Michigan Game Summary

I'm not going to write much guys. This was a pretty devastating loss for me and I don't really know what to say. I'm not organizing this, just bulleting items. I don't even think I'm going to tie it all together.

I'm encouraged by the things Weis is saying after this game. Things like, "Pick your heads up guys. Look at me. We all win as a team and we all lose as a team. And that includes me. But this is not acceptable. It's not OK to play like this. We will not stay at the status quo, things are going to change." I like how he says his confidence isn't shaken. I like how he understands where the players are mentally, where he needs to get them, but at the same time not allowing them to have excuses. I'm skeptical that he knows everything he thinks he does. I'm discouraged because I thought beat downs like this were a thing of the past. Losing is one thing, getting your butt handed to you is quite another. You are going to hear all this weak about how Michigan has better players than us, better athletes. Well that just isn't true. Michigan recruited Brady, Michigan recruited Darius, Michigan recruited John Ryan and Robby Parris. It isn't the athletes. We have the horses, we just weren't prepared or in the right frame of mind to play. Part of that is coaching, part of it isn't. The coaches didn't turn the ball over, but the coaches did put Lambert one-on-one with Manningham...twice. After the first touchdown I would have thought we would have learned. I know the guy is the fastest defensive back we have but Clifford Jefferson was lightning fast and we all know how good he was. I would like to be optimistic, but the last four games have really been pretty poor performances. I hope Weis is the man to lead us back to the promise land. I don't mind if we lose the occasional game to a good team. It just makes me physically ill when we get beaten so bad.

We really gave them the game. Five turnovers, two for scores directly and one inside our own 25ish yard line doesn't win games. If you turn the ball over five times, you aren't going to win against a top 25 team unless they turn it over several times as well. Add to that the fact that we went 3 and out 8 times during the game and you have two of the top three correlations for winning football games going against you. That isn't all coaching, that's partly the players. You don't make the opposition work very hard when you go 3 and out and don't change the field position much.
I've said this for quite some time now and people haven't really listened to me, thought I was cynical, etc. Brady Quinn is not a great quarterback. He hasn't looked great this whole year. His accuracy is poor and he doesn't read defenses incredibly well. People will say things to the contrary but if you go back and look at great quarterbacks, they don't make mistakes on too many throws and they always know who to go to. Going back and looking at film, Brady has missed tons of open receivers. Now, to his credit, he is a tough kid, has a strong arm, and is a good leader. I also think his scrambling ability is underrated (this wouldn't even need to be noticed if our offensive line could block someone). But as a quarterback looking to go to the next level, I don't think he has what it takes to really succeed at this point. Maybe I'm wrong, Weis loves the guy and he knows far more than I do, but I think his receivers and Darius make him look much better than he is. I hope I'm wrong but I haven't seen more than a handful of times that he consistently looks good during a drive, much less a game. I think BYU was an example last year but other than that I'm not sure there has been many good outings for him save a couple of 2 minute drills.

I'm very concerned that people are beginning to figure Weis out. It seems incredibly unlikely that it could happen given the fact that it didn't seem to happen in the NFL but our offense just hasn't looked like they did at all last year. Last year there were a few games where we were really just clicking on all cylinders. This year it seems like we haven't had a drive like that save a few first half ending hurry up drives (which begs the question why we ever huddle at all). I thought Weis was going to carve young, first time defensive coordinator Ron English up. I was poorly mistaken. I thought this would always be an advantage for us. I'm not so sure now. Of course, it's tough to call plays when you are down by 20+ points. Doesn't leave you a lot of options and the defense pretty much knows what you're going to do and can turn loose after Brady.

They kept rushing the passer relentlessly and bringing pressure...where were the screens? And no, those little tight end screens don't count. Carlson doesn't have the shiftiness to make people miss in the open field.

I thought we had a chance at halftime. We were down three scores, we have an offense that is supposed to be capable of scoring a lot. But then we start the second half and go 3 and out twice. No sense of urgency in that one. Our defense held, our offense didn't deliver.

We can't block on the offensive line and we can't run the ball. I don't know what else to say about this. Doesn't make much sense that we could do it last year and not this year with virtually the same offensive line.

Zibi went back to his old form of biting on play action. On Manningham's last touchdown he should have been helping over the top.

Wooden can't bite on a short out when covering Manningham on the first touchdown reception if he is locked up on him one-on-one. If you are on an island you give the receiver the short out to prevent the big play on the out and up. That isn't rocket science, it's football 101. That said, I hope we didn't lose him to injury. I don't like a Stanton lining up across from a freshman.

I thought our defensive line played particularly well. Actually, I thought our defense as a whole played all right (minus a handful of those big plays). I pin the last Manningham touchdown on Minter. Don't leave Lambert one-on-one on him. A lot of the other scores were from turnovers directly or indirectly. We gave up a relatively large number of rushing yards but like 75 of them came on like 5 plays. Being on the field for so long, they had to get tired and a few plays like that are going to happen. But overall, I think they played physically and pretty well. My concerns about stopping the run are somewhat relieved although they did manage to bring our safeties up via play action.
Once again Minter made excellent halftime adjustments. Carr didn't go conservative like he usually does and like John L. Smith did last year in the MSU game. They kept calling the plays and the defense got much better in the second half, particularly on third down.

Thomas had a pretty good game. Minter must have been saving that delayed blitz with him. It worked pretty well.

I said we had to make Henne beat us. While we gave up some easy throws down the field, give the kid some credit. He played very well especially after giving up an early interception. It takes a lot to bounce back like that.

I don't understand how Samardzija can't get open. And if he is being double and triple covered, why isn't someone else open. And if someone else is open, why can't Brady find them?

I'm very concerned about our approach to this game. We came out and looked like we expected to win, which is good, but we didn't seem to understand what it took to win. We were physically manhandled on the offensive side of the ball. We just looked uninspired. As a top team in the country, you have to come out every week with a chip on your shoulder, wanting it, being physical. We can't just be a good team when we are facing adversity and playing against the odds. We can't just play well when we are the underdog. We have to be able to handle successes, to win when we are expected to, to not play to the level of our competition. To be honest, we looked like a Willingham or Davie coached team. I'm really interested to see where we go next week but I'd be lying if I said I'm looking forward to it. I'm also extremely concerned about how this will affect recruiting. If I was a potential recruit in town for this game/watching this game I wouldn't want to come play for us. Weis seemed to indicate he got the opposite impression from those in town but I don't know.