Obli's Observations...

[Obliviax]

This team progresses in just about every phase of the game. Was the second half against Minny the inflection-point? Maybe so. I was really wondering what was going on. I read about a dozen prognostications on the game and only two of them picked Penn State to win. What? Why do I continue to invest in these bozos? They are really no smarter than anyone of us. Regardless, I got a kick out of them eating their words.

The team came out very crisp. One of my hopes for this season is that the team looked like they were prepared and didn't make dumb mistakes. I think, five games in, this has been realized. The team makes very few mental errors in terms of crazy penalties and confusion. Despite a lot of injuries, very few delay of games, TO due to lack proper personnel, illegal shift/formation, and turnovers. This was NOT the case last year.

So here are my game observations:

• I always look at the first series to see how the coaches game-planned. What did we anticipate by looking at film? In the first series, we threw the ball extremely well. Of course, MD was stacked to stop the run so the passing was critical in setting the tone. Again, crisp and purposeful.
• What can you say about Barkley. i really believe he is the best RB I've ever seen at PSU. Kid can do it all. He almost always falls forward. He is fast, can make people miss and can lower his shoulder and get that critical yard.
• What has me excited is the staff's use of TM. (My daughter started calling him Mace Tricksorley). Finally, FINALLY, he is using the Zone-Read properly by carrying the ball. And in running it, he's gained a new confidence.
• For the first time, he made people miss. He's not and never will be a powerful runner. He goes down easily when anyone gets a decent shot at him, but he juked a couple of guys, set up his blocking, and showed much better speed. All in all, he lost his hesitancy.
• Now, lets not go nuts here. Much of his success in the zone read was when 9 of the 11 defenders were keying on Barkley. But tOSU will have to game plan a little differently. Teams will no longer be able to key on Barkley 100%. Neither could MD. And what was the result? 200+ yards for Barkley. So I was very pleased that TM was carrying the ball, for a change.
• I am guessing we ran the zone-read more than 50% of the time. I did note that the staff moved the TE out, away from the box. Then used him when his defender cheated back to cover the run. Gisicki is becoming quite a weapon. Move him out, taking a LB with him. If you don't commit the LB, you run him in the flat or behind the LB. Tough to defend.
• What I did notice about the zone read is that, while they ran it a lot, they attacked different parts of the defense. In other words, the plays looked like they were designed to run at different defenders. So while it is the same action, it attacks the defense differently.
• What I was even more impressed with, in addition to TM's running, was his passing. In wet conditions, it is often helpful to have larger hands, which typically go with a guy being 6-5 or whatever. TM threw an even better ball against MD than he did in previous games. Every single pass was a tight spiral and had authority. His long ball to Thomkins was a perfect throw. It was tight, had authority, and was dropped into the bucket to perfection.
• But whenever I see every offensive player doing well, and people are complimenting the OC for "calling a good game" I think of what is the common denominator? The OL of course. Easily the best game they've played so far. The two Frosh played well, added a level of physicality to the OL. And when Nelson went down, Paris Palmer came in and played pretty well. Now, we'll see about PP when tOSU game plans to attack him, but he played well against MD. This offense is going to be special next season. With TM, SB and that Oline, wow.
• Defensively we played well. Our tackling is still a bit of a mystery. Are MD's running backs that good? Hard to know. But they ran threw a lot of tackles. Regardless, our DL clogged the middle and our DB's really flowed well. Coverage was outstanding. None of MD's WR's scare me but our CB's covered them like a blanket all day long. Even when we knew MD had to rely on the run and defended that, we put our CB's one on one, they were covered really well.
• This MD team killed Purdue? How bad is Purdue? I put MD in the "scrappy" category. PSU outplayed them but had trouble putting them away. They played tough and hard throughout the entire game but had few guys that can make plays. They took a couple of hard shots by our D. But lets not think we just beat a great team. This MD team is a middle B1G team, at best. I'd take Minny to beat them 9 times our of 10. I just have no idea why the media was picking them to win. Honestly, CJF's teams get little to no respect.
• Really liked Sander's TD run. Kid just needs confidence (had a nice KO return as well). But I thought he was going to be caught at the five, but he showed really good and deceptive speed. He's not small, either. I am looking for better acceleration, but that was a nice run.
• A real problem is this team showboating. I simply don't like it. I am not going to mention names. For example, a hard hit on Likely on a punt return was great. Don't get in the kids face and trash talk him in the middle of their bench and then dance on the field. At the game, I couldn't see what happened and wondered why the Minny kids didn't get a flag. After watching at home, I am surprised we didn't get a flag. No place for that in college ball, IMHO.
• On the horse-collar, I watched it and replayed it. The defender had a handful of Barkley's jersey three inches below his collar. The penalty is for a player grabbing the back of the shoulder pads, which didn't happen. So I agree, no call. Overall, I thought the zebras had a good game. You can always argue about holds.
• WTF was Minny's 22 thinking when he laid out Julius? This has to be coming from the coaches. That kid is going to get tossed 100 times out of 100. JJ has really gotten under the skin of the opponents. It will be interesting to see how tOSU coaches against JJ. BTW, saw JJ being very active on the bench. I LOVE how this kid has gotten so involved with this team. He really is giving us an identity. I've never seen anything like that, ever. And this from a kid that only does kickoffs.

Overall, great, GREAT improvement week in and week out. The coaching staff is getting this kids into positions where they can be successful. We are finally learning how to take a kid that can create plays (Barkley) and utilize him to allow other kids to make great plays. We are going to need stronger LB'ers against tOSU. I hope we get Cabinda back over the bye week. I also would like to see Farmer in on passing downs, even if he doesn't start. LB continues to be an area of weakness but they are playing well with the experience they are getting.

Player of the week has to be McSorley. Kid is really gaining confidence. He showed huge improvements in four areas:

• Willingness to run the ball. Hey, when there are three guys waiting for Barkley and a lane three yards wide for you, run the damn ball!
• Deceptive speed. He lost his hesitancy and commits to the play earlier (both run and pass). Several times, he committed to the run and making a first down. When you commit to the run, you run! He's learning really quickly and gaining confidence.
• Moves. He's juked players at least three times. I don't recall him juking, and making them miss, once previous to this game. he was a strait line runner. On his TD run, he juked a player, setting up the blocker to have a better angle and then juked another player who was unblocked.
• Passing. His passes weren't late, they were on time and crisp. On the long ball, he threw the ball earlier and had good authority on the ball. Unlike in previous games where he was late, tried to put more on the ball to get it there, and ended up simply throwing a 50/50 jump ball.

Very encouraging game. So now we are 4-2 heading into a bye week (hopefully, to get a LB or two back) and a night game, a whiteout, against the best or second or third best team in the nation. tOSU has a tough game against Wiscy so we could jump them a little bit. Then its Purdue (awful team), Iowa (par with Minny), Indiana (par with MD), Rutgers (awful team), and a spiraling Sparty team. It is conceivable we end up 5-1 to end the season, but I think we go 4-2. If so, that would put us at 8-4, which is a pretty successful year given the schedule and injuries.

 

[lionlurker]

Great analysis, as always. Also agree with the 8-4. If we'd beaten Pitt, like we should have, we'd possibly have our 9-3 and no more talk about a hot seat.

 

[ga.lion]

This team progresses in just about every phase of the game. Was the second half against Minny the inflection-point? Maybe so. I was really wondering what was going on. I read about a dozen prognostications on the game and only two of them picked Penn State to win. What? Why do I continue to invest in these bozos? They are really no smarter than anyone of us. Regardless, I got a kick out of them eating their words.

The team came out very crisp. One of my hopes for this season is that the team looked like they were prepared and didn't make dumb mistakes. I think, five games in, this has been realized. The team makes very few mental errors in terms of crazy penalties and confusion. Despite a lot of injuries, very few delay of games, TO due to lack proper personnel, illegal shift/formation, and turnovers. This was NOT the case last year.

