MGN: Post game recap

[aztecskin]

I had a good time. Post gamer 

https://open.substack.com/pub/meangreennation/p/first-responder-bowl-north-texas-4b2?r=du4qo&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=true 

 

MGN is traveling back to the middle west of these united states of America, the current home of MGN HQ. We had a good time seeing old friends and some new. We were originally planning on staying until about noon tomorrow to do more catching up but the big winter storm is threatening to make it dangerous. The podcast will be recorded and published Sunday morning. 

I had a good time at this one. It was good to be home again. It was fun seeing all the green. I hope we do better at football next season. Subscribe to the site. Listen to my podcast. GMG 

[97and03]

I am curious about your thoughts on the wisdom of calling 2-1 pass to run play ratio with a guy that hadn’t started since being a freshman in high school. Why does Morris refuse to run the ball?

[aztecskin]

1 hour ago, 97and03 said:

I am curious about your thoughts on the wisdom of calling 2-1 pass to run play ratio with a guy that hadn’t started since being a freshman in high school. Why does Morris refuse to run the ball?

I asked him that in the press conference. He said their DTs were good and made it tough. Said the probably went away from it too much in the second half.

Personally I thought it was fine. The offense had good ideas. Drew missed some wide open guys early but the O moved the ball welll, and scored. The drive killers were an interception, a missed field pressure (sack/fumble) and  that TE coming up an inch short. 

Also the OL was patchwork again (they switched centers again) so I understand being hesitant to simply run at them in that scenario. 

[97and03]

I think the lack of a run game was the difference in the game. 

[GMG_Dallas]

Run game definitely struggled. Observation from a lowly fan was the center's snaps were not crisp. There was the bad snap that hit the turf that Mestemaker recovered but there were several others that weren't on target that visibly caused timing to be off. Couple that with the DL regularly being in our backfield right after the snap and it's hard to run. I may be mixing games but I think even remember a TX State player practically meeting our RB at a hand-off. Mestemaker pulled it back and got taken down by a few defenders but there was just no room to get things going on the ground.

[97and03]

Really they didn’t even try. The stats back this up.

Our RBs had 12 carries for 53 yards. That’s a respectable 4.4 yards per carry. Not amazing but solid enough to take a little pressure off the passing game. By comparison, TxSt averaged 4.6 but they ended up with over 200 yards because they stuck with the run. 
The running game didn’t struggle. Morris gave up on it before it could struggle because he doesn’t value the run game. Or he was so intimidated by a SunBelt team that he panicked? 

[aztecskin]

EM mentioned the bad snaps specifically as being a thing that slowed the entire offense. 

 

Also State had only 90 yards rushing until the 4th where they had that 73 yarder and a couple QB runs. 
 

I agree being able to run is a good thing but I don’t know that it was ever going to be Plan A. I like that we were able to punch it in from the goal line from under center though. That was big. 

[GrandGreen]

9 hours ago, 97and03 said:

Really they didn’t even try. The stats back this up.

Our RBs had 12 carries for 53 yards. That’s a respectable 4.4 yards per carry. Not amazing but solid enough to take a little pressure off the passing game. By comparison, TxSt averaged 4.6 but they ended up with over 200 yards because they stuck with the run. 
The running game didn’t struggle. Morris gave up on it before it could struggle because he doesn’t value the run game. Or he was so intimidated by a SunBelt team that he panicked? 

Or the passing game was working much better.

[NT80]

9 hours ago, 97and03 said:

Really they didn’t even try. The stats back this up.

Our RBs had 12 carries for 53 yards. That’s a respectable 4.4 yards per carry. Not amazing but solid enough to take a little pressure off the passing game. By comparison, TxSt averaged 4.6 but they ended up with over 200 yards because they stuck with the run. 
The running game didn’t struggle. Morris gave up on it before it could struggle because he doesn’t value the run game. Or he was so intimidated by a SunBelt team that he panicked? 

We were behind after the first quarter. 

In trying to stay pace our passing was more effective for quick offense.

[97and03]

1 hour ago, NT80 said:

We were behind after the first quarter. 

In trying to stay pace our passing was more effective for quick offense.

We were ahead until 3:30 remaining in the half. 
 

[GMG24]

12 hours ago, 97and03 said:

I am curious about your thoughts on the wisdom of calling 2-1 pass to run play ratio with a guy that hadn’t started since being a freshman in high school. Why does Morris refuse to run the ball?

I think the interior DL of Texas State had an incredible impact on our ability to run the ball.  Those two interior fellas were MASSIVE.  Surprised to see such large human beings playing at TX State AND excited to see Cassity bring us some big boys like that to UNT.  Next year is going to be fun, I can't wait!

[emmitt01]

5 hours ago, aztecskin said:

EM mentioned the bad snaps specifically as being a thing that slowed the entire offense. 

 

Also State had only 90 yards rushing until the 4th where they had that 73 yarder and a couple QB runs. 
 

I agree being able to run is a good thing but I don’t know that it was ever going to be Plan A. I like that we were able to punch it in from the goal line from under center though. That was big. 

Actually (and I hate to even type this because I was SOOOO excited to see EM acknowledge that getting under center is legal) we punched it in from a shotgun formation the play after we went under center