Nu Wins.. Yah..or Yech

Well NU won today, 7-6. A victory, but not a quality win. The offense continued its woeful performance and the team managed a win only after Pitt missed a last second field goal. We are told to be patient, that the right players will come and the Callahan West Coast Offense will start performing. I'm not so sure...

When you look back to Callahan's successful offenses at Oakland they had some highly experienced players at almost every offensive position.

Starting with Gannon at QB, one of the most intelligent players I've ever seen who played for Calahan with 13 years of NFL experience.

At RB he had Charlie Garner who had 9 years of experience and may have been a quintessential WCO back, able to catch, run and even understanding the blocking assignments.

AT WR he had Tim Brown and Jerry Rice (no need to say what experience levels they had) with Jerry Porter as the third option. Even the TE position had a quality receiver with Doug Jolley.
His OL had two pro-bowlers in Lincoln Kennedy and Barrett Robbins with a third player, Steve Wisniewski who was an excellent, excellent guard.

I'm not saying that he can't find a set of players that can implement his offense at a high level, but it is a difficult task - especially for college, and if you look at when he had the most success, it was with a very, VERY experienced set of players.

I believe he's done a great job of recruiting, but I also think he needs to adapt his system to his talent. If he insists on the system he seems to want to run, I think we will be in for a very inconsistent future. When we have the perfect QB and perfect skill players and OL we will be great. When we don't I'm afraid that we'll scuffle around at .500.
cheers,
Alan...

Pitt vs NU prediction

I won't do a detailed analysis for this game, because both of the offenses for these teams are in disarray. Both defenses have played pretty well thus far, but Pitt has run into a reviatalized ND team and a lucky, but well-prepared Ohio team. Pitt's QB and passing game had success down the stretch last year, but this year is a different story. They have been implementing a new, more running oriented passing offense under Dave Wannstadt. That along with injuries to the OL have led to big problems for them this year. Their defense has been a bit better, but gave up 42 to ND in week one.

NU is a similar story. Their defense has been outstanding so far, though. Even if the competition has only been Maine and Wake Forest, there enthusiasm and results on the field have been great. This will represent a new challange for them, and I expect that Pitt will put together a solid game against this group. However, the NU offense has shown an inability to move the chains, and despite the ND game, the Pitt D has shown the potential to be a quality unit.

That said, I think the NU offense will show some signs of life against the Pitt defense. Many are predicting a low scoring game, but I expect there to be some offense play in this game.. Let's call it 24-21 NU. It will be close, and Pitt will have its chances. Both teams will up against it this week, though.
Enjoy,
Alan...

The West Coast Offense, Drive blocking and NU's offensive line

This is a copy of a post that I published on Nebraska's Rivals site:

In my opinion, the best implementations of the WCO have all emphasized a strong running attack. In SF, Walsh's best teams could all get physical with the best of them and it was fun to watch them run down another team in the second half with their running game only to see them carve up the middle once the safeties got too complacent. They had a balanced attack that made the DB's and LB's defend the entire field and forced them into making critical run/pass decisions.

Similarly, the best Denver teams all relied on the running game as a major part of the offense. In Denver's case, they selected offensive linemen to fit their system - shorter, quicker and more athletic players who could move, work in space and play an attaching style.

Callahan has several times commented on the "type" of Offensive linemen that he wants to recruit and play. In that regard, he is following his experience at the Raiders more than that of Denver in looking for tackles that are very tall, carry a lot of bulk and have the long arms necessary for protecting the QB.

The Raiders had an varied history with going for huge offensive linemen - sometimes even at the expense of their athleticism (Henry Lawrence anyone!), but two things enter into that equation:

1. they were among the first to go with the jumbo linemen - Art Shell and Gene Upshaw were huge for their time, but are today smaller than average. They were also incredibly athletic. These were 2 hall of fame players playing next to pro bowl caliber players in Dave Dalby, John Vella and others.
2. In many cases, they've gotten the other extreme - players like Langston Walker, huge with long arms, but with little quickness and little or no "pop" for drive blocking.

One key hypothosis that I have about the NU offensive line is that it will never put together a great drive blocking team unless they concentrate on getting more athletic players and worrying less about the size and dimensions of the prototypical OT. Callahan and crew are great recruiters, but there might be 1 or 2 tackles a year who go into the pros with the right dimensions for Callahan and the ability to be a powerful drive blocker.
Now, to talk about the current offensive line. It is definitely a mixed bag of talents.

The tackes are big bodies with the right dimensions, but sorely lacking in quickness and a real inability to work in space (whether that is a lack of technique for Seppo is open to debate. I have a feeling that continued coaching and footwork improvements will make him pretty quick on the field). Austin is quick enough and athletic enough when he can play, but he's not the player he was before his injury problems. Koch is a simple earth mover. He's a big, burly guard who, like the tackles, lacks ability to work in space because of his limited footspeed and quickness. He can get movement in the pile, though, and has good strength. Mann is undersized and will have trouble against big nasty nosetackles, but he is quick quick and athletic.. maybe the quickest on the line.

First of all, I don't expect that this group can be a good finesse blocking team. The bookends and guards simply don't have the quickness. What they do have is a good amount of bulk and size. I believe that other teams have had perfectly good offensive lines with this sort of ability up front. But, they tailor their running game to match the skills. Narrow the splits so the DL doesn't have as much open space to exploit their lack of quickness. Back up the RB on running plays a step. Allow him to take the ball and find a hole instead of counting on the play to develop too quickly in the line. Let the OL get a man and lock on to move them somewhere... The bottom line is that they aren't going to blow people out of the holes, so let them lock on and let the back pick his way. It makes the running game a bit slower acting, but we aren't fooling anyone anyway with our running attack.
Final bit of help for the OL, when passing, keep a back in the backfield and use the TE's to help out the T's against the speed rushers when passing.
Anyway, those are some long-winded thoughts. I do believe we have a philosophical problem in recruiting tackles that may make the drive blocking in the future difficult (or at least inconsistent depending on who we can recruit). we are also having problems this year, that could be somewhat mitigated by adjusting our tactics to match the talent.

cheers,
Alan...