Simming the Sugar Bowl

Continuing our NCAA09 tour through the BCS, we've got Chris taking Alabama and Russell playing as Utah. All-American difficulty, 7-minute Quarters, Even Teams.

Utah takes the opening kickoff to the 40. First play is an option, Brian Johnson keeps it for a 12 yard gain. Eddie Wide takes over as a surprising starter at RB, and the option attack begins. Stalling out as the Utes approach the red zone, they hit a 44 yard FG.

Following two runs for 8 yards, JPW fires incomplete on 3rd. Terry Grant gives Bama just enough to convert the 4th, and the Tahhhde roll on. Bama rotates to Glen Coffee, who continues to pound the ball. Eventually they punt, old school.

Mack comes back in at RB and converts a key third down option. The Ute offense keeps cranking out first down on the ground, again stalling out nearing the red zone. Field goal and it's 6-0.

Alabama needs all of two plays to bust a 57 yard TD run by Terry Grant and it's 7-6.

A tired defense takes the field and it looks like trouble as the Utes gain 8 yards on their first play from scrimmage. End of the first quarter. Johnson picks up the first down then takes over the drive, scrambling for consecutive big plays. The drive ends with a 18 yard TD run by Darrell Mack.

Alabama takes the ball and this time they come out throwing. A quick first down pass to Grant, followed by a nice run by Grant. But it's for naught, drive ends in a punt.

Utah's offense finally stalls out from the get-go, ending with an incompletion to a tightly covered receiver.

This time around, Terry Grant comes out with a head full of steam, making defenders miss and picking up more big plays. Nikita Stover makes a key catch on 3rd down to keep the drive alive at midfield. Grant picks up a ten yard run on second down, but it's called back for offensive holding! "Fuck it, I'm going deep" John Parker thinks, clearly pissed off about the call. It's complete for 35 yards to Mike McCoy. Two plays later, Stover hauls it in in the end zone and the Tide have retaken the lead 14-13.

Utah takes over at their 34 with just 28 seconds remaining and two timeouts. (it's not "times out" assholes, timeout is one fucking word) Johnson's first pass is drilled deep into a cornerback's backside on first down. Second down, the play action isn't fooling anybody, but Charlie Higgenbothem drops a sure interception. It will haunt the Tide, as Johnson completes a 46 yard bomb to Jereme Brooks. With time running out, the Utes take a field goal and a 16-14 lead at the half.

Alabama comes out in the third quarter with their newly installed "Spread Fail" package, copyright Tony Franklin. JP runs an option for a one-yard loss then throws a horrible incompletion on 3rd. But it's Stover hauling in the 4th down completion to the Utah 40! But Wilson returns to form throwing a deep pick.

Following a first down and a penalty, however, Brian Johnson returns the favor. Rolando McClain returns an interception just past midfield. With some momentum on his team's side, JPW fires a bullet to McCoy before the Tide are back to pounding away with Grant. The defense holds, and after a FG we're sitting at 17-16.

For shits and giggles, Brian Johnson throws a 70 yard out that's incomplete only because the safety went to Mohammad Massaquoi's school of catching. Utah turns back to the option game. Facing a third and ten, Bama's defense has the quarterback contained against the sideline. But Johnson lofts a pass to his tight end, twenty yard gain and a first down! Mack runs the ball to the 8 yard line on the following play, first and goal! We finish the third quarter with a 2 yard loss on a QB keeper, second and goal.

This is a key drive as we're now in the fourth quarter. Mack gets nailed at the line before Johnson completes a pass to the one yard line on third down. Utah lines up in a goalline power formation on 4th and goal! But it's a bluff, they call timeout with 1 second left on the playclock then kick a FG. 19-17, Utes.

Bama now needs to score. JPW starts the drive off on the right note with a 19 yard pass that's miraculously caught by Nick Walker (not Welkah). Grant softens up the defense with a five yard gain, then it's a slant to Stover. The Tide offense is showing balance, but after a 2 yard loss and an incompletion, Bama faces 3rd and 12. With a truly Innovative playcall, the offense runs a HB power and Grant takes it to the house! 25 yard TD run and they follow it up with a successful 2-point try, 25-19.

