Thoughts from the couch…

[psuro]

1. PSU won and to the best of my knowledge, no PSU player got hurt.

2. If the Auburn players had CMU’s coaching staff they would have made a better showing last week.

3. On paper- great game by Clifford. But he was really hot or really cold. He missed a few open receivers underneath. especially Katron Allen on the sideline. Clifford went deep when he did not have to. Sometimes I wonder if CJF pushes the analytics on the quarterback so that he feels pressured to have a big play when a smaller play would suffice. BTW , Allen was wide open on that play and probably would have had a big run after a short pass.
However, in Clifford’s defense, I think a few passes should have been caught. A 4th down pass to Tinsley comes to mind.

4. Glad Katron Allen decided not to be swayed by Singleton commmitting to PSU. He really shone yesterday.

5. PSU is 1-0 this week and 4-0 overall. Fifth time in six years PSU starts the season 4-0. As always it’s the rest of the season that creates the problem. Perhaps PSU should petition the conference to play OSU or Michigan in the first 1/3 of the season , moving forward.

6. On both offense and defense, the underneath area of the field is a problem. Offensively, Clifford does not look for receivers underneath, and defensively, the blueprint for attacking Diaz’s defense was drawn by Auburn and CMU studying it well. Auburn had running QBs to exploit the underneath, and CMU used their big WR or TE underneath. I think Diaz made an All American of their WR #2.

7. The CMU team that showed up at the Beav yesterday is better than the Auburn team at Jordan Hare last week. As a team. AU certainly had better talent, but CMU was far more focused and organized. They fought to the end.

8. Love the PSU Defensive Secondary.

9. Hard to believe the Defense could not get a sack until the very end - kudos to DDS.

10. I saw an interview with former PSU DL Jack Crawford - he said the season is like doing 12 sprints, and not a marathon. Thought that was a good way of putting it.

11. I think CMU will be show to be more of a challenge than Northwestern next week. I think the team has had their lull, and will now start to pick it up with NW and moving forward. How it pans out-not sure. But I also think NW is a very bad team.

12. Not sure if there was an OL injury. I think there was a #56 on the OL that was not listed on the roster I have from pre-season. It might have been JB Nelson, who is listed as #55 on the pre-season.

13. Some nice effort by Dominic Deluca yesterday. Also ytesterday was the first game I saw that Keon Wylie played - he may have played earlier, but did not notice him until yesterday.

14. No one WR has stepped up. A little disappointing. But the upside is it keeps Clifford locking in on one receiver like he did with Dotson. Or McSorely did with KJ Hamler.

15. In the long run, hope the squad learns from it.

FTG

 

[PrtLng Lion]

Hard to argue with a W, but the things I saw that PSU could do better:

• Receivers dropped 3 passes I can remember that could have / should have been caught, were pretty well thrown by SC.
• Agree, SC is streaky. Especially on the run.
• Was the run blocking just better for Allen than when Singleton was in? Singleton seemed to run into 2 or 3 defenders barely a yard past the line of scrimmage. Allen found gaps and took advantage.
• After the first series or two, we didn't have much pressure on their QB (till the end of the game when backups were in). Maybe CMU's OL was pretty darn good (?).
• Kicking game (FG's)... uggg... I have a bad feeling about this.

 

[WestSideLion]

Nice post, ro. Thanks for sharing. Clifford is who he is 6 years in. He has average talent, but lots of grit. When on a hot streak, he’s dangerous, but he often can’t sustain that for a game.

Allen and Singleton are a great combo. They complement each other nicely and that opens up quite a few things for the offense.

 

[Bison13]

Hard to argue with a W, but the things I saw that PSU could do better:

• Receivers dropped 3 passes I can remember that could have / should have been caught, were pretty well thrown by SC.
• Agree, SC is streaky. Especially on the run.
• Was the run blocking just better for Allen than when Singleton was in? Singleton seemed to run into 2 or 3 defenders barely a yard past the line of scrimmage. Allen found gaps and took advantage.
• After the first series or two, we didn't have much pressure on their QB (till the end of the game when backups were in). Maybe CMU's OL was pretty darn good (?).
• Kicking game (FG's)... uggg... I have a bad feeling about this.

