Why was offence so vanilla against PSU?

[Winnipegopher]

I trust in the coaches and the qb (by the way Gopher media guys are doing great job managing the message- see recent articles about Gray and Whaley) but why did we try nothing tricky against PSU. Early in the year, we used some wildcat and had people like Decker throwing the ball.

I would like to see us come out with some imagination against tOSU. Get Gray (or even Pittman) on the field 10-15 plays and make tOSU think a bit.

Against a good defence our standard O seems to be unable to move the ball- let's try something new.

 

[strokemonster]

My take would be that they tried to go with pretty standard offense to try and eliminate mistakes, turnovers, etc. Keep the game close and hope to pick up a key turnover. Didn't work so well.

 

[RodentRampage]

That's what I thought too, they were attempting to avoid mistakes that Penn State could take advantage of. And it accomplished that, but it didn't give us any opportunities on offense. If we can't score at all, it doesn't matter that the offense didn't make mistakes. I was surprised there wasn't more attempt to get the ball to Decker. We may have to force OSU to shut down Decker if we want to have a chance in this game.

 

[RedPoo]

That's what I thought too, they were attempting to avoid mistakes that Penn State could take advantage of. And it accomplished that, but it didn't give us any opportunities on offense. If we can't score at all, it doesn't matter that the offense didn't make mistakes. I was surprised there wasn't more attempt to get the ball to Decker. We may have to force OSU to shut down Decker if we want to have a chance in this game.

That makes sense. But I think they demonstrated that the "limit mistakes and hope for a big play" strategy isn't working too well against a good defense. Here's to hoping they try and mix things up a little this week.

 

[gopherfaith]

That makes sense. But I think they demonstrated that the "limit mistakes and hope for a big play" strategy isn't working too well against a good defense. Here's to hoping they try and mix things up a little this week.

Yep, nothing ventured, nothing gained. That was just a dull game, such a strange, weird game. I'd also like to see some new, different looks this week. OSU could be ripe for the picking (or they could also not be!).

 

[jovs]

My take would be that they tried to go with pretty standard offense to try and eliminate mistakes, turnovers, etc. Keep the game close and hope to pick up a key turnover. Didn't work so well.

That strategy rarely worked for Mason against the good teams, and Mason tended to prepare that way for every game.

 

[NewEngland_Gold]

Seemed to be just a repeat of what worked...

in the Purdue game. Obviously, PSU and tOSU are not Purdue so maybe some creativity and risk-taking are in order at Columbus.

 

[alphagopher]

we need to come out more like we did against Cal--no vanilla, lots of spumoni; playing vanilla, mano a mano, against a team that out-talents you at every position in all three phases is not very, well, smart, or effective

 

[mesothelioma]

Why do Canucks insist on spelling offense and defense with a "c"?

 

[thailleagle]

Why did our attitude change? In the Cal game it was "We're gonna throw everything we got at them" compared to PSU's performance of "Let's play it safe".......

 

[calminnfan]

I did not think the offense was on the field long enough to show anything other then vanilla. It was not much better then 3 and out using about a minute each time.

 

[The 12th Man]

I did not think the offense was on the field long enough to show anything other then vanilla. It was not much better then 3 and out using about a minute each time.

I agree with you on this. A lot of what offenses try to do is set things up. It appeared as though they tried to set some things up for later but just didn't have the time to do so.