Defense- Whoever said that Mike Leach’s system makes the defense struggle? And who said that Arnett’s 3-3-5 can’t stop the run? We have one glaring hole on our defense and that is talent/experience/depth at safety, and we are starting a true freshman at CB. We are susceptible to the deep ball, and Daniels is a good enough QB to take advantage. If Bennet played for UGA tonight, we probably win by 10+. But the long term questions people had about Leach being able to field a good defense should be silenced for good, as long as we continue to make good staff decisions in the future.
Offense- We struggled late in the game, but we were great in the first 5-6 drives tonight. Some of that was against man coverage, but UGA mostly ran drop 8 zone and Rogers ate it alive with 6-8 yard completions. We had two scoring drives in the first half against almost exclusively drop 8 zone, and they combined for 15 minutes of TOP. UGA then went man on the next drive, and we scored on the long TD to Walley. When executed properly, this system can absolutely beat that drop 8 defense.
At the end of the day, I think our OL just got worn down in the second half. UGA might have the most talented and deepest defense in the country, and they won the war of attrition. We won’t play another defense like that the rest of the year. We won’t go 3-0 to close the season, but we have a solid chance in all of them and we should feel better about the trajectory of the program after tonight.
Offense- We struggled late in the game, but we were great in the first 5-6 drives tonight. Some of that was against man coverage, but UGA mostly ran drop 8 zone and Rogers ate it alive with 6-8 yard completions. We had two scoring drives in the first half against almost exclusively drop 8 zone, and they combined for 15 minutes of TOP. UGA then went man on the next drive, and we scored on the long TD to Walley. When executed properly, this system can absolutely beat that drop 8 defense.
At the end of the day, I think our OL just got worn down in the second half. UGA might have the most talented and deepest defense in the country, and they won the war of attrition. We won’t play another defense like that the rest of the year. We won’t go 3-0 to close the season, but we have a solid chance in all of them and we should feel better about the trajectory of the program after tonight.