So here are my game observations:

• I always look at the first series to see how the coaches game-planned. What did we anticipate by looking at film? In the first series, we threw the ball extremely well. Of course, MD was stacked to stop the run so the passing was critical in setting the tone. Again, crisp and purposeful.
• What can you say about Barkley. i really believe he is the best RB I've ever seen at PSU. Kid can do it all. He almost always falls forward. He is fast, can make people miss and can lower his shoulder and get that critical yard.
• What has me excited is the staff's use of TM. (My daughter started calling him Mace Tricksorley). Finally, FINALLY, he is using the Zone-Read properly by carrying the ball. And in running it, he's gained a new confidence.
• For the first time, he made people miss. He's not and never will be a powerful runner. He goes down easily when anyone gets a decent shot at him, but he juked a couple of guys, set up his blocking, and showed much better speed. All in all, he lost his hesitancy.
• Now, lets not go nuts here. Much of his success in the zone read was when 9 of the 11 defenders were keying on Barkley. But tOSU will have to game plan a little differently. Teams will no longer be able to key on Barkley 100%. Neither could MD. And what was the result? 200+ yards for Barkley. So I was very pleased that TM was carrying the ball, for a change.
• I am guessing we ran the zone-read more than 50% of the time. I did note that the staff moved the TE out, away from the box. Then used him when his defender cheated back to cover the run. Gisicki is becoming quite a weapon. Move him out, taking a LB with him. If you don't commit the LB, you run him in the flat or behind the LB. Tough to defend.
• What I did notice about the zone read is that, while they ran it a lot, they attacked different parts of the defense. In other words, the plays looked like they were designed to run at different defenders. So while it is the same action, it attacks the defense differently.
• What I was even more impressed with, in addition to TM's running, was his passing. In wet conditions, it is often helpful to have larger hands, which typically go with a guy being 6-5 or whatever. TM threw an even better ball against MD than he did in previous games. Every single pass was a tight spiral and had authority. His long ball to Thomkins was a perfect throw. It was tight, had authority, and was dropped into the bucket to perfection.
• But whenever I see every offensive player doing well, and people are complimenting the OC for "calling a good game" I think of what is the common denominator? The OL of course. Easily the best game they've played so far. The two Frosh played well, added a level of physicality to the OL. And when Nelson went down, Paris Palmer came in and played pretty well. Now, we'll see about PP when tOSU game plans to attack him, but he played well against MD. This offense is going to be special next season. With TM, SB and that Oline, wow.
• Defensively we played well. Our tackling is still a bit of a mystery. Are MD's running backs that good? Hard to know. But they ran threw a lot of tackles. Regardless, our DL clogged the middle and our DB's really flowed well. Coverage was outstanding. None of MD's WR's scare me but our CB's covered them like a blanket all day long. Even when we knew MD had to rely on the run and defended that, we put our CB's one on one, they were covered really well.
• This MD team killed Purdue? How bad is Purdue? I put MD in the "scrappy" category. PSU outplayed them but had trouble putting them away. They played tough and hard throughout the entire game but had few guys that can make plays. They took a couple of hard shots by our D. But lets not think we just beat a great team. This MD team is a middle B1G team, at best. I'd take Minny to beat them 9 times our of 10. I just have no idea why the media was picking them to win. Honestly, CJF's teams get little to no respect.
• Really liked Sander's TD run. Kid just needs confidence (had a nice KO return as well). But I thought he was going to be caught at the five, but he showed really good and deceptive speed. He's not small, either. I am looking for better acceleration, but that was a nice run.
• A real problem is this team showboating. I simply don't like it. I am not going to mention names. For example, a hard hit on Likely on a punt return was great. Don't get in the kids face and trash talk him in the middle of their bench and then dance on the field. At the game, I couldn't see what happened and wondered why the Minny kids didn't get a flag. After watching at home, I am surprised we didn't get a flag. No place for that in college ball, IMHO.
• On the horse-collar, I watched it and replayed it. The defender had a handful of Barkley's jersey three inches below his collar. The penalty is for a player grabbing the back of the shoulder pads, which didn't happen. So I agree, no call. Overall, I thought the zebras had a good game. You can always argue about holds.
• WTF was Minny's 22 thinking when he laid out Julius? This has to be coming from the coaches. That kid is going to get tossed 100 times out of 100. JJ has really gotten under the skin of the opponents. It will be interesting to see how tOSU coaches against JJ. BTW, saw JJ being very active on the bench. I LOVE how this kid has gotten so involved with this team. He really is giving us an identity. I've never seen anything like that, ever. And this from a kid that only does kickoffs.

Overall, great, GREAT improvement week in and week out. The coaching staff is getting this kids into positions where they can be successful. We are finally learning how to take a kid that can create plays (Barkley) and utilize him to allow other kids to make great plays. We are going to need stronger LB'ers against tOSU. I hope we get Cabinda back over the bye week. I also would like to see Farmer in on passing downs, even if he doesn't start. LB continues to be an area of weakness but they are playing well with the experience they are getting.

Player of the week has to be McSorley. Kid is really gaining confidence. He showed huge improvements in four areas:

• Willingness to run the ball. Hey, when there are three guys waiting for Barkley and a lane three yards wide for you, run the damn ball!
• Deceptive speed. He lost his hesitancy and commits to the play earlier (both run and pass). Several times, he committed to the run and making a first down. When you commit to the run, you run! He's learning really quickly and gaining confidence.
• Moves. He's juked players at least three times. I don't recall him juking, and making them miss, once previous to this game. he was a strait line runner. On his TD run, he juked a player, setting up the blocker to have a better angle and then juked another player who was unblocked.
• Passing. His passes weren't late, they were on time and crisp. On the long ball, he threw the ball earlier and had good authority on the ball. Unlike in previous games where he was late, tried to put more on the ball to get it there, and ended up simply throwing a 50/50 jump ball.

Very encouraging game. So now we are 4-2 heading into a bye week (hopefully, to get a LB or two back) and a night game, a whiteout, against the best or second or third best team in the nation. tOSU has a tough game against Wiscy so we could jump them a little bit. Then its Purdue (awful team), Iowa (par with Minny), Indiana (par with MD), Rutgers (awful team), and a spiraling Sparty team. It is conceivable we end up 5-1 to end the season, but I think we go 4-2. If so, that would put us at 8-4, which is a pretty successful year given the schedule and injuries.

Good analysis but Indiana away might be 2nd toughest game left. Couple plays away from playing Ohio State very tight on the road...

 

[sss]

Why do I continue to invest in these bozos? They are really no smarter than anyone of us.

I've realized this a few years ago. If you actually pay attention, they pick games with top 25 teams at no better than a 50% success rate, and then come back the next week as if they know more than everyone else. We actually used to do a pool at work where a few of us would pick the winners of every NFL playoff game vs the guys on NFL live. And then we would include a coin flip. Two of the four on NFL live were less accurate than the coin flip. And these are the types of guys we let pick the playoff teams (and used to be MNC). It really is a joke. I've stopped listening to any NFL pre-game and pretty much any NCAA pre-game as well. I do watch BTN occasionally, and Dinardo is as big a clown as there is. It's amazing this guy convinced two ADs to hire him.

 

[marshall23]

Joe liked to say,"your never as bad........" That is a time honored coaching axiom. This was one game. I think all it means is this....a win many had put in the loss column. Each week is a different challenge and projections are unreliable. A monumental spanking by OSU and this board will erupt in negative indignation again.
What I took away from Sat. was perhaps a glimpse of what this staff wants to do offensively, defensively and special teams in the future. We are still too young and too thin to be confident vs. anyone. A key injury could cripple us. On the other hand as the season plays out, future opponents could be bolstered by returning injured players (MSU) or suffer similar rashes of injury as has befallen PSU.
Progress of young teams learning how to win is rarely in a straight line. My hope is that this team can show vs. OSU and hang for 3 quarters. That would, I believe represent progress. Let's not lose sight of the fact that many warned that this season would be the absolute worst impact of the sanctions. This is a marathon and not a sprint. JF is the right person for that sort of effort.

 

[scottpsurules]

This team progresses in just about every phase of the game. Was the second half against Minny the inflection-point? Maybe so. I was really wondering what was going on. I read about a dozen prognostications on the game and only two of them picked Penn State to win. What? Why do I continue to invest in these bozos? They are really no smarter than anyone of us. Regardless, I got a kick out of them eating their words.

The team came out very crisp. One of my hopes for this season is that the team looked like they were prepared and didn't make dumb mistakes. I think, five games in, this has been realized. The team makes very few mental errors in terms of crazy penalties and confusion. Despite a lot of injuries, very few delay of games, TO due to lack proper personnel, illegal shift/formation, and turnovers. This was NOT the case last year.

