Postgame Celebration Thread: Texas Handles Rice, 34-17

Even though it was somewhat pedestrian. Our D, however, has the makings of something special.

Fozzy and CoJo had a few good plays each as well. Malcolm looked pretty darn good, I must admit. The line wasn’t terrible. Gilbert looked like a rookie with some ability.

The defense had some serious brainfarts, as did two defensive players while they were returning punts (Brown on the bad decision that didn’t come back to bite him, and AW on the flubbed return). But overall the defense looks like there’s a lot of talent that could knit together really well.

This would’ve been a much better looking score had it not been for the refs that must’ve been paid to call those ridiculous calls! I think we learned a lot as horn fans, mainly for me I learned to miss our old spread offense…I completely see the reason for the change, but I think we need a better mix of passes from the 4 & 5 wide sets because hardly any team can do it better us.this slow pace running downhill is ok for now, but we’re gonna have to take more shots down field in the future IMO.

But, there were some concerning items today. No need for warning bells quite yet, but they’re on standby.

I can’t imagine the coaches would be too pleased once they break down the film. Some issues need to be cleaned up.

I believe Cody Johnson lost his starting job today though….he was taking too long to hit some lanes the O-line were creating. Newton and Whittaker did a better job.

And furthermore, Mizzou beat Illinois, and K-State is grinding UCLA into the ground with the best RB in college football.

A lot of football left to play, no reason to over-react to anything that happened today. Although its not what I wanted to see, things are going to get better.

I also don’t think we are going to run the ball as much against OU/Nebraska, we are going to do whats best to win, and that is probably have Gilbert throw the ball more then 23 times.

I liked the running game, you could there was a difference, but it is a work in progress.

On to week 2!

Hook ’em

But a win nonetheless. I think the offensive philosophy was to keep things simple and not tip our hand to future opponents. There’s a lot to improve upon but you can’t argue with the result. Guys who impressed: Eddie Jones, David Snow, Kenny Vaccaro. Justin Tucker showed a lot of leg but missed one he should have hit. Tre Newton won a starting job.

Don’t think anybody is going to get too high after that one, although the defense is stout. Shouldn’t get too low neither.

Moving up, stay at #5 or moving down. Florida struggled as well.

Ess-E-See!

JSU went for 2pc after tying up the game, and they converted!

(see what I did there?)

After watching the end of the Ole Mis game. It seems clear to me that our D will be winning games for us for a little while. I’ll take the win but can’t say I wasn’t screaming in frustration at times.

You’ve got to think of this season as sort of like 2006. Breaking in a new offense after a very successful season when we lost our star QB. There are going to be some growing pains, but in general, we played well with a few problems. Chykie had his customary brainfart, both he and AW dropped sure pick-sixes (though AW’s was on a phenomenal play), AW had the muffed punt at the end and both he and Curtis made stupid decisions fielding punts, there was a freak Rice TD, we once again had trouble inside the 5 (though Tre’ managed to punch it in a few times later in the game), the O-line wasn’t as dominant as they should have been against a team like Rice, etc.

But I think we generally played very well defensively (considering we had absolutely no idea what kind of offense they would run) and played pretty well on offense. I think the under center running worked well enough to open up some lanes downfield off of play action and Gilbert’s got a cannon. He had a few bad passes, but it’s his first start and most importantly, the bad passes are mechanical, not because he’s making bad reads. I only counted 1 pass that was interceptable, and that was an incredibly athletic pass breakup by the Rice LB. I swore GG had managed to get it over his head before he made a great leap.

I think we’re going to be really, really good this year. But you have to walk before you can run. This game was about getting our legs under us with this new offense, and I think we did that very well.

Something like 49-6.

