The only glaring weakness I saw was ECU's OL. They are better at run-blocking than pass-blocking, but I can see a good defensive line shutting ECU out. The QB looked really good... reminded me of Case Keenum a little bit. The LBers looked good too.

(09-06-2013 07:12 AM)MinerInWisconsin Wrote:  Obvious to me that ECU was the better team but did not appear to be as much better as I expected. Stats were pretty close. ECU should be a bowl team for sure but the Marshall and MT games will be tough ones in conference play.

From what I have seen so far this season, MT is the game that will be a tough one in the east.

(09-05-2013 11:34 PM)ncbeta Wrote:  Those FAU cheerleaders.....wow!

Yes....Glad I brought my field glasses last night!!

(09-06-2013 01:19 PM)T_Won1 Wrote:  The only glaring weakness I saw was ECU's OL. They are better at run-blocking than pass-blocking, but I can see a good defensive line shutting ECU out.

Shut out. Sure. Our star RB ran for 20 times for 95 yards 4.8 a carry. He ran for 1000+ last year at 5+ a carry and was the CUSA newcomer of the year. Our OL returned about everyon and has about 100 starts returning between them. Nothing to see here. Everyone on the planet knows we are going to pass for a living, but our running game isn't a glaring weakness.

(09-06-2013 01:24 PM)ECUgradstudent Wrote:  

(09-06-2013 07:12 AM)MinerInWisconsin Wrote:  Obvious to me that ECU was the better team but did not appear to be as much better as I expected. Stats were pretty close. ECU should be a bowl team for sure but the Marshall and MT games will be tough ones in conference play.

From what I have seen so far this season, MT is the game that will be a tough one in the east.

Yep. Marshall has yet to really blow me away, but they've only played 1 game, and against an awful team. Not much of a sample size. Gardner-Webb won't teach us anything else about Marshall. @ Ohio and @ VT will be much more telling. Just like our next game vs VT will be more telling about us.

(09-06-2013 01:41 PM)StillJonesing Wrote:  

(09-06-2013 01:19 PM)T_Won1 Wrote:  The only glaring weakness I saw was ECU's OL.

Really? Our star RB ran for almost 100 yards and 5 yards a carry. He ran for 1000+ last year at 5+ a carry and was the CUSA newcomer of the year. Our OL returned about everyon and has about 100 starts returning between them. Nothing to see here.

Watch the replay if you recorded it.

(09-06-2013 08:14 AM)ECUGrad07 Wrote:  The game should have been 38-6... Hardy's one-handed TD catch that got ruled incomplete, plus the garbage TD vs our 2nd team D with under a minute to go (which was NOT a catch... can't believe they didn't review it. He didn't have possession when he went out of bounds).

I call shenaniganz on this. First, that was not a catch, they only had to look once at the review to determine it was not a catch... Hell, look at Hardy's reaction, he is acting frustrated with himself immediately when the ball flies out, before the ref even signals incomplete.

If you don't want to give credit to fau for their late td, then you shouldn't give ecu credit for 2 of the touchdowns that were the result of fau's offense

(09-06-2013 01:41 PM)Fo Shizzle Wrote:  

(09-05-2013 11:34 PM)ncbeta Wrote:  Those FAU cheerleaders.....wow!

Yes....Glad I brought my field glasses last night!!

Please tell me you listened to the 5th quarter call in show last night and heard the rant about not making out the numbers on the uniforms

(09-06-2013 01:44 PM)randaddyminer Wrote:  

(09-06-2013 08:14 AM)ECUGrad07 Wrote:  The game should have been 38-6... Hardy's one-handed TD catch that got ruled incomplete, plus the garbage TD vs our 2nd team D with under a minute to go (which was NOT a catch... can't believe they didn't review it. He didn't have possession when he went out of bounds).

I call shenaniganz on this. First, that was not a catch, they only had to look once at the review to determine it was not a catch... Hell, look at Hardy's reaction, he is acting frustrated with himself immediately when the ball flies out, before the ref even signals incomplete.