Utah gets a nice kickoff return to the 42 yard line, and they need a touchdown with 4:35 remaining. Matt Asiata gets things started with a 5 yard iso, but the gain is negated by a delay of game penalty as Johnson attempts to audible each receiver's route. After Johnson gains three yards, Utah faces a 3rd and 7. Johnson again audibles at the line, and completes a fade to his wide receiver. Shedding the tackle, the gain goes to the Alabama 15! Darrell Mack takes it to the 2, where the battle is on! First and goal: 1 yard gain by Mack. Second and goal: Johnson's nailed at the line. Third and goal: Johnson takes it in, and the Utes have an improbable 4th quarter lead by just a point!

Alabama takes the field with 1:37 remaining, trailing 26-25. Thinking they can fool the defense, Terry Grant takes the handoff but is held to a 3 yard gain. But Wilson forces the following pass into triple coverage, incomplete. On 3rd and 7, Wilson scrambles to his left and throws a deep bomb to McCoy, complete! Bama's nearing field goal range, and the playcalling goes conservative. Grant gains six yards on two carries, but is held to a 2 yard loss on 3rd down. The Tide line up for a field goal with 23 seconds, and it's wide right!

Not satisfied to merely win, Utah looks to humiliate the SEC runner up. They complete a 11 yard pass for a first down just to let Saban know that they fucking could, then kneel down on the ensuing play. Utah wins 26-25 in a back and forth game! Folks, the real Sugar Bowl will be nowhere near this competitive.

Week 1 recap B10/Big E

This weekend showed the growth of these two conferences, and where they might be heading in the next few years. There has been a significant drop in talent in both of these conferences, and amazingly they are all still very competitive. However, it clearly showed that these two conferences have a few more years before their parity will climb to the point where they may be able to compete against the SEC.

So to break down what happened this weekend:

Thursday: Connecticut vs Hofstra and Cincinnati vs Eastern Kentucky. Connecticut is an aspiring Top 25 team, having shown last year that they have come a long way by beating Pitt and Rutgers last year. However they still have a ways to go, losing fairly handedly to both Cincinnati and West Virginia.

Cincinnati, on the other hand, was the surprise of the Big East, especially with the loss of a good coach in Dantoni. This should be their year, but next week they face the daunted Sooners. Putting that as a loss, their only real challenge afterwards should be WVU. This game was merely a warmup for the rest of the season.

Iowa State faced SD State. They only gave up two TDs, and in the fourth quarter. We'll really see whether Chizik has made second year improvements in week 3 when they face Iowa.

Saturday:

Ohio State played Tressel's old team, mainly to give the Penguins some money. However, as his moves showed in the first quarter, he used this game to prepare Terrelle Pryor for what's to come this season. You could say that 4 trips into the red zone with 3 field goals in the first half shows weakness, but taking into account that all three quarterbacks went in for a series or two in the first quarter you know that the offense didn't really get into a roll until the end of the second quarter. And in the end, Pryor showed what he was made of (dragging a few defenders into the end zone on a draw) and the defense shut down the Penguins completely. Ohio U has no chance, so we'll see if the offense can get on a better roll next week in preparation for USC in week 3.

Wisconsin may have a rushing attack, but they clearly showed that their passing attack needs work. They have two huge tight ends that can make things happen, but Evridge is only a mediocre quarterback that needs some time for refinement. PJ Hill showed he can still run through tackles and break some good runs, coming away with 210 yards in the game. Trust me, people will be expecting this - they will need some vertical attack to keep him from getting pummelled on every play.

Penn State vs Coastal Carolina? Not even worth three sentences.

Pittsburgh is the biggest disappointment for the Big East in week 1. Bowling Green is a decent MAC team, but they got blanked in the second half. That hand reaching the half century mark in passing is pitiful considering they don't have the quality receivers like Missouri does to make that worthwhile.

Northwestern is still in a rebuilding stage, but Bacher had enough control and their run game was successful against a Syracuse team that just didn't have any fire. The countdown to Robinson's firing started last year (winning 2 games is for n00bs), and the seat is only going to get hotter.