So here are my game observations:

• I always look at the first series to see how the coaches game-planned. What did we anticipate by looking at film? In the first series, we threw the ball extremely well. Of course, MD was stacked to stop the run so the passing was critical in setting the tone. Again, crisp and purposeful.
• What can you say about Barkley. i really believe he is the best RB I've ever seen at PSU. Kid can do it all. He almost always falls forward. He is fast, can make people miss and can lower his shoulder and get that critical yard.
• What has me excited is the staff's use of TM. (My daughter started calling him Mace Tricksorley). Finally, FINALLY, he is using the Zone-Read properly by carrying the ball. And in running it, he's gained a new confidence.
• For the first time, he made people miss. He's not and never will be a powerful runner. He goes down easily when anyone gets a decent shot at him, but he juked a couple of guys, set up his blocking, and showed much better speed. All in all, he lost his hesitancy.
• Now, lets not go nuts here. Much of his success in the zone read was when 9 of the 11 defenders were keying on Barkley. But tOSU will have to game plan a little differently. Teams will no longer be able to key on Barkley 100%. Neither could MD. And what was the result? 200+ yards for Barkley. So I was very pleased that TM was carrying the ball, for a change.
• I am guessing we ran the zone-read more than 50% of the time. I did note that the staff moved the TE out, away from the box. Then used him when his defender cheated back to cover the run. Gisicki is becoming quite a weapon. Move him out, taking a LB with him. If you don't commit the LB, you run him in the flat or behind the LB. Tough to defend.
• What I did notice about the zone read is that, while they ran it a lot, they attacked different parts of the defense. In other words, the plays looked like they were designed to run at different defenders. So while it is the same action, it attacks the defense differently.
• What I was even more impressed with, in addition to TM's running, was his passing. In wet conditions, it is often helpful to have larger hands, which typically go with a guy being 6-5 or whatever. TM threw an even better ball against MD than he did in previous games. Every single pass was a tight spiral and had authority. His long ball to Thomkins was a perfect throw. It was tight, had authority, and was dropped into the bucket to perfection.
• But whenever I see every offensive player doing well, and people are complimenting the OC for "calling a good game" I think of what is the common denominator? The OL of course. Easily the best game they've played so far. The two Frosh played well, added a level of physicality to the OL. And when Nelson went down, Paris Palmer came in and played pretty well. Now, we'll see about PP when tOSU game plans to attack him, but he played well against MD. This offense is going to be special next season. With TM, SB and that Oline, wow.
• Defensively we played well. Our tackling is still a bit of a mystery. Are MD's running backs that good? Hard to know. But they ran threw a lot of tackles. Regardless, our DL clogged the middle and our DB's really flowed well. Coverage was outstanding. None of MD's WR's scare me but our CB's covered them like a blanket all day long. Even when we knew MD had to rely on the run and defended that, we put our CB's one on one, they were covered really well.
• This MD team killed Purdue? How bad is Purdue? I put MD in the "scrappy" category. PSU outplayed them but had trouble putting them away. They played tough and hard throughout the entire game but had few guys that can make plays. They took a couple of hard shots by our D. But lets not think we just beat a great team. This MD team is a middle B1G team, at best. I'd take Minny to beat them 9 times our of 10. I just have no idea why the media was picking them to win. Honestly, CJF's teams get little to no respect.
• Really liked Sander's TD run. Kid just needs confidence (had a nice KO return as well). But I thought he was going to be caught at the five, but he showed really good and deceptive speed. He's not small, either. I am looking for better acceleration, but that was a nice run.
• A real problem is this team showboating. I simply don't like it. I am not going to mention names. For example, a hard hit on Likely on a punt return was great. Don't get in the kids face and trash talk him in the middle of their bench and then dance on the field. At the game, I couldn't see what happened and wondered why the Minny kids didn't get a flag. After watching at home, I am surprised we didn't get a flag. No place for that in college ball, IMHO.
• On the horse-collar, I watched it and replayed it. The defender had a handful of Barkley's jersey three inches below his collar. The penalty is for a player grabbing the back of the shoulder pads, which didn't happen. So I agree, no call. Overall, I thought the zebras had a good game. You can always argue about holds.
• WTF was Minny's 22 thinking when he laid out Julius? This has to be coming from the coaches. That kid is going to get tossed 100 times out of 100. JJ has really gotten under the skin of the opponents. It will be interesting to see how tOSU coaches against JJ. BTW, saw JJ being very active on the bench. I LOVE how this kid has gotten so involved with this team. He really is giving us an identity. I've never seen anything like that, ever. And this from a kid that only does kickoffs.

Overall, great, GREAT improvement week in and week out. The coaching staff is getting this kids into positions where they can be successful. We are finally learning how to take a kid that can create plays (Barkley) and utilize him to allow other kids to make great plays. We are going to need stronger LB'ers against tOSU. I hope we get Cabinda back over the bye week. I also would like to see Farmer in on passing downs, even if he doesn't start. LB continues to be an area of weakness but they are playing well with the experience they are getting.

Player of the week has to be McSorley. Kid is really gaining confidence. He showed huge improvements in four areas:

• Willingness to run the ball. Hey, when there are three guys waiting for Barkley and a lane three yards wide for you, run the damn ball!
• Deceptive speed. He lost his hesitancy and commits to the play earlier (both run and pass). Several times, he committed to the run and making a first down. When you commit to the run, you run! He's learning really quickly and gaining confidence.
• Moves. He's juked players at least three times. I don't recall him juking, and making them miss, once previous to this game. he was a strait line runner. On his TD run, he juked a player, setting up the blocker to have a better angle and then juked another player who was unblocked.
• Passing. His passes weren't late, they were on time and crisp. On the long ball, he threw the ball earlier and had good authority on the ball. Unlike in previous games where he was late, tried to put more on the ball to get it there, and ended up simply throwing a 50/50 jump ball.

Very encouraging game. So now we are 4-2 heading into a bye week (hopefully, to get a LB or two back) and a night game, a whiteout, against the best or second or third best team in the nation. tOSU has a tough game against Wiscy so we could jump them a little bit. Then its Purdue (awful team), Iowa (par with Minny), Indiana (par with MD), Rutgers (awful team), and a spiraling Sparty team. It is conceivable we end up 5-1 to end the season, but I think we go 4-2. If so, that would put us at 8-4, which is a pretty successful year given the schedule and injuries.

Obli, thanks as always, your very balanced write-ups are definitely one of things I look forward to each week!!

 

[Obliviax]

Joe liked to say,"your never as bad........" That is a time honored coaching axiom. This was one game. I think all it means is this....a win many had put in the loss column. Each week is a different challenge and projections are unreliable. A monumental spanking by OSU and this board will erupt in negative indignation again.
What I took away from Sat. was perhaps a glimpse of what this staff wants to do offensively, defensively and special teams in the future. We are still too young and too thin to be confident vs. anyone. A key injury could cripple us. On the other hand as the season plays out, future opponents could be bolstered by returning injured players (MSU) or suffer similar rashes of injury as has befallen PSU.
Progress of young teams learning how to win is rarely in a straight line. My hope is that this team can show vs. OSU and hang for 3 quarters. That would, I believe represent progress. Let's not lose sight of the fact that many warned that this season would be the absolute worst impact of the sanctions. This is a marathon and not a sprint. JF is the right person for that sort of effort.

Nice post and totally agree. I think you said it better than I did but am happy you got the gist of what I was trying to say. The young talent looks impressive. BTW, Givens played really well on defense and this allowed the DE's to make some plays. Also BTW, MD was well coached. But we simply had better weapons.

 

[Obliviax]

Why do I continue to invest in these bozos? They are really no smarter than anyone of us.

I've realized this a few years ago. If you actually pay attention, they pick games with top 25 teams at no better than a 50% success rate, and then come back the next week as if they know more than everyone else. We actually used to do a pool at work where a few of us would pick the winners of every NFL playoff game vs the guys on NFL live. And then we would include a coin flip. Two of the four on NFL live were less accurate than the coin flip. And these are the types of guys we let pick the playoff teams (and used to be MNC). It really is a joke. I've stopped listening to any NFL pre-game and pretty much any NCAA pre-game as well. I do watch BTN occasionally, and Dinardo is as big a clown as there is. It's amazing this guy convinced two ADs to hire him.

Yep...I watched some weird show on ESPN the other day (which I rarely do). They had a host and two former players making predictions on college games that were toss ups. One guy, who was 5-6 on his predictions was giving the other, who was 4-7, trash talk. What? These two "experts" are under .500 on toss up games? (and talking trash to boot).

Its hard for me to watch or read them any longer. Flouders, for example, reminds me of that drunk guy at the tailgate (BTW, I looked dumb critiquing CJF for running zone reads before halftime with under a minute to go, too!). Jones, to his credit, once in a while, brings something to the table but his game analysis and football knowledge is really weak. The rest, like Ben Jones, might as well be the random guy at Hooters.

 

[Judge Smails]

"I am looking for better acceleration," (from Sanders)

Outside of Barkley, you're going to be looking for awhile. I think Sanders has the acceleration part down okay.