If you don't want to give credit to fau for their late td, then you shouldn't give ecu credit for 2 of the touchdowns that were the result of fau's offense

Our 2 TD's were set up by good defense.

Their TD wasn't a TD. He didn't have possession when he went out of bounds. AND it was against our 2's and 3's. Also, we didn't even play Shane Carden in the 4th. It could have been way worse.

See the difference?

(09-06-2013 01:46 PM)ECUGrad07 Wrote:  

(09-06-2013 01:44 PM)randaddyminer Wrote:  

(09-06-2013 08:14 AM)ECUGrad07 Wrote:  The game should have been 38-6... Hardy's one-handed TD catch that got ruled incomplete, plus the garbage TD vs our 2nd team D with under a minute to go (which was NOT a catch... can't believe they didn't review it. He didn't have possession when he went out of bounds).

I call shenaniganz on this. First, that was not a catch, they only had to look once at the review to determine it was not a catch... Hell, look at Hardy's reaction, he is acting frustrated with himself immediately when the ball flies out, before the ref even signals incomplete.

If you don't want to give credit to fau for their late td, then you shouldn't give ecu credit for 2 of the touchdowns that were the result of fau's offense

Our 2 TD's were set up by good defense.

Their TD wasn't a TD. He didn't have possession when he went out of bounds. AND it was against our 2's and 3's. Also, we didn't even play Shane Carden in the 4th. It could have been way worse.

See the difference?

Let's not even get started on the missed pass interference calls. I counted at least 4 of those...

(09-06-2013 01:44 PM)T_Won1 Wrote:  Watch the replay if you recorded it.

What the hell is there to see. A RB running for 100 yards, a couple rushing TD's. What more do you want from an Air Raid offense. That's not what we do or have made a living from since Ruff's got here, but there is no way it's a glaring weakness, not as long as Cooper and our OL stays healthy at least. His back ups are more unknown at this point.

I mean, Shane was sacked a few times. But that was mainly due to great delayed blitzes and Shane holding onto the ball for 5-6 seconds.

Not going to get on here and play "What if" about last nights game.

All I will say is there were some very iffy calls and we did in fact let off of the gas pedal.

Now playing devils advocate, FAU did miss a couple of field goals that I thought they were going to make. Had their kicker made those and they not get credit for the TD the score have only changed by a point...

Not going to trash FAU, one good thing I saw in their team was their DL. Like others have said their coach just needs time to recruit for his style of play.

All in all we had sloppy play, and not to toot our own horn but we have a ton of talent on this team. If we can just bring it together we could be a top football team this year (No, not saying national champions... just a very good team).

(09-06-2013 01:44 PM)T_Won1 Wrote:  

(09-06-2013 01:41 PM)StillJonesing Wrote:  

(09-06-2013 01:19 PM)T_Won1 Wrote:  The only glaring weakness I saw was ECU's OL.

Really? Our star RB ran for almost 100 yards and 5 yards a carry. He ran for 1000+ last year at 5+ a carry and was the CUSA newcomer of the year. Our OL returned about everyon and has about 100 starts returning between them. Nothing to see here.

Watch the replay if you recorded it.

Yeah, if you couldn't see our OL had some issues you're blind. I don't care how many damn starts they had or whatever miscellaneous statistic somebody can throw out there on them and the run. They aren't living up to the hype as they were supposed to be a strength. I think if we pick a center and stop rotating 2 we'll be fine.

My 2 cents from the Upper Deck

Clearly the more talented team won last night..but..there were some things I saw that are a concern. Either FAU has great talent on the D line or our O line let down a bit last night. FAU did a very good job of making Carden throw when he did not want to and put good pressure on him numerous times. I thought our O line graded out at C in pass protection. This is big concern with VT coming in Sat.

Again...penalties are a concern. We have to execute better.

I was happy with the O line run blocking. They did a decent job on quick hitters but need to work on maintaining blocks long enough to allow delays and sweeps to the outside. FAU was in the backfield much too often last night.

