Larry Slade

[General Jack]

This year's defense compared to last year's defense only gave up 25 yds more total offense per game. Not a bad drop off on paper, but when you dig deeper:

Rushing Defense went from 82 ypg to 143 ypg
Passing Defense went from 216 ypg to 180 ypg

That big swap in yards then allowed teams to just run and run, running the clock down and tire our defense out. The passing yds dropped off, imho, because teams didn't have to pass as much anymore to get first downs. As said before, we need to get the D-Line shored up to stop the run and get some pressure on the QB, and I think everything else will fall in place.

Good analysis, and teams were definitely aware of our run stopping weakness by late in the year and exploited it. Total yards didn't increase by as much because the games were effectively shortened by teams running the ball more.

 

[HawaiiVol]

Thanks, I had looked at the overall stats about a month ago and didn't think it was that bad, but failed to look at the breakdown. This thread prompted me to look even closer at the numbers.

For those interested:

2006
Ranking Summary

2005
Ranking Summary

 

[rockydoc]

Our DB's were abused yesterday along with the rest of the defense.

In defense of the DB's they have to run support so dang much with our porous line this year, I didn't think thet did too bad. We were short one cover CB with the loss of Fellows and Johnson. The knee injury slowed Stewart too much to ever play corner.