You pick & you choose, you win and you lose. Boise got run! Lol moving on
Stat That Stands Out
363
That’s the total combined number of rushing yards vs teams ranked higher than #74 in rush defense Pittsburgh has. That’s 60.5yds/gm in 6 games .
- Vs FSU(14): 27att 96yds
- Vs UVA (74): 35att 8yds
- Vs VT (8): 26att 23yds
- Vs GT (9): 21att -5yds
- Vs Cuse (28): 27att 21yds
- Vs Miami (63): 33att 220yds
Take away Miami and its 143yds total with 28.6yds/gm vs teams that don’t shit themselves while others rush the ball on them. Far be it from me to say BG is VT or FSU defensively, but Id put them somewhere between Cuse & UVA.
On The Ground
The Pitt rushing game is the 2 headed monster of Isaac Bennett & James Conner. They combine for 1365yds rushing. They are big and bigger, Bennett is a bowling ball at 5’11 205, Conner is mammoth at 6’2 230. Paul Chryst still calls the same stuff he called for Wisky: Power O left, Power O right, inside zone, outside zone and Iso. Its straightforward power running. Just line up crash into each other and hope your guy breaks out. Chryst does an innovative job of using formation & personnel to outflank opponents at the point of attack. This usually leaves 1 of the 2 big backs in a position to beat 1 guy in the hole, if they can do that they go a long way. The problem has been, that hasn’t happened, the big backs get the 3yds but don’t beat the guy in the hole to get the 40yarder. Pitt at 115yds/gm rushing is REALLY bad, especially considering the MO of the HC.
On the defensive side its all about 1 guy, and he is a mutant. Aaron Donald is a 1 man wrecking crew, 26.5 TFL, 10 sacks and 54 total tackles back this up. Turn on any Pitt film & #97 is either making the play, disrupting the play or making it so someone else can make the play. The dude reminds me of a Warren Sapp at the 3 technique. Quick, fast, agile & strong as an Ox, just very hard to stop. Lots of attention is focused on him allowing Pitt’s other defenders to make use of many 1 on1 or unblocked scenarios. Teams willing to run 30+ att and use scheme that focuses on doubling the NG or Zone cutblocking have had success. Its when teams have asked their line to Man block that Donald has just pitched a tent in the backfield.
BG is facing the best rush defense unit they have seen all year. They’ve face a couple good units but I think this Pitt unit is the best. That being said BG has failed to reach 150yds just 2X, and in both cases BG rushed fewer attempts than the season avg 41. It’s the Travis Greene show, the 5’10 181 Soph from Carroll City FL is #10 in total rush yds at 1555 & #14 in yds/gm at 119.6. The Miami area is just unreal with the amount of talent they put out, here’s a kid who didn’t get much of a sniff from his home state schools, comes up to the MAC as a WR, redshirts his Frosh yr, gets 1 carry LY & this year becomes a RB that’s #10 in the nation. He’s got tremendous short area quickness and scary stop start burst. Aint the biggest kid at 180, but has alleviated durability concerns this year rushing 261 times. This will be the kid’s biggest test tonight.
Bowling Green’s Defense is either a product of playing in a crappy conference or they are pretty stout. Im inclined to say it’s a mix of both. Can you run on them? Sure, it helps if you have a special runner (Toledo & NoIll), an SEC line & backs (Miss St) or such a good passing game that BG leaves only 5 box defenders (Indiana). You can also get pretty much stonewalled if you don’t have those things. Looking over the Pitt team, I don’t see any of those attributes.
Through the Air
The best thing BG did this season was sit Matt Schillz & start Matt Johnson. Johnson has been superb, 64.4% comp, 3195yds, 23/7 TD/INT, 9.5ypa!! That ypa # of all those nice numbers is the one I love the most. That means the kid is getting the ball down the field. That has a lot to do with Travis Greene & the playaction game. This aint some dink & dunk kid, he’s completing a high percentage and getting down the field. Protecting the ball very well for a soph, something else to smile about. Don’t know what No Ill was thinking but they let the kid get off!! 21/27 393yds 14.6ypa 5 TDs. WOW.
Something else to like about the BG passing game is that they have 6 receivers with more than 20rec. That’s spreading the ball around and not allowing anyone to be keyed on. When a young QB spreads the ball around like that it shows a strong grasp of the offense. The star if you wanna call him that is Shaun Joplin. A big kid at 6’2 & a Sr so he’s a vet, nothing that truly stands out but he’s reliable.
Defensively, unless you’re running some type of spread air raid, its pretty much a no fly zone when BG comes to town. In order to take advantage of the BG secondary its important that teams are able to flood zones and stretch zones. That’s pretty hard to do from compressed tight formations & with 2 man routes. Both things Paul Chryst loves to do.
Pittsburgh’s Tom Savage is an up & down guy. 1 game he may go toss for 400+ & 6tds, the next will be sub 200 with 2 ints. He looks the part and Paul Chryst has always been a magician at coaxing great efficiency from his QBs. Savage looked as if he turned the corner in the final 5gms of the season, tossing the ball the way a Paul Chryst coached QB should. He’s got a stud #1 in Tyler Boyd, the frosh is the truth. Devin Street is hurt though. That’s a huge issue, the next highest receiver has 14 catches. I assume you see a lot of Tyler Boyd as you should, but that’s about all you see.
ON the other side, Pitt is solid if not spectacular in pass Defense. Their issue has been when they’ve seen a tremendous talent (Jameis, Miami’s Morris to Hurns) or a great scheme (ODU, Duke, ND). When that happens they get torched. I think Donald is disruptive enough to cause Johnsons some problems for BG. If Donald isn’t disruptive it could be a long night.
What I See
Both teams will want to establish the line of scrimmage, and in this game its completely necessary. If Pitt controls the line of scrimmage BG is done for. IF BG does Pitt isn’t built to mount comebacks. I think you see a ton of 1970’s style football, slamming a guy into the line hoping he springs one early. A bunch of playction 2man routes from Pitt & Tom Savage. From BG you see Johnson spread it out and some varied playcalling. I think because of Donald BG does a lot of side to side stuff early to tire the legs of the DL. Then come back with some double the nose zone stuff behind it. I like BG’s defense more than Pitt’s.
BG 31 Pitt 19