Here are a couple of quotes from the Dallas Morning News:
If you want to end a long, long road losing streak, come to Ford Stadium.
…the Mustangs' defense tired, and the offense stalled with ineffective play.
For the game, SMU had 270 yards in total offense and doesn't appear to be an improving team in the spread offense. Bennett said he is committed to the spread offense under coordinator Rusty Burns.
They drew 12 flags. They turned over the football twice. They appeared to mismanage the clock at times. They should be better next weekend when they meet SMU, a team that not long ago measured up as their rivals. Now, the only thing TCU and SMU football have in common is Interstate 30. Competitively, they are light years apart.
Indeed, none of TCU's shortcomings Saturday seemed a result of it being rattled in a place, and against a team, that usually strikes fear in most opponents. This is out of SMU's league, for example. The Longhorns in recent years seem to quake at the mere sight of the Sooners coming down the Cotton Bowl tunnel.
As an aside, Blackistone, you can kiss my ass. Don’t praise SMU’s academic standards once a year and then write this crap.
The Quarterbacks.
Eckert’s drives:
Drive 1:
0-2; punt
Drive 2:
0-2; yanked; Romo comes in and TD.
Drive 3:
0-1; turnover on downs
Drive 4:
0-3; punt (punt dropped and SMU recovers)
Drive 5:
0-2; field goal
Drive 6:
5-7 and a sack; TD
The boxscore shows Eckert as 6-18 though I cant figure out where that sixth completion was. The guy was 0-10 and everything he threw went over the receiver’s head. Eckert’s performance was a disaster. I can’t for the life of me understand why he went out on the field after Baylor fumbled that punt return.
It doesn’t matter what Eckert and Romo do next week, the quarterback situation is the same as it was last year. Which is the same as every year of Bennett’s tenure. I’d say Romo better start, but does it really matter?
The Offense:
Correct me if I am wrong, but we had Spring ball, right? I could have sworn I read a press release that said they were practicing in the Spring. Obviously, the defense got a lot of work, because the offense looks like it was shelved the day after the UTEP game and finally taken out of storage on late Friday afternoon. “Gosh, Rusty. Maybe we should, you know, practice a few plays before the game tomorrow, or something.”
The offense, when it was successful, was the same offense we ran when Phillips was the quarterback as a true freshman the last five games of 2003. Ultra conservative, hand off or make a read, then tuck the ball and run. The spread offense requires receivers, which apparently weren’t on the field until late fourth quarter.
Though I missed the halftime interview, Bennett apparently said they were going to run it down their throats. They actually stuck with it according to the play by play, but that is not what I remember. I guess I recall Eckert’s futility as being indicative of the entire second half.
The Defense.
How do you blame the defense? The defense got tired. The defense got tired because the offense couldn’t stay on the field for longer than 90 seconds at a time in the second half. I was also led to believe we would be rotating defensive lineman, which never happened the second half.
Going for it on 4th Down.
I got into a discussion about this with BrianTinBigD. I don’t have that much of a problem with it. At the end of the half, Baylor kicked a 47 yard field goal. They hadn’t moved the ball all game. I think the play called was stupid. It looked unorganized and the players looked confused. And that was the problem.
Next week.
Next week is going to suck. My least favorite memory of Ford Stadium was sitting in the rain against TCU in 2000. TCU had already accepted its bowl bid; there was nobody from SMU there; Coach Fran was auditioning for Alabama; for the TCU fans that greatly outnumbered the SMU fans, it was one big party. Saturday, with the possible exception of the rain, is going to be a repeat performance.
2 comments:
I still think that it was stupid to go for it on 4th down. Right up there with going for 2 last year and letting Tulsa back into the game.
Eckert was awful. The only reason he had the 5 completions on the last drive is because we dropped into a prevent defense and gave ya'll the underneath routes to burn the clock.
Romo is the man for now, though Phillips needs to see some time. Eckert needs to be the holder.
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