- Dion Lewis might be the real deal. Another fantastic game from the true freshman with 236 yards of total offense. The 80 yard touchdown run in the second half put this game out of reach for Buffalo. He is a deceptively strong runner for a guy his size. Hopefully he can continue this early success and put up a huge season.
- That was as good as we will ever see Bill Stull play. Cignetti has devised a gameplan where Stull isn't getting the opportunity to make mistakes. Everything is either a screen pass or a simple read. I kept commenting during that for once Stull looked comfortable in the pocket and throwing the screens. All that being said Stull still had 5-7 horrible passes (most notably throwing two bubble screens 6 feet in front of the wide receiver), 2 of which could have been picked off. If the first pass of the game was picked off the story of this game for Stull would have been much different.
- The defense had a horrible game. Buffalo found a way to negate the pressure from the defensive line and put on a clinic on how to exploit us in the passing game. I have said this a million times since we started the site, when teams pass the ball out of the spread our base defense system doesn't work. You can't expect outside linebackers to cover slot wide receivers for more than 3 seconds. That spot in the middle of the field that Buffalo kept attacking will always be there unless we add another secondary player or get to the QB faster.
- Losing Taglianetti for the season is a blow to our depth but now we get to see Elijah Fields. He needs to seize this final opportunity to be a productive college player. I'm very interested to see how this goes.
- Enjoy the early success. As of now everything is still on course for successful season. Sure the defense had a bad game and the final score hides how close this game was but don't worry. 54 points from our offense is like 145 points from another team. Cignetti has had two successes as a playcaller. The defense can come around with slight tweaks. I'm reasonably optimistic about this season.
I'm in the process of getting the podcast up which will cover the game a little more in depth. Thanks again for reading and I'll be back tomorrow.
1 comment:
Some good insights into the Buffalo game... I agree that the play calling was excellent by cignetti. One comment on your posting, I thought Buffalo did a great job negating our D-Line. Buffalo used a lot of 3 step drops or passes from the gun where the ball was delivered in under 3 seconds. Lots of timing routes and soft corner play lead to the D-Line being non existant in the first half. I thought it was great play calling by Buffalo which allowed them to avoid the Pitt D-Line pressure... Something they need to strategize against in the future.
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