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Before the game, I was very critical of the defensive coaching staff and their lack of adjustments to what the opponents offense is doing. Although I still think I was correct in my interpretation in previous games, I must give a hand to the coaches today.

The team defensively looked prepared for everything Temple was looking to do on offense...and really exposed Temple's weakness - Throwing the ball. We stacked the box to stop the run and really got after Stewart when he tried to pass today.

Although I think it was a lucky break that Pierce hurt his hamstring, I tip my hat to the defensive coaches.

Now for the offense. I will first say that Anthon Samuel is the MAN!!! period.

As for the rest of the offensive we really struggled to get in rhythm today. That Wildcat formation needs to go - we are much better off just giving the ball to Samuel.

I refuse to bash Schillz, as I do think he CAN be the right QB for this offense. But the "happy feet" in the pocket and decision making has to be better to continue to win.

Great win today - lets keep 'em coming

How do you get an offensive coordinator to stop calling plays that simply don't work in the Red Zone? At some point, you would hope the head coach would step in, but I'm not sure Clawson will do that; too loyal or some other poor reason.

This team is tied for 102 (out of 120) in Red Zone efficiency (Toledo is tied for 6th). That is inexcusable. The stats are through last week's games. I'm sure if they factored FG to TD ratio, the ranking would be worse.

Lots of game balls to give out today in my opinion, and what a beautiful day it was weather-wise too.

QB play really left me wanting to see Hurley at times, but I respect the Coach's decision on who's playing QB for us. There's no point in a QB carousel when we're still in the hunt.

Offensively in general. We're starting to see a lot of balance. This bodes well for our young QB. He doesn't have to put the team on his back the entire game to win, as evidenced today. He did just enough and played conservatively. He still looks a little slow in his reads, but that pass to Joplin was clutch.

Samuel is very special. Can break loose on any play. His second efforts are solid, and is a game-breaker.

Defensively, I'm looking forward to the years to come. This unit is coming together IMO. Gates, Woods, Jones all doing a fine job as it's leaders this year.

I'm going to sleep soundly tonight. This season stays on the tracks for now! Roll along.

Was great to see the win but man the first 3 quarters of that game was some of the most boring football I've ever seen in my life. Our offensive playcalling is absolutely ABYSMAL. They don't seem to have any idea how to mix plays. It's either run-run-run or pass-pass-pass. Never seem to do a good job mixing plays, and I don't think we do a good job sticking with the run either, when Samuel is probably the most consistent player on our offense. And I've been saying all year that Wildcat is just stupid. It's painfully obvious EVERY SINGLE TIME what we're going to do and most of the time we're running it with a fumble prone 2nd/3rd string RB. If you want to run the damn wildcat do it with Hurley. You can't tell me he's going to average LESS than the maybe 1 yard per carry we get on the plays...and at least he'd have the threat of throwing the ball.

Today specifically I don't understand why we threw so much underneath and waited so long to take any shots downfield. Schilz strength is pushing the ball down the field...he's not super accurate on the underneath stuff. They had success when throwing downfield, but didn't seem to try it nearly enough today.

I also wanted to be absolutely sick the way we handled that last offensive drive. Specifically 3rd down. It's 3rd and 6 and you run the ball into the line again!? Temple had 2 timeouts. There were about 90 seconds left. Running into the line gets you NOTHING. Them losing one of those timeouts was hardly meaningful. Just a STUPID play call, IMO. You go out there, you try to make a throw to put the game away. We played not to lose rather than to win....it worked out this time, but there was a good chance it was gonna bite us in the ass.

It's amazing that people complain about the losses for three straight weeks.....and then complain about the way the team managed to win this week.

I note our Falcons had 0 turnovers and only 2 penalties for 20 yards. When those figures are higher, coaches often get the blame. I hope we are all giving credit to the staff and players for those impressive numbers that reflect a good sense of game discipline.

