Offense:
OL: The move to change RG seems to have paid off. For the most part they played their best game of the year. Still had some individual breakdowns but for sure JG had more time today and play calls such as the last 40 yard pass helped with that. Run blocking still sucked but I think we were against a pretty good DL. Improving but a LONG ways to go.
RB: Poor, though we did get the ball to Chandler and he made the most of a blown coverage to score. Still to much being knocked backwards
WR: Best game of the year. It appears they were coached well during the break. They won the 50/50 balls. Still some issues on consistent route running and gaining separation but JJ came through in spades today. He WANTED it and it showed.
QB: JG's best game of the year - showed poise and leadership. Some nice throws under duress (the TD to Jennings being an example
On 3rd & 8 and longer JG was 8-for-8 passing for 168 yards and a touchdown. That is pretty darn good!
Coaching: Helton on the sidelines seems to have made a difference, though once it seemed that Pruitt was in his ear big time. For all the whining (including me) about the run calls they did have the affect of creating openings in the secondary because they had to play more men in the box. It still amazes me that we run counter plays and then run away from the counter, same with the FB, we rarely follow the FB into the hole. They had several busts in coverage, usually caused by our alignment. Had a good game plan. On the last drive we got three 1st downs when we had to, hadn't done that in a LONG time. Took a LOT of time off the clock.
Defense:
DL: Best game of the year, really bottle up the inside running game and with the blitz helped really got good middle pressure. Bain had some good plays early. Tuttle wasn't mentioned a lot but he really clogged the middle
LB: Tale of 2 halves. First half they sucked. 2nd half they kicked ass. flowed to the ball, strike that swarmed to the ball. Their drops when we played underneath zone were better (best I could tell on TV but they were in the action). Hard to see on TV but I didn't see a lot of Sapp.
DB: Hit n Miss. We got lucky a time or two at corner on a couple of bad busts, some bad angles and bad tackling, especially in the first half but played much better in the 2nd half. Warrior costs us a TD with bad technique but probably played his best game of the year. Taylor had his normal day and Thompson had his best IMO. Bell was a step down at safety and Osborne gave up two straight 3rd down completions but came back with a 3rd down breakup
Coaching: Clear improvement, yet again. We tackled like crap in the fist half and then tackled well in the 2nd half. We did make some adjustments that further slowed down their run game. The blitz on the first 4th down play for the sack was a thing of beauty, very well executed. Till their last drive they had only 98 yards total offense in the 2nd half.
Great team win, still lots of mistakes to correct and we only get the #1 team in the country in next week.
But if feels good to get a SEC win and the players now have a positive result to gain confidence going forward.
Spoiler alert - Pruitt will be pissed at the effort in practice early next week.
Go VOLS!
