Five passes by the starter

[Zeke]

Five pass attempts by the starter..............discuss.

[chrisfisher]

Five pass attempts by the starter..............discuss.

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Did Quinn lose his catch streak? I can't remember?

[Zeke]

He was able to catch one of those 5.

[KingDL1]

I think the answer is we need to buy DD a copy. He seems to only know one system.

Coaching Football For Dummies

[Green Lantern]

Five pass attempts by the starter..............discuss.

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That's how you win OOC games with teams that have a comparable talent level. Didn't you get that memo?

[shaft]

We're a running team and the ground game couldn't open up the passing game. Why over think this.

[medpilot21]

Some games are just like this. Strong winds, tough defenses, no OL, QB changes, away crowd, etc... are tough to deal with. At least they didnt plant 52 on us? I feel really good about how we played tonight.

Yep, we gonna be fine....

Uh huh, no problemo....

I'm okay with this one...really?

GMG!!!

[BIG DAWG]

Five pass attempts by the starter..............discuss.

Don't forget to put in here that we were down for the majority of the game, and only have 11 attempts throwing the ball the entire game. 3

By the way...did I say that the O-LINE sucks!

[Got5onIt]

Some games are just like this. Strong winds, tough defenses, no OL, QB changes, away crowd, etc... are tough to deal with. At least they didnt plant 52 on us? I feel really good about how we played tonight.

Yep, we gonna be fine....

Uh huh, no problemo....

I'm okay with this one...really?

GMG!!!          

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LOL!!!!!!!!!

[keith]

Five pass attempts by the starter..............discuss.

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It took me a little while to figure out, but I think I finally understand the strategy. Here it is. First, get down by around 28 to 3. Then, the defense will think you are going to try to catch up by throwing the ball. They pull their D back to cover the pass. That, in turn, opens up the running game and you start pounding it up the middle. Pretty sneaky if you ask me.

Keith

[SeanMG]

You forgot the top secret secret play where Meager runs back to the endzone to trick them. Too bad the TU coach looked like a green clad receiver or Meager would of thrown a touchdown.

[Got5onIt]

What about all the 4th down attempts by Tulsa? It showed they had no fear of NT's offense whatsoever.

[chrisfisher]

It took me a little while to figure out, but I think I finally understand the strategy.  Here it is.  First, get down by around 28 to 3.  Then, the defense will think you are going to try to catch up by throwing the ball.  They pull their D back to cover the pass.  That, in turn, opens up the running game and you start pounding it up the middle.  Pretty sneaky if you ask me.     

Keith

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Damn... that sneaky bastard DD even out-foxed me. I don't think I can take this.

[chrisfisher]

I think the answer is we need to buy DD a copy. He seems to only know one system.

Coaching Football For Dummies

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hilarious.. I needed some comic relief!

[mad dog]

Far more to this game than is readily apparent on the stat sheet.

However, no way in hell I can find a bright side when your play balance is 31/11. Now the only way that this looks anything close to "better" would be if you take all of Woody's runs and say that they were scrambles out of pass coverage (which, obviously, they weren't). Then, the play balance is 23/19, which is still WAAAAY too much when you are averaging less than a yard per carry.

That said, this game comes down to the five guys up front. Offensive line play was terrible in both run blocking and pass pro. I can't even say much about play selection when your line isn't giving you holes to run through or time to throw. With the way they were playing, it wouldn't have mattered if the play balance had been reversed. There was no time. Putting in Meager just came off like running up the white flag, and the offense really responded that way. Staying with Meager after a fumble and an interception was even worse.

Just an awful awful loss that hurts a lot more than Texas, for some reason.

But, let's call this one for what it was. The other reason that we had no time to throw was because their defensive line just dominated. There were no holes to run through because their linebackers were flying to the ball and shedding blocks. No one was open in the passing game because their secondary played a suffocating coverage. Tulsa was the better team tonight.

[Got5onIt]

Far more to this game than is readily apparent on the stat sheet. 

However, no way in hell I can find a bright side when your play balance is 31/11.  Now the only way that this looks anything close to "better" would be if you take all of Woody's runs and say that they were scrambles out of pass coverage (which, obviously, they weren't).  Then, the play balance is 23/19, which is still WAAAAY too much when you are averaging less than a yard per carry.

That said, this game comes down to the five guys up front.  Offensive line play was terrible in both run blocking and pass pro.  I can't even say much about play selection when your line isn't giving you holes to run through or time to throw.  With the way they were playing, it wouldn't have mattered if the play balance had been reversed.  There was no time.  Putting in Meager just came off like running up the white flag, and the offense really responded that way.  Staying with Meager after a fumble and an interception was even worse.