Well I think I have said enough about the coaching staff, so I will reserve comment. However, someone brought up EMU having 5 wins in first place and in line to make a bowl game. They have won the directional Mich battle and that will be big for recruiting. I think that EMU is a perfect example of how the talent in the MAC is usually just about the same and that coaching make the difference in most programs. See Brian Kelly, Urban Meyer, Al Golden. The above is why I have such concern for the program and picking the correct coach. Coaching truly makes the difference in MAC football. Hopeful Coach Clawson will prove me wrong.

Just a few game notes:

I agree that Hurley should be the wildcat man. When we lined up for the wildcat, I wondered why Temple even put a guy on the receivers. Come on, everybody knows that Hopgood was going to run the damn ball in that situation.

With our run game working well, the play action was also working well. In fact, at one point I said to my wife, "Wow, we've been running well, but Temple knows another run is coming next. We need to go play action here." Wouldn't you know, we went play action and the entire defense bit on the run. If we can get the run moving in future games, the play action is one amazing weapon for us.

I agreed with the play calling at the end. You make them use their timeouts. However, I would have probably run something off-tackle instead of a dive. With only one timeout and down by 3, Temple had to reserve their timeout for the field goal setup. If they had two timeouts left, that opened up the entire field all the way down.

Who screwed up the Alma Mater? This is the first home game this year that we've arrived in time to see the pregame music. That didn't even sound like the Alma Mater. It sounded more like somebody trying to get way too fancy with a song that is supposed to be near and dear to everybody's hearts at BGSU. Change it back, because that was pathetic.

We need to offer free pizza to the loudest fans more often. When they did that, that was the loudest that stadium had been all day. Then, the crowd woke-up and was actually into the game. Before then, people were just cheering, but they weren't being loud. My idea? Every third down, somebody should say, "Free pizza to the loudest fans!" and have a few people passing out slices of pizza. Heck do hot dogs and brats, too. People would ask, "Do we really need to be this corny?" and start comparing it to the screaming chick on the mic, but I was actually somewhat disappointed that our loudest moment in the game, up to that point, was when food was being given away. Use it to our advantage and try to train the fans to be loud in key moments.

I'm not sure I like the idea of Hurley being a wildcat guy. Yeah he brings the dual threat, but do we really want our backup QB, who we may need should something happen to Matt, trying to take on DTs? If I had to pick a wildcat guy, I think I'd be likely to pick one of our TEs. Bayer maybe. Especially if he has a serviceable arm.

footballguy51 wrote:Just a few game notes:
Who screwed up the Alma Mater? This is the first home game this year that we've arrived in time to see the pregame music. That didn't even sound like the Alma Mater. It sounded more like somebody trying to get way too fancy with a song that is supposed to be near and dear to everybody's hearts at BGSU. Change it back, because that was pathetic.

That new arrangement was introduced last year for the centennial, along with the new march in pregame and the changes to the fight song.

Samuel is fast and strong. I'd like to see some toss sweeps to mix it up. Get him to the corner without a silly pass that takes time to set up!

Thoughts for you armchair coaches:

Notice how many times the correct offensive call was made and the play didn't work because the pass was thrown behind the reciever, a block was missed or the catch simply wasn't made (usually the first).

As a coach you probably would resist making the same call if you just saw a near interception because of those isssues thus failing to mix up the play calling.

There is an old-school coaching philosophy that says keep doing the same thing until it doesn't work - thus run, run, run and then change to pass, pass, pass.

The defense suffers because of the 3-and-outs, poor field position and ultimately in the 3rd and 4th quarter adjustments by coaches aren't as much the problem as fatigue.

The opposition then has the luxury of playing in the lead most games against a fatigued defense and offense under pressure. This puts our coaches and players in tough positions.

If good tackling was the norm nobody would score and for the most part Temple and BG had good tackling this week. Giving up 10 points indicates pretty good all-around defense.

This all is not the result of coaching but a young team that's attempting to achieve at their highest level. Ultimately these tough experiences will make for a better team. I wish more people would note the progress and feel good that each experience should vault this team into a promising position as the season continues.

How to get coaches to stop calling plays that don't work?

Donno.

I recall Blackney's staff calling four, maybe five consecutive up-the-middle runs at or near the 1 yard line against Akron. The crowd was shouting what the play was out of frustration and misery. They didn't make it on any of the plays.