- There were quite a few players who stepped it up yesterday. I thought Burks played his best game of the season (and he finally got a bit of help from Mason playing more beef on the DL and Griffin doing his job). Duncan and Sherfield both gave senior-quality efforts. As did Dallas Rivers. JJW and Herndon played well on the outside.
- Two younger players showed some serious resiliency yesterday. First, major props to Lipscomb to overcoming a mistake-filled first quarter and playing lights out the rest of the game. Second, I thought Andre Mintze did some good work. He got schooled on a counter play in his first series in, but he corrected his mistake and blew up a couple attempts by Carolina to run the same thing late in the game, stepping down and wrong-arming the pulling lineman while not getting turned, and letting the ILBs and safeties clean up. Love seeing younger guys own a mistake and correct it, instead of letting it compound.
- Like everyone else, I'm very curious to know what the hell happened on the 3rd down call in the last series.
- The stats may not reflect it, but the run defense was improved at times. Good to see VU playing two true DTs on run downs, that helped free up the ILBs a bit. The issue now is consistency; too many times yesterday they fit a run perfectly and finished on the tackle, only to see poor block destruction and tackling against the same exact play next time...
-...which brings me to this. The number of mental mistakes at this point are beyond frustrating (and I'm not including the targeting calls, both were horrible, especially the one on Wright). Especially mental mistakes in critical situations, like 3rd and shorts, forcing a punt, or executing an extra point. This has been an issue since the Temple game, when VU had upperclass OLs killing drives with false starts and bad holds on two or three 3rd and shorts. And it's continued in year four of the Mason Era. VU simply does not have the talent to overcome stupid penalties, bad snaps, and being situationally unaware. I like Mason and I think he's an outstanding football mind, but the sloppiness and (what appears to be) inconsistent focus throughout a game is discouraging, especially with a group starting so many upperclassman. He has to figure out a way to get it fixed, otherwise his teams will be mired in mediocrity (good recruiting classes won't fix this issue, IMHO. It's a coaching thing).
- Two younger players showed some serious resiliency yesterday. First, major props to Lipscomb to overcoming a mistake-filled first quarter and playing lights out the rest of the game. Second, I thought Andre Mintze did some good work. He got schooled on a counter play in his first series in, but he corrected his mistake and blew up a couple attempts by Carolina to run the same thing late in the game, stepping down and wrong-arming the pulling lineman while not getting turned, and letting the ILBs and safeties clean up. Love seeing younger guys own a mistake and correct it, instead of letting it compound.
- Like everyone else, I'm very curious to know what the hell happened on the 3rd down call in the last series.
- The stats may not reflect it, but the run defense was improved at times. Good to see VU playing two true DTs on run downs, that helped free up the ILBs a bit. The issue now is consistency; too many times yesterday they fit a run perfectly and finished on the tackle, only to see poor block destruction and tackling against the same exact play next time...
-...which brings me to this. The number of mental mistakes at this point are beyond frustrating (and I'm not including the targeting calls, both were horrible, especially the one on Wright). Especially mental mistakes in critical situations, like 3rd and shorts, forcing a punt, or executing an extra point. This has been an issue since the Temple game, when VU had upperclass OLs killing drives with false starts and bad holds on two or three 3rd and shorts. And it's continued in year four of the Mason Era. VU simply does not have the talent to overcome stupid penalties, bad snaps, and being situationally unaware. I like Mason and I think he's an outstanding football mind, but the sloppiness and (what appears to be) inconsistent focus throughout a game is discouraging, especially with a group starting so many upperclassman. He has to figure out a way to get it fixed, otherwise his teams will be mired in mediocrity (good recruiting classes won't fix this issue, IMHO. It's a coaching thing).