 

[thecoolestfish]

WTF was Minny's 22 thinking when he laid out Julius? This has to be coming from the coaches. That kid is going to get tossed 100 times out of 100. JJ has really gotten under the skin of the opponents. It will be interesting to see how tOSU coaches against JJ. BTW, saw JJ being very active on the bench. I LOVE how this kid has gotten so involved with this team. He really is giving us an identity. I've never seen anything like that, ever. And this from a kid that only does kickoffs.

During the game, by buddy texted that "Julius is living rent-free in opponent's heads."

LOL -- Thought that was perfect.

 

[thecoolestfish]

This MD team killed Purdue? How bad is Purdue? I put MD in the "scrappy" category. PSU outplayed them but had trouble putting them away. They played tough and hard throughout the entire game but had few guys that can make plays. They took a couple of hard shots by our D. But lets not think we just beat a great team. This MD team is a middle B1G team, at best. I'd take Minny to beat them 9 times our of 10. I just have no idea why the media was picking them to win. Honestly, CJF's teams get little to no respect.

I don't want to be a downer, but I'm afraid MD is below "middle B1G" team." I wouldn't be surprised if we got to the end of the season and only Purdue and Rutgers are worse teams in the B1G.

Hope I'm wrong. The fact that we couldn't hold mediocre Pitt to less than 38 points, and we've only experienced more injuries since then, has killed my optimism. LOL

 

[LaJolla Lion]

This team progresses in just about every phase of the game. Was the second half against Minny the inflection-point? Maybe so. I was really wondering what was going on. I read about a dozen prognostications on the game and only two of them picked Penn State to win. What? Why do I continue to invest in these bozos? They are really no smarter than anyone of us. Regardless, I got a kick out of them eating their words.

The team came out very crisp. One of my hopes for this season is that the team looked like they were prepared and didn't make dumb mistakes. I think, five games in, this has been realized. The team makes very few mental errors in terms of crazy penalties and confusion. Despite a lot of injuries, very few delay of games, TO due to lack proper personnel, illegal shift/formation, and turnovers. This was NOT the case last year.

So here are my game observations:

• I always look at the first series to see how the coaches game-planned. What did we anticipate by looking at film? In the first series, we threw the ball extremely well. Of course, MD was stacked to stop the run so the passing was critical in setting the tone. Again, crisp and purposeful.
• What can you say about Barkley. i really believe he is the best RB I've ever seen at PSU. Kid can do it all. He almost always falls forward. He is fast, can make people miss and can lower his shoulder and get that critical yard.
• What has me excited is the staff's use of TM. (My daughter started calling him Mace Tricksorley). Finally, FINALLY, he is using the Zone-Read properly by carrying the ball. And in running it, he's gained a new confidence.
• For the first time, he made people miss. He's not and never will be a powerful runner. He goes down easily when anyone gets a decent shot at him, but he juked a couple of guys, set up his blocking, and showed much better speed. All in all, he lost his hesitancy.
• Now, lets not go nuts here. Much of his success in the zone read was when 9 of the 11 defenders were keying on Barkley. But tOSU will have to game plan a little differently. Teams will no longer be able to key on Barkley 100%. Neither could MD. And what was the result? 200+ yards for Barkley. So I was very pleased that TM was carrying the ball, for a change.
• I am guessing we ran the zone-read more than 50% of the time. I did note that the staff moved the TE out, away from the box. Then used him when his defender cheated back to cover the run. Gisicki is becoming quite a weapon. Move him out, taking a LB with him. If you don't commit the LB, you run him in the flat or behind the LB. Tough to defend.
• What I did notice about the zone read is that, while they ran it a lot, they attacked different parts of the defense. In other words, the plays looked like they were designed to run at different defenders. So while it is the same action, it attacks the defense differently.
• What I was even more impressed with, in addition to TM's running, was his passing. In wet conditions, it is often helpful to have larger hands, which typically go with a guy being 6-5 or whatever. TM threw an even better ball against MD than he did in previous games. Every single pass was a tight spiral and had authority. His long ball to Thomkins was a perfect throw. It was tight, had authority, and was dropped into the bucket to perfection.
• But whenever I see every offensive player doing well, and people are complimenting the OC for "calling a good game" I think of what is the common denominator? The OL of course. Easily the best game they've played so far. The two Frosh played well, added a level of physicality to the OL. And when Nelson went down, Paris Palmer came in and played pretty well. Now, we'll see about PP when tOSU game plans to attack him, but he played well against MD. This offense is going to be special next season. With TM, SB and that Oline, wow.
• Defensively we played well. Our tackling is still a bit of a mystery. Are MD's running backs that good? Hard to know. But they ran threw a lot of tackles. Regardless, our DL clogged the middle and our DB's really flowed well. Coverage was outstanding. None of MD's WR's scare me but our CB's covered them like a blanket all day long. Even when we knew MD had to rely on the run and defended that, we put our CB's one on one, they were covered really well.
• This MD team killed Purdue? How bad is Purdue? I put MD in the "scrappy" category. PSU outplayed them but had trouble putting them away. They played tough and hard throughout the entire game but had few guys that can make plays. They took a couple of hard shots by our D. But lets not think we just beat a great team. This MD team is a middle B1G team, at best. I'd take Minny to beat them 9 times our of 10. I just have no idea why the media was picking them to win. Honestly, CJF's teams get little to no respect.
• Really liked Sander's TD run. Kid just needs confidence (had a nice KO return as well). But I thought he was going to be caught at the five, but he showed really good and deceptive speed. He's not small, either. I am looking for better acceleration, but that was a nice run.
• A real problem is this team showboating. I simply don't like it. I am not going to mention names. For example, a hard hit on Likely on a punt return was great. Don't get in the kids face and trash talk him in the middle of their bench and then dance on the field. At the game, I couldn't see what happened and wondered why the Minny kids didn't get a flag. After watching at home, I am surprised we didn't get a flag. No place for that in college ball, IMHO.
• On the horse-collar, I watched it and replayed it. The defender had a handful of Barkley's jersey three inches below his collar. The penalty is for a player grabbing the back of the shoulder pads, which didn't happen. So I agree, no call. Overall, I thought the zebras had a good game. You can always argue about holds.
• WTF was Minny's 22 thinking when he laid out Julius? This has to be coming from the coaches. That kid is going to get tossed 100 times out of 100. JJ has really gotten under the skin of the opponents. It will be interesting to see how tOSU coaches against JJ. BTW, saw JJ being very active on the bench. I LOVE how this kid has gotten so involved with this team. He really is giving us an identity. I've never seen anything like that, ever. And this from a kid that only does kickoffs.

Overall, great, GREAT improvement week in and week out. The coaching staff is getting this kids into positions where they can be successful. We are finally learning how to take a kid that can create plays (Barkley) and utilize him to allow other kids to make great plays. We are going to need stronger LB'ers against tOSU. I hope we get Cabinda back over the bye week. I also would like to see Farmer in on passing downs, even if he doesn't start. LB continues to be an area of weakness but they are playing well with the experience they are getting.

Player of the week has to be McSorley. Kid is really gaining confidence. He showed huge improvements in four areas:

• Willingness to run the ball. Hey, when there are three guys waiting for Barkley and a lane three yards wide for you, run the damn ball!
• Deceptive speed. He lost his hesitancy and commits to the play earlier (both run and pass). Several times, he committed to the run and making a first down. When you commit to the run, you run! He's learning really quickly and gaining confidence.
• Moves. He's juked players at least three times. I don't recall him juking, and making them miss, once previous to this game. he was a strait line runner. On his TD run, he juked a player, setting up the blocker to have a better angle and then juked another player who was unblocked.
• Passing. His passes weren't late, they were on time and crisp. On the long ball, he threw the ball earlier and had good authority on the ball. Unlike in previous games where he was late, tried to put more on the ball to get it there, and ended up simply throwing a 50/50 jump ball.

Very encouraging game. So now we are 4-2 heading into a bye week (hopefully, to get a LB or two back) and a night game, a whiteout, against the best or second or third best team in the nation. tOSU has a tough game against Wiscy so we could jump them a little bit. Then its Purdue (awful team), Iowa (par with Minny), Indiana (par with MD), Rutgers (awful team), and a spiraling Sparty team. It is conceivable we end up 5-1 to end the season, but I think we go 4-2. If so, that would put us at 8-4, which is a pretty successful year given the schedule and injuries.

Good stuff but no way is IU on par with UMD. Not from what I have seen. They actually have a decent defense this year and will be the toughest road game left on the schedule.