-Rice doesn’t get BS TD or play isn’t incorrectly ruled TD by refs and they have to kick a FG
-We get one of the two or three PI calls they refs blatantly missed
-Tucker makes one FG and other isn’t blocked
-We convert better on third and short situations
-We don’t run a toss on 4 and .00016494 inches on the goal line
-A.J. Williams catches the ball on the punt
-Chykie Brown and A.J. don’t drop the two easiest pick 6s in history
-We don’t give Case 4th-quarter playing time
-GD opens up the offense

Speaking of offense, it was a mixed bag. The O-Line is definitely better running the ball this season, and they looked fine in the passing game against Rice’s decent D-Line. Davis obviously showed probably as little of the offense as possible, giving us an extremely odd mixture of dominance and ineptitude. I’d looking forward to seeing more in the screen game, more plays from the Gun, and actually passing to the uber-talented WRs. Malcolm and Quise looked really good. The O NEEDS to get opened up next game; we can’t just start trying stuff in a real game in Lubbock. Matthews was absolutely non-existent, something I really despised seeing and think could bite us later. Don’t try to save something that is supposed to be a HUGE part of the offensive change this season.

Defensively…well, it’s hard. At times we looked unreal, and at times I was like, “Really guys? This is Rice.” The two dropped pick 6s were pretty embarrassing. Chykie had another bad, bad blown coverage and we weren’t as dominant on the defensive line as I would have liked. On the bright side, Vaccaro was phenomenal. Jeffcoat and Wilson will be superstars sooner instead of later. Robinson looked like a different player—he and Eacho are the truth at LB. Scott and Gideon were solid as well. Eddie Jones dominated basically the entire game. Was not overly impressed with the corners; this wasn’t really their type of game with all the running, but they were pretty lackluster in run support.

So I’m not “It’s the end of the world as we know it!” and I’m not at all excited. I liked our dedication to the running game, but the coaches proved the freaking point so let’s get ON with it against Wyoming. We need a blowout and some confidence going into the Tech game, which is already looking like a fiasco waiting to happen. Hook ’em!

He appeared to perform exactly the same as what we have seen previously. I am just amazed that what we heard was completely different than what we were told. I guess there are players who practice good and then there are players who just plain play football. I think Tre, for his size, is an attacking type of back. Good explosion. Good vision. Too bad for Cody but until he figures out he is not Melton, he will be relegated to short yardage opportunities.

GG showed pretty good poise. Malcolm Williams had a lot of clutch plays for first down and nice catch over the middle. Overall…it’d seemed like a preseason game, but then again, I guess it was for Texas.

Lots to work on: OL needs more work. I like the play call on 4 and goal from the 1 on the first drive, but the OL was porous. The play on 3 and goal from the 1 may not work for us. The OL didn’t blast into the end zone against a much smaller team and the motion man was slow to engage. The defensive interior needs a lot of work. Hopefully the DT’s and MLB’s can make significant improvements, so that we don’t have to scheme around the problem. Kick off coverage needs a lot of work too. Punt receivers…will be getting an earful.

Here’s to a week of improvements.

I was thinking more along the OL – were the guys that are there recruited as pass protectors versus the hoggs we need on the OL to run effectively.

It was obvious that the o-line hasn’t had to run block in years. They are soft, especially for Texas, and especially for the running game we are trying to establish.

Fozzy was the only RB to average more than 4 YPC, and it drops below 4 if you remove his 21 yard scamper

Garrett made terrible passes. This is our QB?

The defense played like they should have with the exception of a few stupid mistakes, but I attribute all of that to week 1 rust.

All that said, I don’t see our 10 win streak ending this year. We clearly have enough talent to win football games even if we don’t play well. If GG can start to throw even moderately accurate passes, then the offense should start to be more efficient. I really like the new offensive system. Assuming that there are more than the like five plays we saw today, and assuming that the o-line learns how to open up holes, and assuming that GG can hit receivers, and assuming that GD figures out that we will never, NEVER be able to effectively run out of the shotgun, then we should be able to put up points in bunches.