Allen got most of his yards in the second half when central Michigan did not have the safeties up in the box nearly as much. Feasible in regard to ros point About the big play mentality from the coaching staff to Clifford does play a part in him looking deep when the simple sex yard out would work.

 

[Connorpozlee]

I don’t typically nitpick coaches but I have to say this. I hate (and I mean absolutely hate) dropping pas rushing ends into coverage on obvious passing downs. It’s way too cutesy. CMU had 3rd and goal from the 30 and I see Chop Robinson dropping back into coverage. For gods sake, let the man go get the QB!

 

[91Joe95]

I don’t typically nitpick coach but I have to say this. I hate (and I mean absolutely hate) dropping pas rushing ends into coverage on obvious passing downs. It’s way too cutesy. CMU had 3rd and goal from the 30 and I see Chop Robinson dropping back into coverage. For gods sake, let the man go get the QB!

Especially since they turned down a 4th and goal from the 20 and instead accepted a penalty hoping to take CMU out of field goal range.

 

[Zone-Blitz]

CMU played cover zero because they had no fear of Clifford throwing deep. He didn’t disappoint. We better get used to the run game shut down and hoping good Clifford shows up from here on out because CMU provided the blueprint

 

[JakkL]

Jack and Steve mentioned a few times that the cmu D was showing cover 0 on 1st down a lot. My question is why didn't SC audible out-of a run or take the P option of RPO? This is his 6th year?!?!

 

[ILLINOISLION]

We play MUCH better when we play hurry-up on O and we play much better when we allow Clifford to run.

Did we run ANY hurry-ups on O? Maybe 1 or 2 plays?

Clifford broke containment and had clear field in front of him AT LEAST 5-6 times in the first half, never ran it once. The second half first play was a called run for him, went for an easy 15 yds.

 

[84lion]

Downloaded from Youtube and watched most of this today (pretty bad, first half especially very chopped up, missing plays – you get what you pay for). FWIW:

O Looked to me like “typical PSU” that either gets off to a slow start or gets up by a couple scores and then either the other team adjusts or PSU D goes to sleep or whatever. And PSU O hits a wall and can’t get anything going. Not to take away from CMU but PSU let them back into it.

O Best thing PSU has done is to de-emphasize the RPO. Number of negative plays has been reduced and as a result, drives and TOP are improved. Running and passing game is a lot better. Seems to be a lot less "Chinese fire drill" on the sidelines as well.

O Millen mentioned Clifford being “streaky” and he was right. Cliff’s either on fire or cold as ice. OTOH, Cliff’s stats looked OK, 22-34, 217 yards, 3 TD. Hard to argue with that.

O CMU 4 TOs, PSU none.

O PSU D again looks “typical” in that they let the opposition run all over the field but are fairly stingy about letting the other team score. As Dilbert says, “I’ll take it.”

O Kicking game is a huge problem. Needs to be corrected or PSU will lose a game or two due to this.

O Franklin’s in-game management – well, as Westside says about Clifford, “he is who he is” and that isn’t gonna change. Nevertheless I would not be surprised to see that cost a game this year as well.

Overall, PSU appears to be a good team and improving. Are they good enough to beat Michigan away and Minnesota and Ohio State at home? We will see. Even if “worst case” they go 0-3, the remaining games are all winnable (Indiana and Maryland – either or both could be losses especially if the team drops 3 straight). There seems to be enough depth this year that they should be able to overcome injuries if they occur.

 

[VaDave4PSU]

Was the run blocking just better for Allen than when Singleton was in? Singleton seemed to run into 2 or 3 defenders barely a yard past the line of scrimmage. Allen found gaps and took advantage.

