[CTcard]

We are 25th in offensive efficiency; 96th in defensive efficiency. We are 41st in offensive points per drive (2.6 ppd), we are 100th in defensive points per drive (2.81 ppd given up).

It's not just the numbers. For the first time since 2015 I am rather optimistic about the prospects for the offense.

The run game hasn't yet been great (only two good games) but the OL is showing signs of moving people, some competency with both gap and zone blocking, and there are two young backs who look competent.
The pass game finally looks like it is working towards some purpose. We're not just throwing back-shoulder/box-out lobs. There are full route trees, some downfield and some higher percentage routes, (some slants as somebody noted, but we're still not very good at that), and even some throws to backs getting them the ball moving in the right direction. Miraculously, the pass game didn't collapse when we lost two of our top three receivers - though the windows got awfully small.
The run pass mix is still pretty pass heavy, but getting better. Our plays are still too formation dependent, but not really down dependent. Personally, I think we're in the shotgun way too often, but maybe I'm just old fashioned that way.

The best thing is that most of the key contributors are pretty young. Even without the pandemic eligibility rules, I think the only real contributor who would have been using up eligibility is occasional starter Harrington. Mills game by game trajectory has been pretty good, with PER of 110, 140, 148, 166 - and those without the volume collapsing (though not as crazy as in the Colorado game).

Overall, the offense is far from being the almost unstoppable machine of 2015, but one can see a plan that looks like it could develop into something.

The defense ... that's a much bigger problem.

[Has anyone else seen a software glitch where an entire post disappears upon hitting the return key? That just happened to the first version of this post.]

[CTcard]

We are 25th in offensive efficiency; 96th in defensive efficiency. We are 41st in offensive points per drive (2.6 ppd), we are 100th in defensive points per drive (2.81 ppd given up).

It's not just the numbers. For the first time since 2015 I am rather optimistic about the prospects for the offense.

The run game hasn't yet been great (only two good games) but the OL is showing signs of moving people, some competency with both gap and zone blocking, and there are two young backs who look competent.
The pass game finally looks like it is working towards some purpose. We're not just throwing back-shoulder/box-out lobs. There are full route trees, some downfield and some higher percentage routes, (some slants as somebody noted, but we're still not very good at that), and even some throws to backs getting them the ball moving in the right direction. Miraculously, the pass game didn't collapse when we lost two of our top three receivers - though the windows got awfully small.
The run pass mix is still pretty pass heavy, but getting better. Our plays are still too formation dependent, but not really down dependent. Personally, I think we're in the shotgun way too often, but maybe I'm just old fashioned that way.

The best thing is that most of the key contributors are pretty young. Even without the pandemic eligibility rules, I think the only real contributor who would have been using up eligibility is occasional starter Harrington. Mills game by game trajectory has been pretty good, with PER of 110, 140, 148, 166 - and those without the volume collapsing (though not as crazy as in the Colorado game).

Overall, the offense is far from being the almost unstoppable machine of 2015, but one can see a plan that looks like it could develop into something.

The defense ... that's a much bigger problem.

[Has anyone else seen a software glitch where an entire post disappears upon hitting the return key? That just happened to the first version of this post.]