing while at the game. Lots of "new" guys. All summer they did 7 on 7. Now in the first game, adrenaline takes over. Well the receiver runs a little faster, maybe cuts of his route without being aware of doing so. Sometimes that can be a big problem. This is probably why Leidner looks to Wolitarski a little too often. He knows they have their timing down.
 

I haven't looked at the data but I almost prefer not to score on the first possession. It seems that when we do the team says to itself, "this is going to be easy." And it is not, we then proceed to struggle to score. IIRC we didn't exactly blow out North Dakota State.
 



in wait!what?'s version of Easy Rider, he will be playing the Redneck with the shotgun.
 

This whole slow start thing exists on both sides of the ball. How can it be that other teams come out with aggressive game plans to attack our weaknesses and cause us to make adjustments, and our offense can never do the same? It's odd.
 

Section2 said:
This whole slow start thing exists on both sides of the ball. How can it be that other teams come out with aggressive game plans to attack our weaknesses and cause us to make adjustments, and our offense can never do the same? It's odd.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure they're even being aggressive... we just flop around like a dead fish for the first possession most of the time, even the first quarter in many games.
 

denguegopher said:
I haven't looked at the data but I almost prefer not to score on the first possession. It seems that when we do the team says to itself, "this is going to be easy." And it is not, we then proceed to struggle to score. IIRC we didn't exactly blow out North Dakota State.
Click to expand...

I'm not sure this makes any sense...
 

It seems like the Gophers do their darndest to play to the level of their nonconference competition.

Heaven help us. I hope things change starting this coming Saturday.
 

It isn't a surprise the gophers haven't been great on offense since about 2005
 


In 13 games last season, the Gophers scored 3 offensive touchdowns for the SEASON in the first quarter, and only one of those was on the opening drive (vs. Nebraska). The other two 1st quarter TDs came with under 2 min left in the 1st quarter (vs. IA, vs. ILL). In all, Minnesota's offense scored 30 points TOTAL in the 1st quarter last year in 13 games.
 


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