Just an awful awful loss that hurts a lot more than Texas, for some reason.

But, let's call this one for what it was.  The other reason that we had no time to throw was because their defensive line just dominated.  There were no holes to run through because their linebackers were flying to the ball and shedding blocks.  No one was open in the passing game because their secondary played a suffocating coverage.  Tulsa was the better team tonight.

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Pretty fair writeup, Illuvius.

Not to make excuses for the loss, but it was Tulsa's homecoming. Gotta win those games, right?

[FirefightnRick]

Far more to this game than is readily apparent on the stat sheet. 

However, no way in hell I can find a bright side when your play balance is 31/11.  Now the only way that this looks anything close to "better" would be if you take all of Woody's runs and say that they were scrambles out of pass coverage (which, obviously, they weren't).  Then, the play balance is 23/19, which is still WAAAAY too much when you are averaging less than a yard per carry.

That said, this game comes down to the five guys up front.  Offensive line play was terrible in both run blocking and pass pro.  I can't even say much about play selection when your line isn't giving you holes to run through or time to throw.  With the way they were playing, it wouldn't have mattered if the play balance had been reversed.  There was no time.  Putting in Meager just came off like running up the white flag, and the offense really responded that way.  Staying with Meager after a fumble and an interception was even worse.

Just an awful awful loss that hurts a lot more than Texas, for some reason.

But, let's call this one for what it was.  The other reason that we had no time to throw was because their defensive line just dominated.  There were no holes to run through because their linebackers were flying to the ball and shedding blocks.  No one was open in the passing game because their secondary played a suffocating coverage.  Tulsa was the better team tonight.

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If it was once or twice a year I'd buy the "our offensive line played terrible, their d line, linebackers, DB's played exceptional" excuse. But it's not just once or twice a year. It's every game, every year. During our 26 game conference win streak we were still ranked at the bottom offensively in the nation, but two of those 4 years we had a top 10 and top 15 defense to back up the poor O play. How in 9 seasons can you statistically rank as a bottom feeder offense? Nothing has changed. Nothing other than it's a poor offensive philosophy. Anything else used to explain it is simply an EXCUSE!

Rick

Edited September 17, 2006 by FirefightnRick

[mad dog]

iono man... you've obviously been to a lot more games than me. But what I saw tonight, in Tulsa, was an overmatched offensive line whose play stifled an obviously talented running back, an apparently deep receiving corps and an ostensibly talented QB.

You can not buy it if you so choose, but I know we didn't have this problem in 2003 and 2004. The offensive line then was at least opening gaping holes, and was decent enough in pass pro to allow Hall to hit the occasional playaction pass.

And why can you only buy it once or twice a year? If it is the case, shouldn't it stand to reason that it happens MORE often rather than less?

[Guest GrayEagleOne]

In my opinion, it was a poorly called game. There was little balance. I didn't see the game but they say that the O line was terrible. Why? Did they suddenly forget how to block or were the defensive schemes of Tulsa giving them a problem. If it's the latter, why would you continuously try to run it up the middle? Try something that would give them different blocking patterns. Don't keep batting your head against the wall.

Now, according to Dickey, they were just making mistakes because things are so complicated. If that be the case, simplify them. But, many of these linemen have been playing organized football for seven or eight years by now. Does that mean that they are too inexperienced to make adjustments. Or, if one is having a bad night handling an opponent how about substituting? I think that we have some pretty big and talented backups. I'm beginning to wonder if the offensive line is not a whipping boy to cover inadequate play-calling.

[mad dog]

Personally, I'm not excusing the playcalling. 31/11 is really questionable, from a layman's perspective. I am just wondering out loud if ANYTHING would have worked with what we had up front.

[FirefightnRick]

iono man... you've obviously been to a lot more games than me.  But what I saw tonight, in Tulsa, was an overmatched offensive line whose play stifled an obviously talented running back, an apparently deep receiving corps and an ostensibly talented QB.

You can not buy it if you so choose, but I know we didn't have this problem in 2003 and 2004.  The offensive line then was at least opening gaping holes, and was decent enough in pass pro to allow Hall to hit the occasional playaction pass.

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No. Read for yourself.

1999: North Texas: Rank 112th out of 114 teams.

2000: North Texas: Rank 113th out of 114 teams.

2001: North Texas: Rank 108th out of 115 teams

2002: North Texas: Rank 115th our of 117 teams

2003: North Texas: Rank 95th out of 117 teams

2004: North Texas: Rank 82nd our of 117 teams.

2005: North Texas: Rank 116th out of 119 teams.