I don't even want to touch the Indiana and Iowa games, except to say that these kinds of matchups are exactly why other conferences say Big 10 sucks. Crap NC games doesn't do anything, doesn't make your team improve by playing bad competition. THANKS DELANEY!

West Virginia, however, is a confusing tale... since the final score hides the fact that they pretty much had the game in hand all the way through (2 td's in the fourth quarter, one with 2 seconds left). However, the baffling statistic is that they achieved less than 200 yards on the ground, which was not an uncommon figure with the Slaton/White duo of last year. Everyone claimed Noel Devine would be able to pick up the slack - but as you can clearly tell by the box score he doesn't have the breakaway talent that Slaton had. This is a cause for concern only if they were in a better conference... but they're not.

Michigan is a team that is TRULY rebuilding - new coach, new scheme, new quarterback, new running back... actually, you can say that pretty much the entire team is brand new. Having lost the race to get Pryor, they are stuck with a mediocre quarterback with no game-breaking ability (not to mention a poor arm and throwing technique). Their defense, which is supposed to keep them in games, made too many mistakes, and their offense will need a few more games to get into rhythm. Utah showed them how to run the option offense. We will have to keep close tabs to see how good Michigan gets by the time conference play rolls around.

Minnesota was the worst team of the Big 10 last year, and that will continue this year. Barely pulling out a win against a Northern Illinois team is sad... especially since Garrett Wolfe is no longer there. They lack playmakers in the backfield, and their rushing must improve by conference play otherwise they'll be blown away for the rest of the season.

Michigan State is on the rise! Yes, they lost to a Cal team that's on the decline, but Dantoni has done a phenomenal job in making this team competitive. Their problems start with penalties, but the positives will help them in the long run. They need to find a way to give the ball to Javon Ringer more - even though he carried the rock 27 times. If their O-line improves play, his yards per carry will increase. Hoyer needs to make better decisions throwing (40% completion percentage) but only threw one pick. The defense came up big, with one interception for a touchdown and another that prevented a touchdown. Both special teams suffered, with a blocked punt each. This is a quality loss for the Spartans, and if they start playing in both halves (they were non-existent in the first half) they really have a chance at beating the middle of the B10 conference.

GAME OF THE WEEK

Losing to the #6 team is not necessarily bad. Especially for an Illinois team that upset OSU last year. They wanted to avenge their loss to the Tigers from last year, but they were unable to keep it together. They had problems with two key things: penalties and turnovers. Would they have clinched out a win had Williams not thrown that 4th quarter interception? Would the defense, which lost their best player to the draft, have stepped up and gotten the ball back? Ron Zook must be happy that this year they competed a lot better than last year, but he knows that penalties and turnovers will kill him in the long run. However, Illinois still has time to blow away their next few opponents before meeting up with Penn State in the conference opener.

Sunday and beyond:

Louisville just sucks. All they get is a safety? Oh, and Rutgers? Nothing without Ray Rice. Fresno State looks to be really good this year...

All in all, we can clearly see that the Big 10 is gaining some momentum. Really - the addition of good coaches over the past 5 years into the league will help its transformation (Zook, Dantoni, Rodriguez, Bielema). We can also see that the Big East was really about star players: Rice made Rutgers, Slaton made WVU (with White), and Brohm made Louisville. Without them, the league is far worse off.

2007 Poinsettia Bowl

In only its second year of existence, the Poinsettia Bowl moved up to the coveted opening bowl slot, which it used last December to give us a 37-7 masterpiece of TCU destroying Northern Illinois. The year before, Navy destroyed Colorado State 51-30, leading people to question why the pee-wee team from Fort Collins was invited to a bowl in the first place. There, that is the entire history of the Poinsettia Bowl.

Navy Midshipmen (by Coach Lawrence)

For the Naval Academy, 2007 has been an historic season. The Midshipmen defeated Notre Dame for the first time in 44 years, winning a thrilling 46-44 triple overtime contest by stuffing ND's attempt to pound in a two-point conversion. A blowout victory in the regular season finale against Army gave Navy an unprecedented six straight wins in the series and also gave them the Commander in Chief's Trophy for the fifth straight season. (previously, Air Force had held it for six) Along the way there have been some setbacks - a home loss to div I-AA Delaware and another home loss to Ball State marking the low points - but at 8-4 the Midshipmen roll into the bowl season with at least 8 wins for the fifth straight season.

