Post by bennyorange on Oct 9, 2017 7:28:57 GMT -8
On the other hand...yes, I do see improvement in defense: Keeping UW and SC down to 42 and 38 points, respectively, is an improvement over the 58 CSU (CSU!!) and the 48 Minnesota (Minnesota!!) dropped on us. Our defense is getting better against much stronger games. In fact, if we had won the CSU and UM games in tight contest, losing to UW 42-7 and SC 38-10 would not alarm me in the slightest. After our first 3 games, I thought both of those teams were going to drop at least 55 and more likely 60 on us.
I saw improvement on the offense against SC, as well. Garretson was able to complete more that just RB swing passes and screens; he actually threw a few downfield. It gives me some hope. No interceptions. Collins and Hodgins are good receivers.
Special teams? There are some decent things there. Porebeski is putting the ball where no one, not even Pettis from UW, can return it. That'll help.
A lot of the criticism that others are mentioning I agree with and have posted such: Garretson will most likely not win games on his own, I have zero trust in the staff to game plan, our rush D is weak, etc. However, the Beavs have shown signs of decency against both UW and SC of late, and even did a couple decent things against WSU. Not by any stretch would I bet on OSU to win more games this season, but I think it is realistic to believe that they can. I think they will win one or two more.
This matches up with my feelings. We've played much better defense against much better teams the last three weeks. We still make glaring out of position mistakes which are maddening but generally the defense has played fairly solid, and at the very least, way better than the first three games.
Offensively we showed some good signs of improvement but the consistency still has a long way to go and I continue to question our play calling. PLEASE scrap the delay which usually results in our back getting stuffed behind the line of scrimmage. DG showed he CAN throw a decent pass longer 10 yards though admittedly his skills and upside are limited.
All in all I was encouraged and think we may have a chance at 1 or 2 W's before the season is over. We seem to be playing hard and improving which is really all I'm looking for at this point. We're still a crappy team but we're a lot less crappy than we were in the first three games.