Solar

I still can't believe what that USC player did. So blatantly late on a slide. At what point is it not a football play and a crime? Dante Moore is one of the nicest human beings on the planet and the USC players are high fiving that they put him in an ambulance.

Dante into the fencing position. He's done

That the second time today I've seen a defensive lineman called for hands to the face when they had a fist full of jersey and shoved it into their face. Is that the right call? Anyways, Riley schemes their best WR against a LB..Points for USC. Dante simply has to be more aggressive. It may mean an INT, but we have no choice. Passes need to move the chains.

Like I said, Dante plays not to lose. Wasted 2 downs, giving the ball back to one of the best offenses in the country.

Patterson adjusted quickly to our run focus. The Coordinator duel is on. If the defense biases the run the middle of the field will open up for the pass.

Loving the defensive play of the LBs and DL. Great to see them dominating a good OL.

Man that 1st down is how it's supposed to look!

Brutal holding penalty. Dante Moore is more conservative than Mario Cristobal in the second half with a lead. He has no interceptions this year, but man does he play not to lose. 3 points is better than none though. I'm happy with a defensive game.

Good call be DL and Mehringer to commit to running the ball at all cost.

Glad Jamari is back

Front 7 getting it done. Coverage eating bags of popcorn watching the QB..

Hate to say it, but in San Diego it's hot and a little muggy. Nothing like the OSU game, but not what we want to see.

Good point. Still Dixon and Ollesh left, and it would be fun to see Tommi Tophi running down the seam once or twice. We'll see what happens.

Thanks Mike, I think we will see a lot of 2 TE sets Saturday for 2 reasons, #1 McClellan is out so pressure to keep three WRs on the field is gone, and #2 that was when things looked right running the ball against PSU (Low bar, I know). and the seam throws to releasing TEs will be effective enough to keep the USC LBs honest to not dagger every gap when we've got 2 TEs in the game.

IF we don't get things turned around on execution and motivation our closest comp will be A&M under Jimbo Fisher after Mike Elko left. I can't take credit for that, some non-Duck fan/hater posted that on twitter, but it's the situation that we are closest aligned to at this moment in time.

Geez John, looking at those stats the one that dooms us is a 30 pff blocking grade for BOTH of our tackles INCLUDING the PSU game. Even if they miraculously double that it won't be good enough to run the table. One thing I saw on the tape of the OSU game is that the RBs were not trusting the rushing lanes would be there, and Dante Moore not trusting to have time to throw. It seemed so deeply ingrained that the OL must be sucking bad in practice too as these seemed to be learned habits. The hope is DL pulled the RBs and QB aside and said you have to trust the OL to do their job, there is no other way to play the game. Respond to the circumstances of the play, but you have to trust the OL to do their job. If the ceiling really is low for our OL and the USC DL shows up like they did at home the first two games, we get blown out. I'm talking 3 points in the 1st half kind of dominated. Then our defense looks bad statistically because our O keeps giving the ball back to USC to try again. USCs defensive scheme and players strengths are to defend well against what we try to do. The only thing that is sure to work is to throwing the ball to the middle 3rd over and over, which is a high risk high reward low efficiency thing to do, completely against the character of a Dan Lanning offense. I'm very curious to see what Mehringer dials up and tells Dante to take advantage of in this game.

This may be the hardest prediction ever, who knows if our OL can suddenly be able to block and our RBs and QB can actually trust them and excute? Oregon 31 USC 30 2 TOs 1 sack 390 yards for Dante is the only way we win.

Scheme problem first and foremost. DL is a gap control scheme, not see ball get ball.tou can only attack the ball through the gap you are responsible for. So if disengaging from the blocker would take you out of your assigned gap, you don't do it. It's a bend don't break strategy for the DL.

One could argue it's only a matter of time before salaries for all but 1st rounders are higher at the college level.

PSU Coach just confirmed this was the case. 10 minute quarters offer was rejected by him. He wanted his team to play the full game. Judging by the coldest post game handshake I've ever seen (he never broke stride), I do think he still didn't like that last score.

I saw Raiola play in the game he was injured in. Before he was injured the offense moved the ball. After he was injured they couldn't move the ball. For those that remember the Herbert/Burmaeister duo with the same light switch affect when Herbert was out. That significantly increased my respect for him. He can run an offense.

I'm more worried about our TE room. Any word on them?

I really don't have the data to say if the internal promotions are bad or good. However, I do believe Dan need to take a more innovative, flexible and introspective approach to scheme. And if he isn't willing to bring in outside coordinators running those innovative schemes, I don't know if there is an internal mechanism to allow that to happen, which is the one part of the article that resonated with me.

I think the O Line is still the bigger variable for our success. Our DL runs a certain scheme and the backups are as good as the starters, so it kind of is what it is at this point. The OL is more important because DM can wilt under pressure, and his below average pocket presence makes him vulnerable to sacks. Also we don't have anyone in our RB that excels in super tight spaces with questionable rushing lanes. I saw some RBs that do on other teams Saturday, but ours do not. Bo Nix and Bucky Irving were both players that could cover a multitude of OL sins, but now we are the exact opposite. We really need an OLine that is elite or we will struggle in the B1G to have an efficient offense that our team is designed to be. We'll need way more 3rd and long high percentage plays drawn up by the OC.

He was the one player we lost that I really thought we didn't want to lose.