My One Concern From Yesterday

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I didn't get to see the game and only got to hear about 1/3 of it so I'm going a lot from the box score, play-by-play, and stats. Overall It looks to me like a very good game by the Horns so I'm not just complaining.

The one thing I noticed though that concerns me is the apparent lack of pressure on the QB by our pass rush. Zero sacks and only 5 Hurries against a team that threw the ball nearly 40 times and doesn't have an O-line full of blue chips. If reality was what it looks like to me and this doesn't improve I'm affraid some of the better teams on our schedule are going to chew up our young secondary.

I really thought with Muschamp letting loose guys like Sergio that I'd see more impressive stats in terms of QB pressure, especially against a team that is obviously going to be passing and isn't stacked on the O-line like FAU.

Does anyone else share this concern or am I misinterpreting what I've seen or obsessing too much on one flaw?
 
Very little pressure and absolute porous secondary. Gideon is the only player in the secondary that showed any promise. All other jobs should be open each week until they figure out who can guard someone.

Oklahoma, Missouri and Tech will not make the same mistakes FAU did. Luckily, we have a few games to try and improve.
 
We had a good pass rush, FAU goes with a very quick release on their passing game. Smith still had to throw the ball away a few times. It was a straight rush by the front four. We did not tip off any of our blitz packages.

We will not show anything special against UTEP. The D will dial up a few things for Arky. No use in giving everybody a lot of film to study.
 
I saw a different game than busterbrown. There was reasonable, though not overwhelming pressure. Smith threw the ball earlier than he wanted to and often didn't have time to make the kind of throw he wanted to.

A big issue with the pass D was substandard tackling, not porousity, as such. There is more work to be done, as should be expected, but it's clear, or it was clear to me, that substantial progress has already been made.
 
Absolutely no pass rush. It looked like the same defense from the last several years in terms pf pass rush and pressure. Also, not sure why all of the love for Thomas. If he is truly the best player we have at safety, that's not good. Would like to see Wells step up. Verdict still out on Gideon.
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I was at the game with good seats. The real problem was we didn't defend the middle of the field. Almost every completion was right down the friggin middle of the field. We should at least take away the easy stuff and force the long pass to the sideline. Pass rush was OK, not great. I thought Kindle looked good in spurts from the rush end. Safeties were late the whole first half but got it together after half time.
 
The pass rush was adequate. I use the word adequate because there were a lot of QB hurries and he was on his *** a good bit after throwing the ball. Actual sacks did not materialize. To be honest, I am pleased with the pass rush game plan. I have seen posts that said we never blitzed , got no penetration etc. Not true. We were getting there but the QB did a real good job of getting rid of it. Plus they checked a lot of routes at the line when it looked like the blitz was coming, as any good QB will and any college offense will have built in. I think the sacks will come. The thing about pass rush and blitizing is the players have to execute. The down linemen must stay disciplined in their rush lanes and damn it, if a blitz is called, you gotta get there because by definition a blitz is leaving each guy in the secondary on an island. I saw one example of us losing discipline in the rush/blitz execution when we had an outside corner blitz coming outside the end and the Def End rushed from the outside of the OT as well. The 2 defenders actually got in the way of each other and slowed each other down. Guarantee you the end was supposed to run a stunt in the B gap (between guard and tackle) with an outside corner blitz coming. Very fixable.

Although I give FAU's QB and receivers props for checking into hots and quick fades when they knew pressure was coming (meaning straight man in the secondary) I am concerned with our man coverage. It has got to improve, and given their youth and talent, and given Muschamp's abilities as a coach I am confident it will. Look for us to be much better against UTEP and look for continuing improvement as the season progresses.
 
Also at the game. The pressure was OK, not bad but not awsome. We got pressure lots of times but the QB just ditched it early. The secondary was very slow to react, but these are freshmen so I expect lots of improvement in the next three weeks. The pass rush does need to get better but I am guessing Boom doesn't want to show too much before Big 12 play.

Remember defense is as much of a chess game as offense. He can't show too much fancy stuff too early. Also, if these guys are having to learn fifty different blitzes then they need a game or two just to get used to the base defense. Move some guys around in the regular d and see who can play where before pulling out the big guns. Over all wh pushed the o-line around pretty well but needed to work on the passing game, both LBs and DBs. The biggest two weaknesses were right down the screws about 20 yards deep and picking up the RB out of the backfield in the flats.
 
I am sick of hearing about the quick release. What do we think Bradford, Harrell, Reesing, and Daniel will have. Smith is one of the worst Qbs we will face this year. Our D-line did not get to the Qb and the linebackers did not take the right path to get to him either. I think the LBers will improve. I need to see much more out of the D-line. Thomas was abused all game. No doubt about that.
 
If sacking the QB is what it takes to make you happy then start being pissed right now because the Texas defense will not be known for it. Neither was Auburn's
 
I would like to see 1 sack. Is that too much to ask? I would also like to not see 200+ passing yards in a quarter in a half from a sun belt conference team. Is that too much to ask? I think Auburn would have done better.
 