2006: North Texas: Rank 113th out of 119 teams.(This will change to 118th tomorrow)

I'll give you that you remember our best offensive team out of the past 7 years but ranked 82nd isn't going to scare many people. And it certainly didn't concern the D coordinator at Memphis. One could consider the '04 season a decent offensive year I suppose but such teams as ULM, South Florida, Arkansas St, New Mexico St and of course a 4-8 Tulsa team ranked higher. I'm not diminishing any of those teams accomplishments but it points to a trend that has affected us in many negative ways, especially in OOC play.

You know the saying about lipstick and a pig? Well you can dress up our style of play on offense all you want. Lay excuses about poor execution on our players shoulders or talk about how it was great play by the opposing defenses all you want. But our history speaks for itself, and it's historically a pig. One would think that we could be better on offense than average as the 107th worst offense the past 7 & 2/12 seasons. That's not the players fault. We're talking about 3 generations of players playing for the same offense basically having the same level of production. And this year on paper we have argueably the best talent ever during the DD era yet statistically their headed towards the worst yet.

Where is the common denominator in all this? If we are going to continue to play this type of low production offense, and I think tonight set an all time meaning for the word "LOW", then we had better hope our defense continues to improve and find within itself something special for conference. They can again overcome our lack of offense as the '02, '03 and '04 defenses did. But they shouldn't have to after 9 years in this system.

Rick

Edited September 17, 2006 by FirefightnRick

[UNTFan23]

I was at the game.

Tulsa basically pulled a safety up and was putting 10 men in the box. Tulsa also blitzed almost every 3rd down. When we did that sell out blitz, the QB dumped it off on a quick slant that I believe lead to a TD. Tulsa also effectively used the screen when we did blitz one or two LBs. Our lack of adjustments in the second half just reeked of poor coaching and game planning.

I have no clue where the ultra conservative play calling came from, even though JQ had a muscle strain. Sometimes key players get hurt, it sucks but it happens. Deal with it and move on. The difference between how we played Tulsa and SMU was like night and day. Had I have known we were going to play our patiented vanilla offense, I would have never gone to the game. Dickey owes me $21 for my ticket and $30 for gas.

Our offense has got to do something more then what they are doing now. We were in the game at the half, but our inability to control and move the ball killed us. I know Dickey just loves to run the ball, but why keep running into a wall of defenders EVERY ... SINGLE ... DOWN!!! Our defense looked gassed by the end of the third. We had 2 1st downs in the 2nd half (one was on a penalty). It was flashes of last year all over. Also, I noticed when Meager came in, we started having trouble getting plays in on time. What's up with that?

Another thing that just killed us ... that cushion we give the WRs. An excellent coaching staff will see this and plan around it. Tulsa was running 5 and 10-yd routes almost all night long. Tulsa took what we gave them.

Is Akron even worth listening to if we're going to play like this?

[keith]

Early in the game, JT ripped off a couple of 13 yard runs (I think one was called back for illegal procedure). The line obviously opened up some holes early. So, what happened? Tulsa coaching staff adjusted appropriately and our coaching staff did not. Once TU adjusted to plug the holes and stop the run all we needed to do was hit a couple of quick, simple passes to give them something else to think about.

Keith

[FirefightnRick]

I was at the game.

Tulsa basically pulled a safety up and was putting 10 men in the box.  Tulsa also blitzed almost every 3rd down.......

I have no clue where the ultra conservative play calling came from,

The difference between how we played Tulsa and SMU was like night and day.  Had I have known we were going to play our patiented vanilla offense, I would have never gone to the game.  Dickey owes me $21 for my ticket and $30 for gas.

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1999: North Texas: Rank 112th out of 114 teams.

2000: North Texas: Rank 113th out of 114 teams.

2001: North Texas: Rank 108th out of 115 teams

2002: North Texas: Rank 115th our of 117 teams

2003: North Texas: Rank 95th out of 117 teams

2004: North Texas: Rank 82nd our of 117 teams.

2005: North Texas: Rank 116th out of 119 teams.

2006: North Texas: Rank 118th out of 119 teams.

Rick

[Guest GrayEagleOne]

Early in the game, JT ripped off a couple of 13 yard runs (I think one was called back for illegal procedure).  The line obviously opened up some holes early.  So, what happened?  Tulsa coaching staff adjusted appropriately and our coaching staff did not.  Once TU adjusted to plug the holes and stop the run all we needed to do was hit a couple of quick, simple passes to give them something else to think about. 

Keith

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Keith, if you're just going to come on here and make perfect sense maybe you should be banned from the board.