 

[lionroar88]

• A real problem is this team showboating. I simply don't like it. I am not going to mention names. For example, a hard hit on Likely on a punt return was great. Don't get in the kids face and trash talk him in the middle of their bench and then dance on the field. At the game, I couldn't see what happened and wondered why the Minny kids didn't get a flag. After watching at home, I am surprised we didn't get a flag. No place for that in college ball, IMHO.
• WTF was Minny's 22 thinking when he laid out Julius? This has to be coming from the coaches. That kid is going to get tossed 100 times out of 100. JJ has really gotten under the skin of the opponents. It will be interesting to see how tOSU coaches against JJ. BTW, saw JJ being very active on the bench. I LOVE how this kid has gotten so involved with this team. He really is giving us an identity. I've never seen anything like that, ever. And this from a kid that only does kickoffs.

Well Minny getting a flag would have been impressive since we were playing UMD.

My wife decided Saturday would be a good day to take the family shopping (disaster on so many levels it was almost EPIC)... so I didn't get to watch the game live. I did get to listen to it on SiriusXM and I miss listening to Hamm and Jones (my wife actually commented that she learned a lot listening to 'that guy' (Hamm), and neither of them were 'homers' they explained why plays worked, or didn't, for each team, and didn't go over the top when PSU scored) - wife is a Bama fan because her mother went there, and is a UMD grad. Anyhoo - I watched the game when I got home on the DVR, and I agree with you all you posted... but I didn't see you mention anything about the OL?

Mahon - absolutely dominated both ends of the line. His progression since last year has been nothing but stellar.
Bates - makes VERY few mistakes for a true freshman Guard
Gaia - PLEASE F'ing get this kid off the OL! He caused at least 4 TFL because he snaps the ball into McSorely's facemask, or next to his helmet. He is missing so many blocks it isn't close to funny.
McGovern - HOLY CRAP! This kid is blocking a DT for 3 seconds, then sheds off and takes out a LB on nearly every play. He is a beast!
Nelson - We are going to miss him immensely. After he went down Mahon slid over to RT and Palmer came in at LT.

Palmer - his footwork is either horrendous or spectacular... this guy is a tough read. He should be a lot better than he is.
Wright - When he is in you can't help but be impressed!

I think we are still a bit thin along the line. We have depth, but it isn't 2 or 3 at each spot and there is significant drop-off once you get beyond the 1st string (Wright being the exception). When they brought Larrent in and put him at LG next to Palmer the left side got swamped and resulted in either a sac or TFL.

I would love to see:
LT - Mahon
LG - Bates
C - McGovern
RG - Menet/Gonzalez
LG - Wright/Palmer

 

[LaJolla Lion]

Well Minny getting a flag would have been impressive since we were playing UMD.

My wife decided Saturday would be a good day to take the family shopping (disaster on so many levels it was almost EPIC)... so I didn't get to watch the game live. I did get to listen to it on SiriusXM and I miss listening to Hamm and Jones (my wife actually commented that she learned a lot listening to 'that guy' (Hamm), and neither of them were 'homers' they explained why plays worked, or didn't, for each team, and didn't go over the top when PSU scored) - wife is a Bama fan because her mother went there, and is a UMD grad. Anyhoo - I watched the game when I got home on the DVR, and I agree with you all you posted... but I didn't see you mention anything about the OL?

Mahon - absolutely dominated both ends of the line. His progression since last year has been nothing but stellar.
Bates - makes VERY few mistakes for a true freshman Guard
Gaia - PLEASE F'ing get this kid off the OL! He caused at least 4 TFL because he snaps the ball into McSorely's facemask, or next to his helmet. He is missing so many blocks it isn't close to funny.
McGovern - HOLY CRAP! This kid is blocking a DT for 3 seconds, then sheds off and takes out a LB on nearly every play. He is a beast!
Nelson - We are going to miss him immensely. After he went down Mahon slid over to RT and Palmer came in at LT.

Palmer - his footwork is either horrendous or spectacular... this guy is a tough read. He should be a lot better than he is.
Wright - When he is in you can't help but be impressed!

I think we are still a bit thin along the line. We have depth, but it isn't 2 or 3 at each spot and there is significant drop-off once you get beyond the 1st string (Wright being the exception). When they brought Larrent in and put him at LG next to Palmer the left side got swamped and resulted in either a sac or TFL.

I would love to see:
LT - Mahon
LG - Bates
C - McGovern
RG - Menet/Gonzalez
LG - Wright/Palmer

Wright really struggled last week with pass protection. He was at G instead of T, but just pointing that out.

 

[lionroar88]

Wright really struggled last week with pass protection. He was at G instead of T, but just pointing that out.

Thanks. I did not notice that. With Nelson down I would still like to see him and Palmer split time at RT and bring Menet or Gonzalez up to RG - Larrent and Gaia look lost out there.

 

[LaJolla Lion]

Thanks. I did not notice that. With Nelson down I would still like to see him and Palmer split time at RT and bring Menet or Gonzalez up to RG - Larrent and Gaia look lost out there.

Don't be surprised of you see Fries in the 2 deep in 2 weeks.

 

[Judge Smails]

Don't be surprised of you see Fries in the 2 deep in 2 weeks.

You might as well get the kid out there. Palmer will be gone next year. Let him get his feet wet now.

 

[Obliviax]

You might as well get the kid out there. Palmer will be gone next year. Let him get his feet wet now.

I guess I'll be shocked to see anyone new in against tOSU. I suspect Palmer will play LT along with who was playing in the second half against MD. If changes are to be made, it will probably be made when we play Purdue, the week after. I know its a bye week but hate to have a kid's first real experience be against tOSU.

 

[BBrown]

This team progresses in just about every phase of the game. Was the second half against Minny the inflection-point? Maybe so. I was really wondering what was going on. I read about a dozen prognostications on the game and only two of them picked Penn State to win. What? Why do I continue to invest in these bozos? They are really no smarter than anyone of us. Regardless, I got a kick out of them eating their words.

The team came out very crisp. One of my hopes for this season is that the team looked like they were prepared and didn't make dumb mistakes. I think, five games in, this has been realized. The team makes very few mental errors in terms of crazy penalties and confusion. Despite a lot of injuries, very few delay of games, TO due to lack proper personnel, illegal shift/formation, and turnovers. This was NOT the case last year.

So here are my game observations:

• I always look at the first series to see how the coaches game-planned. What did we anticipate by looking at film? In the first series, we threw the ball extremely well. Of course, MD was stacked to stop the run so the passing was critical in setting the tone. Again, crisp and purposeful.
• What can you say about Barkley. i really believe he is the best RB I've ever seen at PSU. Kid can do it all. He almost always falls forward. He is fast, can make people miss and can lower his shoulder and get that critical yard.
• What has me excited is the staff's use of TM. (My daughter started calling him Mace Tricksorley). Finally, FINALLY, he is using the Zone-Read properly by carrying the ball. And in running it, he's gained a new confidence.
• For the first time, he made people miss. He's not and never will be a powerful runner. He goes down easily when anyone gets a decent shot at him, but he juked a couple of guys, set up his blocking, and showed much better speed. All in all, he lost his hesitancy.
• Now, lets not go nuts here. Much of his success in the zone read was when 9 of the 11 defenders were keying on Barkley. But tOSU will have to game plan a little differently. Teams will no longer be able to key on Barkley 100%. Neither could MD. And what was the result? 200+ yards for Barkley. So I was very pleased that TM was carrying the ball, for a change.
• I am guessing we ran the zone-read more than 50% of the time. I did note that the staff moved the TE out, away from the box. Then used him when his defender cheated back to cover the run. Gisicki is becoming quite a weapon. Move him out, taking a LB with him. If you don't commit the LB, you run him in the flat or behind the LB. Tough to defend.
• What I did notice about the zone read is that, while they ran it a lot, they attacked different parts of the defense. In other words, the plays looked like they were designed to run at different defenders. So while it is the same action, it attacks the defense differently.
• What I was even more impressed with, in addition to TM's running, was his passing. In wet conditions, it is often helpful to have larger hands, which typically go with a guy being 6-5 or whatever. TM threw an even better ball against MD than he did in previous games. Every single pass was a tight spiral and had authority. His long ball to Thomkins was a perfect throw. It was tight, had authority, and was dropped into the bucket to perfection.
• But whenever I see every offensive player doing well, and people are complimenting the OC for "calling a good game" I think of what is the common denominator? The OL of course. Easily the best game they've played so far. The two Frosh played well, added a level of physicality to the OL. And when Nelson went down, Paris Palmer came in and played pretty well. Now, we'll see about PP when tOSU game plans to attack him, but he played well against MD. This offense is going to be special next season. With TM, SB and that Oline, wow.
• Defensively we played well. Our tackling is still a bit of a mystery. Are MD's running backs that good? Hard to know. But they ran threw a lot of tackles. Regardless, our DL clogged the middle and our DB's really flowed well. Coverage was outstanding. None of MD's WR's scare me but our CB's covered them like a blanket all day long. Even when we knew MD had to rely on the run and defended that, we put our CB's one on one, they were covered really well.
• This MD team killed Purdue? How bad is Purdue? I put MD in the "scrappy" category. PSU outplayed them but had trouble putting them away. They played tough and hard throughout the entire game but had few guys that can make plays. They took a couple of hard shots by our D. But lets not think we just beat a great team. This MD team is a middle B1G team, at best. I'd take Minny to beat them 9 times our of 10. I just have no idea why the media was picking them to win. Honestly, CJF's teams get little to no respect.
• Really liked Sander's TD run. Kid just needs confidence (had a nice KO return as well). But I thought he was going to be caught at the five, but he showed really good and deceptive speed. He's not small, either. I am looking for better acceleration, but that was a nice run.
• A real problem is this team showboating. I simply don't like it. I am not going to mention names. For example, a hard hit on Likely on a punt return was great. Don't get in the kids face and trash talk him in the middle of their bench and then dance on the field. At the game, I couldn't see what happened and wondered why the Minny kids didn't get a flag. After watching at home, I am surprised we didn't get a flag. No place for that in college ball, IMHO.
• On the horse-collar, I watched it and replayed it. The defender had a handful of Barkley's jersey three inches below his collar. The penalty is for a player grabbing the back of the shoulder pads, which didn't happen. So I agree, no call. Overall, I thought the zebras had a good game. You can always argue about holds.
• WTF was Minny's 22 thinking when he laid out Julius? This has to be coming from the coaches. That kid is going to get tossed 100 times out of 100. JJ has really gotten under the skin of the opponents. It will be interesting to see how tOSU coaches against JJ. BTW, saw JJ being very active on the bench. I LOVE how this kid has gotten so involved with this team. He really is giving us an identity. I've never seen anything like that, ever. And this from a kid that only does kickoffs.