CMU seemed to play the LoS tighter when Singleton was in at RB. A lot of his plays were kind of predictable in nature and were likely to be "stopped or Singleton burns them". The staff made the proper adjustment: play your other RB. Allen got better looks and made them pay. Singleton has plenty of growing to do from the mental aspect of "you can't take everything outside", but like Barkley you can't take away his biggest threat either.

I hate (and I mean absolutely hate) dropping pas rushing ends into coverage on obvious passing downs. It’s way too cutesy.

Personally, I felt like they are setting something up with this. The DEs seemed to be going 5-10 yards deep playing middle field 1/3 outer zone. My bet is they go towards the middle of the field vs Michigan and we get a INT.

 

[Connorpozlee]

CMU seemed to play the LoS tighter when Singleton was in at RB. A lot of his plays were kind of predictable in nature and were likely to be "stopped or Singleton burns them". The staff made the proper adjustment: play your other RB. Allen got better looks and made them pay. Singleton has plenty of growing to do from the mental aspect of "you can't take everything outside", but like Barkley you can't take away his biggest threat either.



Personally, I felt like they are setting something up with this. The DEs seemed to be going 5-10 yards deep playing middle field 1/3 outer zone. My bet is they go towards the middle of the field vs Michigan and we get a INT.

Yeah, I thought of that. But to see it just drives me insane. I want my pas rushers rushing the passers, not trying to cover a receiver while the coverage guys are trying to rush the passer.

 

[Bvillebaron]

1. PSU won and to the best of my knowledge, no PSU player got hurt.

2. If the Auburn players had CMU’s coaching staff they would have made a better showing last week.

3. On paper- great game by Clifford. But he was really hot or really cold. He missed a few open receivers underneath. especially Katron Allen on the sideline. Clifford went deep when he did not have to. Sometimes I wonder if CJF pushes the analytics on the quarterback so that he feels pressured to have a big play when a smaller play would suffice. BTW , Allen was wide open on that play and probably would have had a big run after a short pass.
However, in Clifford’s defense, I think a few passes should have been caught. A 4th down pass to Tinsley comes to mind.

4. Glad Katron Allen decided not to be swayed by Singleton commmitting to PSU. He really shone yesterday.

5. PSU is 1-0 this week and 4-0 overall. Fifth time in six years PSU starts the season 4-0. As always it’s the rest of the season that creates the problem. Perhaps PSU should petition the conference to play OSU or Michigan in the first 1/3 of the season , moving forward.

6. On both offense and defense, the underneath area of the field is a problem. Offensively, Clifford does not look for receivers underneath, and defensively, the blueprint for attacking Diaz’s defense was drawn by Auburn and CMU studying it well. Auburn had running QBs to exploit the underneath, and CMU used their big WR or TE underneath. I think Diaz made an All American of their WR #2.

7. The CMU team that showed up at the Beav yesterday is better than the Auburn team at Jordan Hare last week. As a team. AU certainly had better talent, but CMU was far more focused and organized. They fought to the end.

8. Love the PSU Defensive Secondary.

9. Hard to believe the Defense could not get a sack until the very end - kudos to DDS.

10. I saw an interview with former PSU DL Jack Crawford - he said the season is like doing 12 sprints, and not a marathon. Thought that was a good way of putting it.

11. I think CMU will be show to be more of a challenge than Northwestern next week. I think the team has had their lull, and will now start to pick it up with NW and moving forward. How it pans out-not sure. But I also think NW is a very bad team.

12. Not sure if there was an OL injury. I think there was a #56 on the OL that was not listed on the roster I have from pre-season. It might have been JB Nelson, who is listed as #55 on the pre-season.

13. Some nice effort by Dominic Deluca yesterday. Also ytesterday was the first game I saw that Keon Wylie played - he may have played earlier, but did not notice him until yesterday.

14. No one WR has stepped up. A little disappointing. But the upside is it keeps Clifford locking in on one receiver like he did with Dotson. Or McSorely did with KJ Hamler.

15. In the long run, hope the squad learns from it.

FTG

Good analysis. The problem with the underneath stuff is the blitzing IMO.