Navy is one of the last teams left using the triple option offense. Led by Jr QB Kaipo-Noa Kaheaku-Enhada, they are the nation's only offense to average over 300 ypg rushing, at 351. When running the ball, Navy averages over 6 ypc on both first and second down. Five runningbacks average between 35 and 65 yards per game in a system that keeps defenses on their toes. The offense is extremely effective throwing on first down, though in later situations they struggle more. Defensively, the Midshipmen do give up 4.25 ypc, and the passing defense is mediocre at best.

Game Plan:
1. 5 yards on first down. Dictate the pace on the remaining downs with manageable yardage situations.

2. Patience on defense. Though Utah may try to pound Darrell Mack against the smaller defense, Navy has to like their odds of winning a rushing battle more than winning a shootout with Brian Johnson. Keep at least one safety in coverage support and don't bite the playfakes.

3. Both hands on the ball. In four losses, Navy has 7 fumbles and an average TO margin of -2. In their eight wins, they have just 4 fumbles and an average TO margin slightly under +1. All those pitches and improvised exchanges increase the risk of error - Navy must be intelligent in their decision-making and execute well so as not to give up any breaks.

Utah Utes (by Coach Pendley)

For the Utes, it wasn't the best season. Of course, that's the case any time you lose to your rival - in this case, BYU - even if the game is close. Of course, most teams would kill for 8-4 (I'm looking at you, Florida International) and a seven-game winning streak in the middle of the season. However, that winning streak was over the Who's Who of Who Cares - the "highlight" being either a) beating a dead-in-the-water TCU team 27-20 at TCU or b) beating Louisville on the road 44-35 in a game that would've been huge three years ago. Heck, even their signature win - a 44-6 slaughter of UCLA (who was ranked 11th at the time) - was largely undone by UCLA playing their scout team the second half of the season. Geting shut out by UNLV (1-7, 2-10) can also be filed under "inexcusable".

So what do these guys actually do right? Play pass defense. They had a 7 TD / 16 INT ratio on the season (that's not a misprint), only allowing an average of 188.1 yards per game. (That's including Louisville's 467-yard game.) RB Darrell Mack is the second-leading rusher in the MWC, averaging just over 100 yards a geam. They didn't do too badly in the hidden yardage / turnover games, either, coming it at 43+ yards per punt and a +10 turnover margin on the season, respectively. Of course, they're also going up against a Navy team that hasn't been formally introduced to the forward pass. Good times.

What can Utah do to win this game?
1: Take to the air. QB Brian Johnson hasn't been great with only 162 yards per game (helped by an injury sustained in the opener), but the good news is that Navy doesn't know how to actually play defense. They've allowed 31 TDs to only 9 INTs on the season, which says that the secondary doesn't play for turnovers. If Johnson can keep the ball on target, Utah should be able to go ball-control against Navy's triple option.

2: Stick 8+ in the box. Let's be honest here; Navy's leading receiver, O.J. Washington, has 22.4 yards per game receiving. They're glorified blockers. Leave your corners on an island and start assigning your LBs and safeties to Kaipo, Eric Kettani, Adam Ballard, Shun White, and Jerod Bryant (not at the same time). Seven different guys from Navy average over 30 yards per game, so don't expect to continually shut them down - but put yourself in a position to make a play. Let's be honest: the scout team isn't going to figure out how to really play against Navy's triple option, but the least you can do is give the defensive playmakers an opportunity to do just that.

3: Win the time of possession game. Utah probably needs the ball for at least 33 minutes to pull out a win, and they have the tools to do that. Get the ball in Mack's hands and play the timing route game on the pass; force Navy into a couple of quick punts and take advantage of it. Utah should win the hidden yardage game too, but since Navy lives on their rushing offense getting in a situation where Utah has to take to the air while the Midshipmen are on the ground is not a winning scenario.