Overall, great, GREAT improvement week in and week out. The coaching staff is getting this kids into positions where they can be successful. We are finally learning how to take a kid that can create plays (Barkley) and utilize him to allow other kids to make great plays. We are going to need stronger LB'ers against tOSU. I hope we get Cabinda back over the bye week. I also would like to see Farmer in on passing downs, even if he doesn't start. LB continues to be an area of weakness but they are playing well with the experience they are getting.

Player of the week has to be McSorley. Kid is really gaining confidence. He showed huge improvements in four areas:

• Willingness to run the ball. Hey, when there are three guys waiting for Barkley and a lane three yards wide for you, run the damn ball!
• Deceptive speed. He lost his hesitancy and commits to the play earlier (both run and pass). Several times, he committed to the run and making a first down. When you commit to the run, you run! He's learning really quickly and gaining confidence.
• Moves. He's juked players at least three times. I don't recall him juking, and making them miss, once previous to this game. he was a strait line runner. On his TD run, he juked a player, setting up the blocker to have a better angle and then juked another player who was unblocked.
• Passing. His passes weren't late, they were on time and crisp. On the long ball, he threw the ball earlier and had good authority on the ball. Unlike in previous games where he was late, tried to put more on the ball to get it there, and ended up simply throwing a 50/50 jump ball.

Very encouraging game. So now we are 4-2 heading into a bye week (hopefully, to get a LB or two back) and a night game, a whiteout, against the best or second or third best team in the nation. tOSU has a tough game against Wiscy so we could jump them a little bit. Then its Purdue (awful team), Iowa (par with Minny), Indiana (par with MD), Rutgers (awful team), and a spiraling Sparty team. It is conceivable we end up 5-1 to end the season, but I think we go 4-2. If so, that would put us at 8-4, which is a pretty successful year given the schedule and injuries.

Agree. I was really surprised at how well Trace moves and he made some people miss also is faster than I thought.

Sanders is going to be a stud. I'm glad Franklin and staff had the confidence in him to put him in. I think that run will give him a big boost. I thought he had a chance on the one return for big yardage when he slipped making the cut.

Jack said, on the radio, that they were tackling too high. I think the one MD RB is about 5'7" he's also very fast.

I definitely agree about some of the "showboating" I didn't notice it at the game but it sure was obvious on the TV replay.
Most of it seems to be coming from the secondary. Franklin needs to put a stop to it.

 

[ncgolfer]

Outstanding post, Obliviax. You put a lot of effort into it and it's greatly appreciated. The only disagreement you'll get from me is your assessment of IU. McSorley, McGovern, B. Smith, S. Miller, T. Brown, Gesicki, Bowen, Reid, Windsor all seem to get noticeably better every week.

 

[Bob78]

You might as well get the kid out there. Palmer will be gone next year. Let him get his feet wet now.

My guess is that they will use the off week to see if they are ok with Palmer and Wright in the mix, or if they need to take the shirt off Fries now and give him more reps to test that. If they can get McGovern some reps at C (and that is probably too much stuff to work on even with an off week and Ohio State looming!) then they can give Gaia some rest. My guess is they would prefer to figure out how to utilize Wright more, and not use up a shirt. But, if Fries can help, and him playing gives us the best chance of winning, then by all means.... give me Fries with that! (apologies all around).

My prediction that 8-4 as the bar for the season is looking very possible, especially now with knowing that Iowa and Mich. State aren't as strong as predicted back in August. Indiana steps up, though, better than expected as of this point. It is easy to see how this team's confidence - along with the individual confidence of a number of younger players, led by Trace - is growing each week and that they have a ton of success to build on for the 2nd half of this season.

With a healthy Cabinda back at some point soon, and avoiding any more OL injuries, they should have lots of well-deserved confidence for a successful 2nd half of the season. This team is getting better on both sides of the ball, which is what any team wants through the course of a season.

 

[Obliviax]

My guess is that they will use the off week to see if they are ok with Palmer and Wright in the mix, or if they need to take the shirt off Fries now and give him more reps to test that. If they can get McGovern some reps at C (and that is probably too much stuff to work on even with an off week and Ohio State looming!) then they can give Gaia some rest. My guess is they would prefer to figure out how to utilize Wright more, and not use up a shirt. But, if Fries can help, and him playing gives us the best chance of winning, then by all means.... give me Fries with that! (apologies all around).

My prediction that 8-4 as the bar for the season is looking very possible, especially now with knowing that Iowa and Mich. State aren't as strong as predicted back in August. Indiana steps up, though, better than expected as of this point. It is easy to see how this team's confidence - along with the individual confidence of a number of younger players, led by Trace - is growing each week and that they have a ton of success to build on for the 2nd half of this season.

With a healthy Cabinda back at some point soon, and avoiding any more OL injuries, they should have lots of well-deserved confidence for a successful 2nd half of the season. This team is getting better on both sides of the ball, which is what any team wants through the course of a season.

Agree....my biggest concern about 8-4 is that Iowa and Sparty have power running games. We need Cabinda and Bell back at 100% to counter that power attack.

 

[PSUFBFAN]

My guess is that they will use the off week to see if they are ok with Palmer and Wright in the mix, or if they need to take the shirt off Fries now and give him more reps to test that. If they can get McGovern some reps at C (and that is probably too much stuff to work on even with an off week and Ohio State looming!) then they can give Gaia some rest. My guess is they would prefer to figure out how to utilize Wright more, and not use up a shirt. But, if Fries can help, and him playing gives us the best chance of winning, then by all means.... give me Fries with that! (apologies all around).

My prediction that 8-4 as the bar for the season is looking very possible, especially now with knowing that Iowa and Mich. State aren't as strong as predicted back in August. Indiana steps up, though, better than expected as of this point. It is easy to see how this team's confidence - along with the individual confidence of a number of younger players, led by Trace - is growing each week and that they have a ton of success to build on for the 2nd half of this season.

With a healthy Cabinda back at some point soon, and avoiding any more OL injuries, they should have lots of well-deserved confidence for a successful 2nd half of the season. This team is getting better on both sides of the ball, which is what any team wants through the course of a season.

Now that the season is half-over and we have a feel for the quality of everyone, my confidence in wins for the remaining games (most to least) is as follows:

Rutgers
Purdue
Iowa - I simply don't think they can outscore us, the game is at home, and at night.
MSU - hard to say now where both PSU and MSU will be by end of year, but current trends for both teams are favoring PSU
Indiana - on the road and they are better than expected
OSU - let's just not get anyone hurt!