 

[PSUJam]

1. PSU won and to the best of my knowledge, no PSU player got hurt.

2. If the Auburn players had CMU’s coaching staff they would have made a better showing last week.

3. On paper- great game by Clifford. But he was really hot or really cold. He missed a few open receivers underneath. especially Katron Allen on the sideline. Clifford went deep when he did not have to. Sometimes I wonder if CJF pushes the analytics on the quarterback so that he feels pressured to have a big play when a smaller play would suffice. BTW , Allen was wide open on that play and probably would have had a big run after a short pass.
However, in Clifford’s defense, I think a few passes should have been caught. A 4th down pass to Tinsley comes to mind.

4. Glad Katron Allen decided not to be swayed by Singleton commmitting to PSU. He really shone yesterday.

5. PSU is 1-0 this week and 4-0 overall. Fifth time in six years PSU starts the season 4-0. As always it’s the rest of the season that creates the problem. Perhaps PSU should petition the conference to play OSU or Michigan in the first 1/3 of the season , moving forward.

6. On both offense and defense, the underneath area of the field is a problem. Offensively, Clifford does not look for receivers underneath, and defensively, the blueprint for attacking Diaz’s defense was drawn by Auburn and CMU studying it well. Auburn had running QBs to exploit the underneath, and CMU used their big WR or TE underneath. I think Diaz made an All American of their WR #2.

7. The CMU team that showed up at the Beav yesterday is better than the Auburn team at Jordan Hare last week. As a team. AU certainly had better talent, but CMU was far more focused and organized. They fought to the end.

8. Love the PSU Defensive Secondary.

9. Hard to believe the Defense could not get a sack until the very end - kudos to DDS.

10. I saw an interview with former PSU DL Jack Crawford - he said the season is like doing 12 sprints, and not a marathon. Thought that was a good way of putting it.

11. I think CMU will be show to be more of a challenge than Northwestern next week. I think the team has had their lull, and will now start to pick it up with NW and moving forward. How it pans out-not sure. But I also think NW is a very bad team.

12. Not sure if there was an OL injury. I think there was a #56 on the OL that was not listed on the roster I have from pre-season. It might have been JB Nelson, who is listed as #55 on the pre-season.

13. Some nice effort by Dominic Deluca yesterday. Also ytesterday was the first game I saw that Keon Wylie played - he may have played earlier, but did not notice him until yesterday.

14. No one WR has stepped up. A little disappointing. But the upside is it keeps Clifford locking in on one receiver like he did with Dotson. Or McSorely did with KJ Hamler.

15. In the long run, hope the squad learns from it.

FTG

I wasn't at the game but am happy to share this post from @Lubrano from FB.

"Joe was not only mentioned but his voice was also heard. In fact, the pre-game video prior to the Ohio game was the first time since 2011 that Joe’s voice was heard in Beaver Stadium.

President Bendapudi and Athletics Director Pat Kraft are embracing our past, in particular the contributions of Joe and Sue.

I fully expect to see and hear more of Joe during the balance of the season.

We remain very hopeful that Joe and Sue will be appropriately honored at Beaver Stadium…

Frankly, a change in leadership at the University was needed for any of this to occur."

 

[VaDave4PSU]

I wasn't at the game but am happy to share this post from @Lubrano from FB.

"Joe was not only mentioned but his voice was also heard. In fact, the pre-game video prior to the Ohio game was the first time since 2011 that Joe’s voice was heard in Beaver Stadium.

President Bendapudi and Athletics Director Pat Kraft are embracing our past, in particular the contributions of Joe and Sue.

I fully expect to see and hear more of Joe during the balance of the season.

We remain very hopeful that Joe and Sue will be appropriately honored at Beaver Stadium…

Frankly, a change in leadership at the University was needed for any of this to occur."

Sue was in the President's box suite Saturday.

 

[PSUJam]

Sue was in the President's box suite Saturday.

I'm happy that she was able to accommodate others in her suite and hope they were appreciative.