Falcons Serve Notice? Blow Vandals Out?

Well, the sun rose and things are happy in the Falcon Nation.  Last year was a long year that ended very badly, and while we won at Idaho and not at Boise, it was still a very good feeling. The team dominated, looked much improved, and seemed to have made dramatic improvement on everything that was killing the team last year.  We'll go through all those carefully here, but let's just savor being the beater and not the beatee for a minute.

Big credit to our team.  This was not an easy assignment....long road trip with soooo many new players, many seeing their first action or their first start.  We were clearly well prepared--much better prepared than our opponents.  I thought we had a very deep and good game plan which they players executed.  It wasn't perfect, but it was very good.  It has to be very satisfying for our team after last season.

The first few minutes did not portend any of this.  Idaho took the opening kickoff and ran a 6 play, 78 drive in 2:25 right down BG's throat and I was starting to have PTSD from the Toledo and WMU games last year.

BG then drove into Idaho territory, but could not run the ball at all, eventually trying to run on 4-5 and giving the ball back.  All of a sudden, it was November 2010 and we were back in the wilderness again.

Note that one of the Idaho players said that he thought the Vandals got complacent at this point.   Really?  You had a losing record this year and you are up 7-0 after 6 minutes and you were complacent?

It did not, in fact, turn out that way.  The defense came right back out and got a three and out, and then Schilz hooked up with Eugene Cooper for a 76 yard TD on the next play and the game was tied, and from there, things changed completely.  BG proceeded to score every time it had the ball for the rest of the half, ending in the victory formation at halftime with a 30-7 lead that certainly looked insurmountable, though I doubt anyone in the Falcon fan base was "complacent."

The scoring game on a blitzkreig of offensive tactics that completely victimized the Vandals.  There were misdirections, draws, screens, downfield passes.  Coach Akey said his players were "wide eyed" but lost focus on their "keys"....BG made Idaho pay for those mistakes time and again.  Consistent with Coach Clawson's desire for an explosive offense, BG had 6 plays over 22 yards and as high as 76, and 5 players over 10 yards.

When something like that happens, it means everyone on the offense is performing.  To start, let's look at our maligned offensive line.  Importantly, they were not playing under ideal circumstances.  LT Kyle Bryant broke his hand and could not play, so they moved C Ben Bojicic to LT, moved Chip Robinson to C, and Dominic Wharton (our new JUCO guy) to LG.  In addition, Scott Lewis remains injured.  That's a lot of moving around on a line that was a question mark to start with, and yet, I think they performed great and certainly won the lion's share of the battles.  As we will see below, the passing and running games both succeeded, and Schilz was only sacked once and had a lot of time to throw in the first half.

So kudos to the line, for performance and for adjusting to that setback.  Only when they get their job done can the rest of the team do their stuff.

Which they did.  Schilz had a very strong game, particularly in the first half.  He finished the game 19 of 31 for 291 yards, 2 TDs and no INTs.  That's 61% completions and not on a bunch of dinks, but a number of downfield throws.  Things were a little less productive in the second half, but by then BG was just killing clock.  He finished with a QB rating of 161, which is very strong.  When Schilz was pressured, it looked like he handled it well, and he showed some mobility, running for a first down and throwing on the run a couple of times.  His play was very encouraging.

Even more encouraging the was the running game.  BG finished at 3.9 yards per carry, which is significantly better than what we saw last year.  The bulk of the carries actually when to true freshman Anthon Samuel, who had a very strong game, (22 for 141, 1 TD and 52 long).  Jordan Hopgood also 18 less effective carries at 2.5 yards per carry.  They both benefited from getting nice push from the O-line and often hit the defense 3 yards upfield and with momentum.  (The team average was held down by a school record number of plays from the victory formation (4.  Warning, I made that up).

BG clearly decided in the second half that they wanted to run clock and put the game away.  You'd be hard pressed to do better---they had the ball for over 21 minutes in the second half....coming up next, the defense, special teams, and overall perspective.