Crimson Red Sports

                                                                                      UM vs Bama

First, congrats to the Bama players and coaches on the big win today.  Obviously, some improvement needed in areas, but not a bad start.

OFFFENSE:  The offense put together 414 total yards which included 303 passing and 111 rushing yards.  For negative plays, I have Bama with 7 tackles for losses 2 sacks, and one fumble lost.  Most, if not all of these occurred in the 2nd half.  Bama had 2 three and outs one which was on their first possession of the game. For plays that covered 10+ yards, Bama had 14 passing plays and 4 running plays.  As far as scoring drives, Bama got into the red zone 5 times. They scored 4 touchdowns and fumbled once.  The other scores came from outside the red zone with a touchdown pass and a field goal. 

QB:  I thought Jones played a very good game.  After starting out 5 for 10, he went 13 for 14 the rest of the game.  The one incompletion was a drop.  He put the ball on the mark where the receivers were the only ones able to make a play on the ball.  Many passes hit the receivers in stride.  There were a couple of throws that had to be perfectly thrown and he did it.  Young had a decent day for his first game in college football.  He was 5 for 8 and showed some poise in the pocket.  He did make a bad throw on his last pass but thankfully it wasn’t in a crucial situation.

RB:  Harris ran the ball well and had over 100 total yards when combining receiving and rushing yards.  The other running backs didn’t find the openings that was provided for Harris.  I do think most of this was the fault of the offensive line.

Rec: As expected this year, Waddle and Smith were the main targets coming in.  They both had 8 catches and Waddle had 2 touchdowns in those 8 catches.  Metchie looks to be a good complement to the receiving core.  Also, they throw in a ball or two to the tight-end every once in a while.  The backs, except for the drop by Robinson, also have the ability to make plays in the passing game.

OL:  This game really didn’t impress me with the offensive line.  Bama did run for over a 100 yards and most of it was done in 3 quarters.  I say this because they were not dominant in the closing part of the game.  The good news is there were few negative plays in the first half, but almost all, if not all came in the second half.  I did notice the OL chasing the wrong way a couple of times which allowed the Tiger’s LB to shoot the gap and make the play.  If the OL hadn’t been chasing back, then he may have gotten to the 2nd level to make the block and spring the runner.  I also, saw a missed stunt pick-up which led to a sack.  I don’t know they just looked lazy to me in the 2nd half.  If
could be they need to be in better game shape.

Def:  Bama gave up a total of 322 yards which included 253 passing and 69 rushing.  Of this yardage, 187 came on the last 3 drives when there were some back-ups in.  This is also where most of their points came from.  As for negative plays, I have the Bama defense with 5 tackles for losses, 5 sacks (officially it shows up as three in the stats), and 2 fumbles recovered (one on special teams).  As for plays that covered 10+ yards, I have Missouri with 8 passing plays and 2 running plays.  They got into the red zone 3 times and scored 2 field goals and a touchdown.  One touchdown came from outside the red zone.  The touchdown at the end of the game was where the DL lost their lanes and allowed the QB to walk into the end zone. The biggest flaws I saw on defense was missed tackles.

DL: The DL, as no one really stood out to me they played a solid 3 quarters. I guess this could be expected when not really knowing what to expect from a new coach and team.  Also, I don’t know how long Bama had to really prepare when Missouri was added to their schedule.  I am sure they had to scramble to get video on them.  I do think Anderson with be a star if he can remain healthy.  I also think the long touchdown on the wheel route may have been a bust on the freshman outside backer Sanders #16.  I say this without knowing their coverage and responsibilities.

LB: It was great to see Moses back on the field.  In my opinion, the defense didn’t seem to be moving around as much.   I thought he showed the speed he had before the injury.  I also thought Harris looked like he was freed up to play with less responsibility on his plate.

DB: They really weren’t challenged much downfield as most of the passing game by Missouri was in the short to intermediate parts of the field.  The quick passing game by Missouri also help take away from the pass rush.  It also seemed they like to throw the ball were the inside backers vacated. 

Special Teams:  Bama’s special teams were solid.  They hit all the extra points and field goals.  There was only one kickoff return that went for 25 yards and that return was aided by a penalty.   Punts were decent and covered well where they even recovered a fumble that led to a field goal.

Penalties:  Bama had 7 penalties.  Many of them unforced.  There was an unsportsmanlike conduct on the kickoff return that gave Missouri good field position.  Fortunately, didn’t hurt them.  They had a holding that negated a sack.  Three false starts by three different OL.  There was an illegal formation on the extra point which didn’t hurt, and finally a delay of game.  These, as usual, need to be cleaned up.

Finally, this was a good way to start the season. Bama has some areas to clean up, tackling/penalties.  Also, there is some blocking assignments that need to be fixed.  I will say, the commentators kept saying that Missouri had a solid defense, so that may be part of the problem.  It wasn’t a good look to the start of the game when Bama had a player coming on late as well as going 3 and out.  The good news is there is plenty of room for improvement.  I also think the defense played very vanilla, but they must clean up tackles and assignments.  By assignments I mean coverage responsibilities as well as rushing lanes and responsibilities. If you are playing on the end of the LOS, you have to keep the offensive player on your inside player.  This hurt Bama a couple of times yesterday.

Feel free to comment:

17 and Counting

Great to see you back coach!  Now I KNOW BAMA football is back!

Great job hscoach. Welcome back. My main gripe again is these blessed penalties. RTR!

Thanks coach.


I've been wondering if we might miss Scott Cochran's weight room.  With the rotation in the second half this was a good game for the Bama coaches to assess how in shape our linemen were without them running out of steam on the field.  The players looked good to me.  Much better than any other team I saw yesterday.

Thanks again for your game notes.

RE

It was a solid but not great performance against an SEC opponent. They won without difficulty, got the young guys some SEC road game experience, and escaped without major injuries as far as I know. I’ll take that any week any season.

hscoach, even though Trey Sanders was in with the second OL, I didn't like what I saw. He looked tentative - that might be because of lack of push from the OL, but when Robinson got back in, he hit the hole hard and viciously. Overall, with no spring ball and the COVID situation, I liked what I saw.

Carl I have the opinion that Trey getting in the real play time he found out the speed and hitting is a lot different. Maybe he will come to what we all thought he could do but we will have to see. Good to see people coming back. RTR!

I went back and watched the replay 3 times and I have to say we have a big drop off it seems from the 1st team offense and defense to the 2nd team.
Does anybody else see that or will it improve maybe with games. There are games on our schedule that look like really tough games right now for instance Georgia, TA&M, Fla especially if we get that far. RTR!

I think you had a lot of underclassmen and first timers in with the backups.  The lack of the spring game as well as limited practices, probably hinders some of the progress.  I would imagine a lot of times are in the same situation.

He may be tentative at this point.  Coming off an injury with very little contact for a long while could add to that.  Also, the just wasn't a lot of push by the OL when he was in the game, even when some of the starters were still in.  I really didn't see a lot of openings when he was in there. 

Great breakdown, Coach. I only got to watch pieces of the game. I really liked what I saw in the first half and was obviously disappointed in the 2nd half.

It did look like maybe the players were a bit out of shape, but I'm tickled to death with the lack of injuries. At this point in the season, I'll take that trade off.

I think it will take some experience time then maybe we can all get up to par with the 2nd teams and all. I do like what a CNS offense brings to field these days but the defense just don't look like it did in the old days of CNS. RTR!

Saw a stat somewhere yesterday talking about the rough start for some other big stars from earlier days and they said don't be surprised by the first game.  Derrick Henry among others were listed in the article.