Texas may very well not end up leading the nation or the Big 12 in sacks, but I guarantee we will get our share when it is all said and done. Different packages with guys doing different things than they have before. You can work on it in practice all you want but the improvement comes from game reps. It will come boys. Improvement in the secondary will have a big effect on this as well.
 
Rockmoor, I hope you are right. I just don't think that fans are wrong to be a little worried about the defense. I hope as much as anyone that we make major strides. I just watched the defense against FAU and saw a lot of similarities to last year. Again, I hope I am wrong.
 
I was pleased with the young guy in the secondary. They will only get better and I expect that to be a lot better. The interception in the end zone appeared to be caused by excellent pressure on the QB. I am a little concerned about replacing Houston at DT though. I hope the next guy can do as well.
 
I have concerns as well but I like what I am seeing in the area of agressiveness with the calls.

Just a personal note, I was at the game last night. I had not been to a home game in person since Ricky broke the record against A&M. This Friday night was the first one in 15 years that I have not been coaching on a field somewhere in this great state, as I have hung up my whistle and become a principal. Since high school coaches work weekends during the season, my game attending has obviously been limited. My 2 sons, ages 14 and 11 had only seen the Horns in person in Houston whenever we played Rice. They were freaking overwhelmed with the whole experience. Not that they needed to be recruited to be die hards, they already are since I am a '90 grad and football is in their blood. But man it was so cool as a dad to share that with them last night. I want to thank everybody at that game for being part of that collective mass that brought so much joy to my sons. We will be back for Rice and hopefully some more.

Hook 'em.
 
busterbrown is right. If you extrapolate the first game over a 13 game season, we will have a grand total of zero sacks!!
 
" I would also like to not see 200+ passing yards in a quarter in a half from a sun belt conference team. "

You mean the sun belt conference champion. And Smith was a fairly highly rated QB coming out of highschool. We beat a fairly good, championship team by over 40 points the first game of the season.
I have no complaints.
Of course there are still areas to work on.
But USC beats a Virginia team not really any better than FAU by about the same score and once again they are being slobbered over by the pundits. What a load of horsecrap.
 
I mentioned in another thread about how teams like FAU and Tech are going to get their yards. Maybe not as much v. some schools as others but still, they will put up numbers esp. in first games of the season. It is their system. Look to the running game or lack thereof.

The huge factor is yards not translating into points on the scoreboard and not entering a track meet that goes down to whoever has the ball last. Those games are fun to watch if your team is not in them. I don't care if it takes blocked FG attempts, fumbles in the red zone or deflected INT's in the endzone. Just as long as the yards don't equal points.

We have things to work on as all teams do after a first game. I like that this opponent was salty and a decent team compared to others in the past. It gives us a more true account of things to work on. And again, there are for sure some things to work on. There better always be or the team is getting complacent.
 
I watched he game on PPV. I was hoping for more pressure on the QB. My impression was that UT was taking a very vanilla approach to pressuring the QB (quite often just bull rushing). That worked well enough. I am relatively certain that Muschamp does not want to reveal any stunts before he has to. Makes sense to me. I would much prefer that Stoops has to react in realtime rather than having weeks to prepare for UT blitzing strategies.
 
The three facts that cannot be repeated enough:

1.) This was Game One for most of the secondary.

2.) FAU is not a bad football team. They're a lot better than ULa-La (who is almost a de facto member of the Big XII by this point, given the number of games they play with Big XII teams).

3.) FAU gained 28 passing yards in the second half. The starting QB wasn't eating up the field at the start of the third quarter.

Texas stopped FAU in the red zone 3 times after big passes over an inexperienced secondary put them in position to score. They averaged 1 point per red zone possession, which is pretty freaking salty.
 
Thanks for all the feedback from those that saw the game.

The lack of sacks per se doesn't concern me and is consistent with Muschamps philosophy, however, it was also only 5 QB Hurries in the box score stats. For 40 passes this doesn't sound like a very good pass rush. Yet I've seen a number of posters say we had enough pass rush to consistently mess with the QB. If so, what constitutes a QB Hurry in the stats that isn't accurately reflecting the amount of pressure we had?

For those on the other hand who said the pass rush was just "fair", I go back to my concern that this is far from one of the best O-lines we'll face, so if it was only "fair" against them how much trouble will we have against the more talented teams we'll face.

I do agree one factor may be that the coaches didn't show much more than the basic package which would keep things somewhat in check.

I hope people can forgive me if I'm seeming overly negative. I'm just looking for some reassurance that this won't turn into one of those big "Oh ****" factors as the season goes on.
 
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Have concerns.

If Coach Maschamp adjusts that well from one half to the next, imagine what he can do over the course of a season! He brings a toughness and a desire that's infectious. (see bloody face picture)

It's something special to want to realize your potential. It's even more special to have people around you that can help you do it.

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