Game Thread: Tennessee

[FlyingBurrito4]

I have no positives here. That's probably a 66-23 loss if Babers doesn't go for it (and make it) on 4th down at their own 15. 4-17 on 3rd down. Would have been a much larger defeat if they weren't 3-3 on 4th.

[BGSU33]

1 more point is all it takes. But, for how good this offense is, the defense is worse. It's going to take A LOT of points for this team to win games.

For anyone who was optimistic that a bad defense who lost 4 guys to the NFL would be better......this was a rude awakening. Short on talent on that side of the ball.

Frustrating football.

Agreed

[able1]

And if we get the blatant missed pi call in the endzone and don't fumble the handoff at the 5...

We can play what if all night. I was encouraged by what i saw more than i was let down, despite the score. My biggest concern is Greene. There were also way too many shoulder tackles and i hope that gets corrected in a hurry but I'm still looking forward to the season. The mac should be alot of fun.

[ikenyon]

The defense was fine today. They got enough stops for us to win.

Stop it.

[ikenyon]

Tackling is fundamental and this team hasn't been able to do it since Babers took over. Everything else is an excuse. No one could wrap up and every single time it turned a minimal gain into a big gain.

Every high school team I've watched this year has been a better tackling team.

This is what people need to wake up to. It's not that there isn't talent on the defensive side of the ball. It's our coach's hubris to not understand that you are going to need a solid defense to win games; especially upset better teams. You'd hope that games where we give up 55-60 points would serve as a wake up call that "hey, we should probably play better on defense." But Babers never seems to approach it that way. It's always about the offense. At some point, the defense and the style of play needs to be addressed.

[BGSU33]

Anyone know why Arron Banks didn't play today? He was listed as a #1 LB coming in to today's game.

[kdog27]

Tennessee played just as poorly on defense. The difference was the offense sputtered way too many times. 30 points on 557 yards is a fail. We actually out gained them for most of the game. I don't put anything into the last 150 yards we gave up, the game was over. I don't like giving up 600 yards either but the fact of the matter is any power 5 team can line up and out class us whether Babers or Clawson is coaching. Clawson didn't exacly beat any power 5 teams did he? ...The offense has to put the ball in the end zone more than they did when they are in red zone.

I am extremely disappointed with the penalties though. Special teams will be much better against MAC athletes I would think.

[ikenyon]

Why is the general consensus that its acceptable to have a bad defense if our offense is good? Why not just try to be good on both sides of the ball?

[Rollo83]

The defense was fine today. They got enough stops for us to win.

Stop it.

+1

The only one that stopped the Volunteers today were themselves.

And, sorry to say, but Western Michigan and Toledo will present every bit the challenge on offense that Tennessee did...if not more so.

[kdog27]

No one thinks it's acceptable. The offense has to take some ownership too. You have to finish drives. A 6 play 80 yard drives means nothing if you don't get 7 points.

[hammb]

The defense was fine today. They got enough stops for us to win.

Stop it.

+1

The only one that stopped the Volunteers today were themselves.

And, sorry to say, but Western Michigan and Toledo will present every bit the challenge on offense that Tennessee did...if not more so.

The only thing that stopped us today was ourselves. Moreso than Tennessee stopping themselves. We were the ones shooting ourselves in the feet with penalties. We were the one that fumbled inside the 5 yard line without Tennessee touching us. We were the ones that dropped passes and missed open receivers throughout the bulk of the first quarter. We were the ones that couldn't get the ball in the end zone when we had opportunities,,,largely because we couldn't make

Stupid undisciplined penalties.
Ridiculously bad special teams play.
Rusty qb that looked like he hadn't played in a year for the first quarter.

Those were the main reasons we lost. Our shoddy tackling and inability to force any turnovers would be next on the list, but it is what it is.

I just think it's way too easy and short sighted to say "our defense sucks and that's why we lost". The style of football we play will always make the defense look worse then it really is, and I don't know why people still don't realize that.

Blaming the defense for this team is no different than blaming the offense for not scoring enough when a ball control team loses 24-13. When you build your team around a style of olay predicates on dictating tempo then you damned well better to play that side of the ball well. Our offense wasn't good enough today and screwed our defense over. Certainly they did nothing to overcome it but they kept us in the game with key stops when we needed them...until the offense s**t the bed with that fumble, they had kept us in the game.

[hammb]

If we cannot start doing two things this style of play is doomed to failure:

Score Tds in bunches, especially in the first quarter.
Force turnovers on defense.

The whole idea is to build a quick lead before the opponent knows what hit them. Then the defense can play with their ears pinned back as the opponent tries to play catchup. Defensive success in this tempo is predicated on the offense building that lead and putting pressure on the opponent. Settling for fgs and going three and out in the first quarter is a recipe for disaster...it did us in today and it did us in last year as well.