 

[Tri-Power65]

My wife decided Saturday would be a good day to take the family shopping (disaster on so many levels it was almost EPIC)... so I didn't get to watch the game live. I

You should have taken the opportunity to buy a pair of pants.

Kidding aside, I agree that Gaia needs to be relegated to the bench immediately.

 

[lionroar88]

You should have taken the opportunity to buy a pair of pants.

Kidding aside, I agree that Gaia needs to be relegated to the bench immediately.

LOL.

Saturday and Sunday are our only days to get things of this sort done. Having two young kids makes it hard to do this kind of thing in the evening and since we were gone for 6 hours... would have put it off till this weekend, but she leaves for a week to San Fran and part of the shopping was for her to get stuff for the business trip. Wish I could have gone with her, but she's doing a quality audit and being stuck in a hotel room with a 5yo and 3yo is not my idea of a fun time! LOL

 

[PSUSignore]

I agree on the showboating to an extent. I've grown to tolerate the endless first down finger point and sack/pass breakup celebrations that seem prevalent on every play in today's game. But in this game Nick Scott stood over the punt returner that he laid out in a taunting manner, and unwisely did so on the UMD sideline. There's no place for that. I was not at all surprised that UMD players reacted the way they did, I figure PSU players would have done the same had the roles been reversed. I too was surprised we didn't get an unsportsmanlike call on that one.

 

[SR108]

This team progresses in just about every phase of the game. Was the second half against Minny the inflection-point? Maybe so. I was really wondering what was going on. I read about a dozen prognostications on the game and only two of them picked Penn State to win. What? Why do I continue to invest in these bozos? They are really no smarter than anyone of us. Regardless, I got a kick out of them eating their words.

The team came out very crisp. One of my hopes for this season is that the team looked like they were prepared and didn't make dumb mistakes. I think, five games in, this has been realized. The team makes very few mental errors in terms of crazy penalties and confusion. Despite a lot of injuries, very few delay of games, TO due to lack proper personnel, illegal shift/formation, and turnovers. This was NOT the case last year.

So here are my game observations:

• I always look at the first series to see how the coaches game-planned. What did we anticipate by looking at film? In the first series, we threw the ball extremely well. Of course, MD was stacked to stop the run so the passing was critical in setting the tone. Again, crisp and purposeful.
• What can you say about Barkley. i really believe he is the best RB I've ever seen at PSU. Kid can do it all. He almost always falls forward. He is fast, can make people miss and can lower his shoulder and get that critical yard.
• What has me excited is the staff's use of TM. (My daughter started calling him Mace Tricksorley). Finally, FINALLY, he is using the Zone-Read properly by carrying the ball. And in running it, he's gained a new confidence.
• For the first time, he made people miss. He's not and never will be a powerful runner. He goes down easily when anyone gets a decent shot at him, but he juked a couple of guys, set up his blocking, and showed much better speed. All in all, he lost his hesitancy.
• Now, lets not go nuts here. Much of his success in the zone read was when 9 of the 11 defenders were keying on Barkley. But tOSU will have to game plan a little differently. Teams will no longer be able to key on Barkley 100%. Neither could MD. And what was the result? 200+ yards for Barkley. So I was very pleased that TM was carrying the ball, for a change.
• I am guessing we ran the zone-read more than 50% of the time. I did note that the staff moved the TE out, away from the box. Then used him when his defender cheated back to cover the run. Gisicki is becoming quite a weapon. Move him out, taking a LB with him. If you don't commit the LB, you run him in the flat or behind the LB. Tough to defend.
• What I did notice about the zone read is that, while they ran it a lot, they attacked different parts of the defense. In other words, the plays looked like they were designed to run at different defenders. So while it is the same action, it attacks the defense differently.
• What I was even more impressed with, in addition to TM's running, was his passing. In wet conditions, it is often helpful to have larger hands, which typically go with a guy being 6-5 or whatever. TM threw an even better ball against MD than he did in previous games. Every single pass was a tight spiral and had authority. His long ball to Thomkins was a perfect throw. It was tight, had authority, and was dropped into the bucket to perfection.
• But whenever I see every offensive player doing well, and people are complimenting the OC for "calling a good game" I think of what is the common denominator? The OL of course. Easily the best game they've played so far. The two Frosh played well, added a level of physicality to the OL. And when Nelson went down, Paris Palmer came in and played pretty well. Now, we'll see about PP when tOSU game plans to attack him, but he played well against MD. This offense is going to be special next season. With TM, SB and that Oline, wow.
• Defensively we played well. Our tackling is still a bit of a mystery. Are MD's running backs that good? Hard to know. But they ran threw a lot of tackles. Regardless, our DL clogged the middle and our DB's really flowed well. Coverage was outstanding. None of MD's WR's scare me but our CB's covered them like a blanket all day long. Even when we knew MD had to rely on the run and defended that, we put our CB's one on one, they were covered really well.
• This MD team killed Purdue? How bad is Purdue? I put MD in the "scrappy" category. PSU outplayed them but had trouble putting them away. They played tough and hard throughout the entire game but had few guys that can make plays. They took a couple of hard shots by our D. But lets not think we just beat a great team. This MD team is a middle B1G team, at best. I'd take Minny to beat them 9 times our of 10. I just have no idea why the media was picking them to win. Honestly, CJF's teams get little to no respect.
• Really liked Sander's TD run. Kid just needs confidence (had a nice KO return as well). But I thought he was going to be caught at the five, but he showed really good and deceptive speed. He's not small, either. I am looking for better acceleration, but that was a nice run.
• A real problem is this team showboating. I simply don't like it. I am not going to mention names. For example, a hard hit on Likely on a punt return was great. Don't get in the kids face and trash talk him in the middle of their bench and then dance on the field. At the game, I couldn't see what happened and wondered why the Minny kids didn't get a flag. After watching at home, I am surprised we didn't get a flag. No place for that in college ball, IMHO.
• On the horse-collar, I watched it and replayed it. The defender had a handful of Barkley's jersey three inches below his collar. The penalty is for a player grabbing the back of the shoulder pads, which didn't happen. So I agree, no call. Overall, I thought the zebras had a good game. You can always argue about holds.
• WTF was Minny's 22 thinking when he laid out Julius? This has to be coming from the coaches. That kid is going to get tossed 100 times out of 100. JJ has really gotten under the skin of the opponents. It will be interesting to see how tOSU coaches against JJ. BTW, saw JJ being very active on the bench. I LOVE how this kid has gotten so involved with this team. He really is giving us an identity. I've never seen anything like that, ever. And this from a kid that only does kickoffs.

Overall, great, GREAT improvement week in and week out. The coaching staff is getting this kids into positions where they can be successful. We are finally learning how to take a kid that can create plays (Barkley) and utilize him to allow other kids to make great plays. We are going to need stronger LB'ers against tOSU. I hope we get Cabinda back over the bye week. I also would like to see Farmer in on passing downs, even if he doesn't start. LB continues to be an area of weakness but they are playing well with the experience they are getting.

Player of the week has to be McSorley. Kid is really gaining confidence. He showed huge improvements in four areas:

• Willingness to run the ball. Hey, when there are three guys waiting for Barkley and a lane three yards wide for you, run the damn ball!
• Deceptive speed. He lost his hesitancy and commits to the play earlier (both run and pass). Several times, he committed to the run and making a first down. When you commit to the run, you run! He's learning really quickly and gaining confidence.
• Moves. He's juked players at least three times. I don't recall him juking, and making them miss, once previous to this game. he was a strait line runner. On his TD run, he juked a player, setting up the blocker to have a better angle and then juked another player who was unblocked.
• Passing. His passes weren't late, they were on time and crisp. On the long ball, he threw the ball earlier and had good authority on the ball. Unlike in previous games where he was late, tried to put more on the ball to get it there, and ended up simply throwing a 50/50 jump ball.

Very encouraging game. So now we are 4-2 heading into a bye week (hopefully, to get a LB or two back) and a night game, a whiteout, against the best or second or third best team in the nation. tOSU has a tough game against Wiscy so we could jump them a little bit. Then its Purdue (awful team), Iowa (par with Minny), Indiana (par with MD), Rutgers (awful team), and a spiraling Sparty team. It is conceivable we end up 5-1 to end the season, but I think we go 4-2. If so, that would put us at 8-4, which is a pretty successful year given the schedule and injuries.

I was impressed with how well the team was prepared for this game in all three phases. Maryland is a good running team, particularly on the perimeter, and our Defense shut down the perimeter throughout the majority of the game. Maryland has a good return game, and our kick coverage was excellent all game. On offense, we started fast, were determined to run the ball, and executed well. We attacked the perimeter with a couple different looks, McSorely made excellent decisions on when to keep and when to give, and we were able to block Maryland's front seven more consistantly than I have seen for the last three years, throughout the entire game.

