Wrong. It’s a process. He’ll get it fixed. As long as the players and coaches Keep Choppin there’s a bright light at the end of the tunnel. Championships. Plural. He’s a great coach, just you wait and see.
Football GAMEDAY THREAD: Rutgers Football versus UMass
- Thread starter Richie O
- Start date
Where are you in Vietnam? I lived in Ho Chi Minh City, D7 for 4 years and now in Bangkok since 2020.
It sucks to get up at 5:00 AM to watch a disaster like today.
PSAL…surely you can’t dispute that if Lonergan truly beat out Surace to be the starter then Surace isn’t a D1 caliber starter QB.
The UMass qb (VT transfer) is miles better than Lonergan
Lonergan was clearly terrible under pressure. Panics easily. And he isn’t mobile.
But did you see what our defense looked like? On the first drive without pressure in his face, Lonergan looked fine. It’s quite possible he looked mostly like that in practice because our defense stinks to an unimaginable level.
I’m sure there will be story lines about how much better AJ is than Lonergan all week long. But I personally have the QB decision pretty low on my current list of grievances with Greg’s coaching right now. Perhaps some will say - AJ is such a loyal, nice kid. We suck anyway so we should be playing him if it’s close. I don’t disagree with the premise having seen the team - Surace should play now. End of story. But just to be clear, AK doesn’t even win this game for us. The D and the OL are THAT bad.
Considering the starting point, the OL sits at the top of my grievance list right now. Hiring Jim Turner looks like a really REALLY bad decision right now. He didn’t inherit bare bones. A few question marks, sure, but… We rushed for 30 NET YARDS against UMass. If we can’t afford to fire Greg right now, begging Flaherty to come back, might be option number 2 (not realistic but…) The bottom line is if you can’t run at all, your offense becomes one dimensional.
Which leads me to the next highest complaint on my offense list. We have an all star receiver who has superior wing span than everyone on UMass by a mile. If we’re forced to throw on almost every snap, the ball should only go to him unless others are noticed wide open. Throwing to KJ in traffic is fine. He’s great at shifting to play defense when he needs to. Somehow, when we threw into tight coverage, it mostly went to other receivers. That’s on the coaches.
The defense was historically bad last year and looked materially worse yesterday. Greg deserves the blame for delaying the hire and failing to pick up any high major defenders in the portal. Beyond that, it’s probably too early to throw pitch forks at the new staff considering how bad we were to start and the talent level got worse, not better.
That’s where I’m at.
It’s all only the coaches, starting with the failure who’s been stealing salary since his return. Now, finally, the curtain is peeled back and everyone sees him as the grossly incompetent phony coach he is. Come Monday the only thing he should be overseeing at SHI is the merch tent.
To be fair, it’s not apples to apples when a QB 2 comes in with 4 min to go and makes some nice throws with the game outcome already in hand. He did do a nice job avoiding an initial blitz though he was sacked by someone else on the scramble attempt. Didn’t see that ability from Lonergan so that was noteworthy.
The defense and the OL are the overarching problems with this team though. And neither issue looked fixable.
It’s not “only” the coaches. Obviously Lonergan didn’t help us by turning it over 4 times, but the play calling sucked. After we marched up the field on drive one it made no sense at all to hand off twice to Raymond to start our send drive. Clearly, we expected to be able to move the ball on the ground, and were dead wrong. No push at all. Once we saw we couldn’t dominate the line, the game plan should’ve been simplified. Target KJ long almost every snap, unless someone else is noticed wide open. Whoever is QB should be assigned that mission for the rest of the season. The run game probably cannot be “fixed” as it’s an OL issue. Feel bad for Raymond.
It’s time to move on from GS. Yesterday felt like I was at a Chris Ash game. Full circle moment.
Only if he wasn’t passed over by the prior administration for multiple roles.
Plus he has been mentioned and interviewed for NFL head coaching jobs.
That ship has sailed.
Yes is 1000000000% all in the coach!
From his NIL decisions 30mm
His delayed DC decision after portal closed
His delayed QB decision
Team unprepared
Etc
it’s all a n the coach ! He’s Awful
Oh - yes - for sure. The coaches are responsible. Your leaving out the biggest one in my opinion. Replacing Flaherty with Turner looks like the worst decision of all right now TBH. Especially considering Jim’s shady past.
