Who will be Some of our Major New Contributors?

[hammb]

3 yards & a cloud of dust may suck to watch to some people, but it protects your defense and is a proven method to WIN football games.

Of course it sucks, but as exciting as the first half of that game was, there was no way that grinding out the clock for a win would make it a boring game.

Forget 2rb sets, PJ Pope alone in the shotgun could have won us that game.

I think so to.

My point was simply that running the football with a lead is a VERY good idea. They flat out could not stop PJ Pope in that game, and we didn't give him the ball nearly enough. Give him the touches and we not only grind out the clock and keep their offense off the field, we probably still would've scored.

As great as our passing game was the old Woody-ism still holds true, "Only 3 things can happen when you throw the ball, and 2 of them are bad."

[Flipper]

I always thought that saying was kind of silly. Only four things can happen when you run and two of them are bad also. You can gain yds, you can lose yds and you can fumble. You can also get stopped for no gain, which is value neutral. You can kill the clock just as effectively throwing short as you can handing the ball off...you just have to be smart about it.

Should we have tried to run more against UT, probably. Would it have mattered in the end? I have no idea and I hope that the team isn't spending too much time worrying about it either.

There's something to be said for adjusting your tactics and there's something to be said for sticking to the game plan that you best know how to execute. I think the lesson has been learned about striking a balnce between those two concepts.

[BGSUFootballFan]

We wouldnt have had that lead to protect against UT if we were a "3yards and a cloud of dust team" if it aint broke dont fix it!

[PGY Tiercel]

We wouldnt have had that lead to protect against UT if we were a "3yards and a cloud of dust team" if it aint broke dont fix it!

You're right that we probably wouldn't have had the lead. But that second half clearly showed something broken. They should have switched to running at that point. The option needs to be available. The teams needs to be able to grind the ball out on the ground when the passing game is faltering. I agree that I don't want to see the offense change its game plan drastically, but to have the option of running when something goes wrong seems good to me.

[kdog27]

We wouldnt have had that lead to protect against UT if we were a "3yards and a cloud of dust team" if it aint broke dont fix it!

When it does break you have to have something else to go to. The pass game was not working in the third quarter and it cost us. Those were the worst 45 minutes I have ever spent in Toledo.

[hammb]

We wouldnt have had that lead to protect against UT if we were a "3yards and a cloud of dust team" if it aint broke dont fix it!

When it does break you have to have something else to go to. The pass game was not working in the third quarter and it cost us. Those were the worst 45 minutes I have ever spent in Toledo.

Worse still was that when the passing game was faltering the run game was stll pretty good, we just didn't go back to that well enough, IMO.

[BGSUFootballFan]

i agree with all 3 of you on that, my only point was lets not even come close to being a running team, except when we have a big lead on the road and cant connect on the short passes or "extended handoffs"

[Class of 61]

Very few people have mentioned this, but I recall it showing a bit more in the Spring game than in seasons past. I'd like to see our QB under center a bit more than out of shotgun 99% of the time.

Again, it creates a different look, with or without 2 RBs in the lineup at same time, AND, let's be honest, it would help OMAR get to the "next level" whatever that might be....seems that Josh Harris' biggest problem in going to pros was adjusting to 3-5 step drops etc. So getting "used to" being under center a bit more would help BG's overall look AND help Omar avoid the adjustment problems experienced by Josh.

That said, "dance with who brung ya"...and don't mess with a successful system TOO much.... just create a few wrinkles that make it harder for defenses to adjust to the usual format.

And, finally, I want to see Dan Macon get a true shot at one of those RB spots, or at least share time a bit better than in previous years... not to mention that THREE RB's also can contribute due to having fresh legs out there all the time.