START QTR POSS. YARD PLAYS YARDS RESULT
08:04 1 05:18 TEX 38 12 57 Turnover on Downs
02:05 1 02:10 RICE 30 4 -4 Field Goal Good
12:08 2 04:06 TEX 30 9 69 Rushing Touchdown
06:24 2 00:00 RICE 10 0 11 Fumble Return Touchdown
04:54 2 03:26 RICE 50 9 50 Rushing Touchdown
00:00 2 00:00 TEX 40 0 0 End of Half

Out Of the 4 (yes, only 4) first half drives, Texas Scored on 3 of them and the one they didn ‘t score on was stopped on 4th down at the 5 yrd line. So the offense was playing well in the first half but didn’t have a lot op opportunities. Offense sputtered in the 3rd and only had 2 chances in the 4th to do anything.

The issues are very workable from this game. Nothing in the game that can’t be fixed in a week.

These were my impressions live; the offense looked “ok” with flashes of “really good”. Garrett’s timing looks a little off still on some of his passes. There were a lot of “first game of the season” mistakes and timing issues. The O-line looked like a work in progress again with some flashes of brilliance. I expected them to dominate Rice up front more, but it was their first game as a unit.

The defense looks “really good” with flashes of “sheer greatness”. The defense is going to win some games for us this year… and yes, Kenny Vaccarro is a beast, truly. The Bros. Acho are awesome too. Jackson Jeffcoat looked good too when he was in, and Chykie, well he just needs to hang on to pick sixes.

It was a win, and a decent win at that, it could have been better and it could have been much worse. I am hopeful for the season and not down about it at all. We will have some challenges this season, it ain’t gonna be a cruise like it has been at times with Colt and certainly with Vince, but we should do well this year, maybe even better than “well” depending upon how much they can correct from today.

Looked like there were some nerves on offense, GG especially. He’ll need to settle down or we’ll notch losses in OU and Neb.

The package they installed for Goodwin/Monroe/Hales looked good. Constraint plays and everything, but for some reason, GD ran the base play like 5-6 times, but only one sweep and one QB roll out. The sweep went for 20+, the roll-out was botched by GG but easily could have been a TD.

“I told the guys congratulations, I was excited that we’re 1-0, but they need to quit talking about the end, they need to quit talking about how good they’re going to be and they better get a bunch better before Wyoming or we’ll have trouble winning next week.”

I wish this were on TV here.

Their secondary is not so horrible. The D line and linebackers stepping in for Miller, who was out early in the game with a sprained ankle.

i didn’t expect them to be good at all.. but down 6-3 to north dakota st. in the 4th??? really

So he’s helping my fantasy team by getting Broyles all these catches and yards, but killing his team. That works.

Is it on TV in Austin?

Gotta keep up appearances for our game so we can give them their first loss. Doesn’t help us if they’re #23. Plus they have FSU next week. But trust me, I love that they’re getting embarrassed.

utah st. missed fg..

4th down ou at utah st. 39

My conclusion is that they are a mean a-hole ridden team. Reasons:
a) Legarette sucker punch = bad, stupid, mean players
b) What did New Mexico do to deserve 72-0?
c) Their duck man beat up Houston’s Shasta a few years ago

driving back into hornfrogs territory at end or 3rd qtr. TCU up 28-21.

ou has ball back after int.

final 31-24

Looks like the frogs are pulling out the win. Figured they would, but there’s always that feeling that the mid-major might be out of their league.

4:18 to play from their own 18. Not over yet!

Kind of an intriguing, academic game.

Pass protection was pretty good
Run blocks were inconsistent at times. Hix worries me the most..he whiffed on A LOT of blocks earlier in the game.

However…there were huuge holes at times and I felt like our running backs shouldve cashed on them more..our running backs definitely lack the burst to hit those holes hard

but I believe one is enough

it sucks to be him…shouldve come to Texas…

Who barely held on for dear life at home against lowly USU.

This was Rice. I’m not really sure you can measure anything about the Horns yet. GG didn’t blow me away. I did like seeing Jeffcoat playing fired up. Here’s to hoping we were just off because it was Rice.

May want to hold back on the arrogance and the holier than thou attitude. You’re not the only one to discover this team may need a few games to work itself into shape.

here in OKC last night. Talk about gnashing and grinding of teeth. If I remember, they were getting a little cocky on CCM during our game. What a dose of reality does to bring you back to earth.