I simply meant that Lonergan didn’t help matters with 4 turnovers. But then - I also said we would’ve lost the game with AK in there. Timing of the QB decision didn’t matter on this case. We were unprepared because Greg and Kirk failed to assess how bad the OL was (likely because they were going up against the worst defense in FBS which they mistakenly thought was improved).
Rutgers was beaten by UMass in all aspects of the game except who had the best playmaker, which was KJ Duff.
Rutgers was clearly outcoached with UMass coming ready to play while Rutgers wasn’t..
UMass was the more physical team, which negated Rutgers edge in overall talent. Rutgers fear of returning kicks was known to UMass and their kicking team hit Rutgers hard on every kickoff even though Rutgers had no intent in returning a kick.
UMass was more creative on offense which made them hard to defend.
Rutgers was very predictable on offense which made them easier to defend, especially since UMass intimately knew their offense.
UMass special teams were clearly better with a 67 yard punt that was within the 5 yard line and a 52 yard field goal. The UMass punter and kickers simply seemed more talented than Rutgers.
UMass had 53 transfers and the team did look way better than the 0-12 team they were last year. However, talent wise, except for the punters and kickers, Rutgers had the edge. That edge was minimized by being outcoached and Rutgers playing soft.
Rutgers quarterback also played skittishly and didn’t look like a veteran. Unless AJ Surrace is truly a bust, Rutgers likely picked the wrong quarterback to start.
Rutgers was clearly outcoached with UMass coming ready to play while Rutgers wasn’t..
UMass was the more physical team, which negated Rutgers edge in overall talent. Rutgers fear of returning kicks was known to UMass and their kicking team hit Rutgers hard on every kickoff even though Rutgers had no intent in returning a kick.
UMass was more creative on offense which made them hard to defend.
Rutgers was very predictable on offense which made them easier to defend, especially since UMass intimately knew their offense.
UMass special teams were clearly better with a 67 yard punt that was within the 5 yard line and a 52 yard field goal. The UMass punter and kickers simply seemed more talented than Rutgers.
UMass had 53 transfers and the team did look way better than the 0-12 team they were last year. However, talent wise, except for the punters and kickers, Rutgers had the edge. That edge was minimized by being outcoached and Rutgers playing soft.
Rutgers quarterback also played skittishly and didn’t look like a veteran. Unless AJ Surrace is truly a bust, Rutgers likely picked the wrong quarterback to start.
Fast forward to Nov 28. RU pulls off the Senior Day upset of five win MSU to finish 2-10.
As the clock hits 0:00 Schiano explodes in emotion, tears streaming down his face like @ Purdue, expressing proudness and affirmation that Keep Choppin is a real thing. Post-game he heaps praise on the seniors, the coaches and promises he’ll look in the mirror to ‘fix it’and resume the quest for championships in 2027.
In the mirror he sees Vince Lombardi. The football world sees a giant red nose, size 59 shoes and brightly colored curly hair.
As the clock hits 0:00 Schiano explodes in emotion, tears streaming down his face like @ Purdue, expressing proudness and affirmation that Keep Choppin is a real thing. Post-game he heaps praise on the seniors, the coaches and promises he’ll look in the mirror to ‘fix it’and resume the quest for championships in 2027.
In the mirror he sees Vince Lombardi. The football world sees a giant red nose, size 59 shoes and brightly colored curly hair.
The bright light at the end of the tunnel is a train. RU football is the woman tied to the tracks.
They're more knowledgeable with the sound off. Much like most of the people on this network. People knowing what they're talking about on TV isn't a thing anymore.
I didn’t say that. In fact, I think picking Lonergan over AJ is among Greg’s least concerning “mistake”. Lonergan owns his own fumble though. And the first pick was simply horrendous. He wasn’t even under pressure. He threw it to someone other than number 8 in double coverage. Again - I think for the duration of a whole game AJ would make mistakes too if we can’t get a lick of run push. I don’t think QB really matters. The lines look as bad as under Ash to me.
UMass defended like they knew all 3 plays in KC's playbook. Harysmiak was probably shocked that they didn't change anything.
Latest
-
01
The Knight Report
Recruit Visitor list for Rutgers Football versus USC
-
02
The Knight Report
Join The Knight Report TODAY for $1 and get 50% off!
-
03
The Knight Report Football
Behind Enemy Lines: An inside look at the USC Trojans
-
04
The Knight Report
Rutgers Football Wednesday Injury Report: Latest Updates ahead of the USC game
-
05
The Knight Report
Greg Schiano previews Rutgers Football versus USC + Recruiting Tidbits - TKR Pod