I have been happy with the staff's ability to adjust this year. Up until this game we have played better in the second half of almost every game. This game we started fast and were able to sustain it throughout the game. Being able to run the ball also opened up the play action touchdown pass in the second half to Thompkins.

Maryland losing Hills certainly helped the defense the second half, but I am still encouraged with some of the guys who have stepped in and seem to be improving each week such as Smith, Bowen, and Farmer. Yea, we are missing too many tackles, and our safeties are having to make too many plays. This will eventually hurt us at some point, I am sure that smart coaches will note that they are quick to support the run, and will take advantage of that in the passing game. The DLine is getting better, and though not a dominating force, they have the ability to make big stops at key times in a game and there seems to be a lot of depth. I like the fact that a lot of kids are playing and getting experience. Brown and Miller should end up being real good ends at some point. The tackles move well and are making plays at times, but they all need to get get bigger and stronger. The rotation does keep them fresh, however.

Bottom line, the team is getting better. Although I don't think Maryland is very good, this was a great win in terms of recruiting and confidence. I am cautiously optimistic. While I only see two sure wins left on the schedule, I do think we can be competitive with Indiana, Iowa and Michigan State. Two of those three games will be at home which should help out.

 

[Obliviax]

I was impressed with how well the team was prepared for this game in all three phases. Maryland is a good running team, particularly on the perimeter, and our Defense shut down the perimeter throughout the majority of the game. Maryland has a good return game, and our kick coverage was excellent all game. On offense, we started fast, were determined to run the ball, and executed well. We attacked the perimeter with a couple different looks, McSorely made excellent decisions on when to keep and when to give, and we were able to block Maryland's front seven more consistantly than I have seen for the last three years, throughout the entire game.

I have been happy with the staff's ability to adjust this year. Up until this game we have played better in the second half of almost every game. This game we started fast and were able to sustain it throughout the game. Being able to run the ball also opened up the play action touchdown pass in the second half to Thompkins.

Maryland losing Hills certainly helped the defense the second half, but I am still encouraged with some of the guys who have stepped in and seem to be improving each week such as Smith, Bowen, and Farmer. Yea, we are missing too many tackles, and our safeties are having to make too many plays. This will eventually hurt us at some point, I am sure that smart coaches will note that they are quick to support the run, and will take advantage of that in the passing game. The DLine is getting better, and though not a dominating force, they have the ability to make big stops at key times in a game and there seems to be a lot of depth. I like the fact that a lot of kids are playing and getting experience. Brown and Miller should end up being real good ends at some point. The tackles move well and are making plays at times, but they all need to get get bigger and stronger. The rotation does keep them fresh, however.

Bottom line, the team is getting better. Although I don't think Maryland is very good, this was a great win in terms of recruiting and confidence. I am cautiously optimistic. While I only see two sure wins left on the schedule, I do think we can be competitive with Indiana, Iowa and Michigan State. Two of those three games will be at home which should help out.

As usual, a great and helpful post. These are your most positive comments since BOB's first year. Two comments: I believe we were up 24 10 when Hills got hurt and I feel we went conservative in the second half. At one point, I counted 6 or 7 zone reads in a row.
I think, post bye, we'll see TM carrying the ball more and more. He had five yards before anyone touched him against MD. With the exception of Purdue, we won't see an easier defense the rest of the year.

 

[SR108]

I think, post bye, we'll see TM carrying the ball more and more.

In this offense, he, TM, has to run the ball and be a threat in order to provide Barkley with some room. It also helps with the read option play action passing game.

I have criticized Franklin and his staff for being out prepared and out coached in prior games such as the Pitt game, but I am willing to give credit where credit is due, and PSU out coached and out prepared Maryland in all phases of this game. This was a must win for Franklin, not so much as far as his immediate job stability, but for recruiting sake it was big.

 

[Obliviax]

In this offense, he, TM, has to run the ball and be a threat in order to provide Barkley with some room. It also helps with the read option play action passing game.

I have criticized Franklin and his staff for being out prepared and out coached in prior games such as the Pitt game, but I am willing to give credit where credit is due, and PSU out coached and out prepared Maryland in all phases of this game. This was a must win for Franklin, not so much as far as his immediate job stability, but for recruiting sake it was big.

Again, totally agree. We didn't see TM carry the load until at halftime of the Minny game. Why? Were the read options "no option" options? It was pretty obvious TM needed to run. The result was several plays were there was simply nobody there to defend TM when he pulled the ball out of Barkley's tummy. Maybe they just needed to feel confident in TM and/or TM needed to feel confident in himself. Millen kept saying TM would run the ball more so he was clearly tipped off by the coaches.

Lets hope it continues but I am afraid tOSU will be a different set of circumstances. I feel like MD was way over rated. We'll see.

 

[gogolion]

I think Indy on the road is going to be our toughest game after tOSU. They have a good O-Line and some powerful runners. Against tOSU on their opening drive of the 2nd half they ran it down tOSU's throat for a long TD drive. We will be challenged to stop them with our LB issues.

Obli, you may want to edit your post. I think you referred to Minny a couple of times where you meant MD.

I'm no expert, but I felt like we really dominated this game along the line, both offensively and defensively, which is something I certainly couldn't say in previous games. Of course, TM keeping the ball often definitely helped open things up on offense. On D I felt like our line didn't get pushed around like we have in previous games and it made things easier for our LBs and defensive backs in the run defense.

I also think things got a lot easier when Hills went out. We didn't have to worry much about the passing game after that and could concentrate on stopping the run. We won't have that luxury against many teams.

 

[SR108]

I am afraid tOSU will be a different set of circumstances

Ohio State is loaded with talent and speed from top to bottom. Trace is doing a great job the last couple of games, but they have more than enough speed and athletes to handle both he and Barkley if they are ready to play. Hopefully Wisconsin will really battle them and take some wind out of their sails.

 

[CDLionFL]

One extra wrinkle that I noticed on the zone read -- when they run it to the left, Gesicki will sometimes split further out to the sideline and be a safety valve for McSorley to lateral it out to him. He did toss it out once against Minnesota. It's just one more thing a defense has to pay attention to and will create space for Trace to run or get Gesicki down the sideline.

 

[BBG65]

It's all about the Jimmys and Joes. I think we had a clear talent edge at all the offensive skill positions as well as the DL and secondary. That's not to take anything away from the coaches, but talent and experience rule the day. We'll be on the other end of the talent equation against Ohio State, but should be close to or better than everyone else on the schedule. Of course, injuries are the wild card.

 

[kgilbert78]

It is nice to read some good football talk. Great thread....

 

[freckles3]

Yep...I watched some weird show on ESPN the other day (which I rarely do). They had a host and two former players making predictions on college games that were toss ups. One guy, who was 5-6 on his predictions was giving the other, who was 4-7, trash talk. What? These two "experts" are under .500 on toss up games? (and talking trash to boot).

Its hard for me to watch or read them any longer. Flouders, for example, reminds me of that drunk guy at the tailgate (BTW, I looked dumb critiquing CJF for running zone reads before halftime with under a minute to go, too!). Jones, to his credit, once in a while, brings something to the table but his game analysis and football knowledge is really weak. The rest, like Ben Jones, might as well be the random guy at Hooters.

I was watching a BTN show last week with a host (forget who it was) and Robert Smith as the expert. He thought Maryland was the third best team in the BIG East. Shows you how much he knows. But then again, he's never been a PSU fan.

 

[kgilbert78]

I was watching a BTN show last week with a host (forget who it was) and Robert Smith as the expert. He thought Maryland was the third best team in the BIG East. Shows you how much he knows. But then again, he's never been a PSU fan.

You don't often figure this stuff out until closer to the end of the season. The turtles *did* look good--until they met us.

That said, sometimes the talking heads get it right. Was listening to ESPN this morning and Desmond Howard was talking about the targeting calls--and brought up the PSU one vs Michigan. He thought the call was insane and strongly defended the PSU defender. Surprised me though....

 

[royboy]

Ohio State is loaded with talent and speed from top to bottom. Trace is doing a great job the last couple of games, but they have more than enough speed and athletes to handle both he and Barkley if they are ready to play. Hopefully Wisconsin will really battle them and take some wind out of their sails.

Yeah, probably so. But remember Saquon Barkley went for 194 yards last year vs a Buckeye defense that was LOADED with NFL talent.

I'm not ready to predict a score, but I think PSU can move the ball and give tOSU a game.