Good job again by the receiving corps. The kids are making the tough catch and not dropping the ball on routine plays. If we have a shot at VT it will hinge on Carden getting time and being able to get the ball to them.

Another good job by special teams.

Hats off to the defense. They played with intensity and hit hard last night. I hope this is an indication that they are buying into coach Smith's system. I was especially impressed with our coverage. 2 picks and several deflections. Good work.

I was very impressed with our students last night. They really came in loud and kept up the intensity well into the 3rd quarter. Downtown called a lot of them after that...but...I understand

FAU has some yummy cheerleaders. They look like NFL chicks.

(09-06-2013 01:46 PM)ECUGrad07 Wrote:  

(09-06-2013 01:44 PM)randaddyminer Wrote:  

(09-06-2013 08:14 AM)ECUGrad07 Wrote:  The game should have been 38-6... Hardy's one-handed TD catch that got ruled incomplete, plus the garbage TD vs our 2nd team D with under a minute to go (which was NOT a catch... can't believe they didn't review it. He didn't have possession when he went out of bounds).

I call shenaniganz on this. First, that was not a catch, they only had to look once at the review to determine it was not a catch... Hell, look at Hardy's reaction, he is acting frustrated with himself immediately when the ball flies out, before the ref even signals incomplete.

If you don't want to give credit to fau for their late td, then you shouldn't give ecu credit for 2 of the touchdowns that were the result of fau's offense

Our 2 TD's were set up by good defense.

Their TD wasn't a TD. He didn't have possession when he went out of bounds. AND it was against our 2's and 3's. Also, we didn't even play Shane Carden in the 4th. It could have been way worse.

See the difference?

The only difference I see is you wanting to count 38 ecu points while only counting 6 for fau... 17 of your points came from your offense driving a total of 23 yards... I could see you saying hey the game wasn't even as close as the final scored showed, if you dominated them in the stat book, but your stats are almost exactly the same. By no means was this game a blow out like you suggested with 38-6 should of score

After looking at FAU's past few recruiting classes, I think FAU's DL & LBs might be more talented than I gave them credit for. Quite a few 3* recruits and JUCO transfers in that mix. It's too bad for FAU that their offense is flat out horrible.

(09-06-2013 02:15 PM)blunderbuss Wrote:  After looking at FAU's past few recruiting classes, I think FAU's DL & LBs might be more talented than I gave them credit for. Quite a few 3* recruits and JUCO transfers in that mix. It's too bad for FAU that their offense is flat out horrible.

Stop being so nice. Its a great deal worse then that due to our staff not picking a QB and working with him.

If we go back to the Navy game a couple of years ago, the one we won, the same rule that hurt us on Hardy's catch last night, helped us to a win. By rule, I do not believe that Hardy's catch should have been a TD. Did he catch it, yes, but there is a stupid rule about completing the act of the catch or whatever. Either way, it was one heck of a play.

But...FAU's TD was NOT a catch.

I do find it funny that everyone wants to criticize ECU for not winning by enough, but did you look at our game plan? It was a lot different than the 4 or 5 days before. It looked like we were trying something completely different, and it worked. It wasn't pretty, and I think a lot of that had to do with the short week, but it worked. And, our defense looked pretty darn good compared to FAU's offense.

(09-06-2013 02:19 PM)OwlFamily Wrote:  

(09-06-2013 02:15 PM)blunderbuss Wrote:  After looking at FAU's past few recruiting classes, I think FAU's DL & LBs might be more talented than I gave them credit for. Quite a few 3* recruits and JUCO transfers in that mix. It's too bad for FAU that their offense is flat out horrible.

Stop being so nice. Its a great deal worse then that due to our staff not picking a QB and working with him.

I hope BBuss is correct. Otherwise...VT is going to feast on Carden next week.

Someone needs to tell your coach that Hankerson is the guy for the job. Go ahead and make the change now. All he needs is playing time. He has field presence. You cant teach that or coach it.