1. The bottom line is we got a win (breaking a seven game losing streak, although that should be a given against an FCS foe) and continue to be quite healthy heading into the USC game. Those were the two main things that needed to happen, so mission accomplished in that sense. But I don't think we learned anything about the team and, to the extent one wants to evaluate what we saw, there's some cause for concern. We'll know much more about the team in three weeks.
2. Neither the level of execution nor level of dominance against a massively outmatched team left me feeling great. On execution, the sloppiness in taking care of the ball was of course horrible with multiple offensive and multiple special teams turnovers. That's ugly. On dominance, the trenches did not look like what you'd expect from top 25 talent vs. top 200 talent, although I don't want to overstate it. With half as much sloppiness on turnovers the score would have looked like the oddsmakers forecast. The 8.6 yards per play compared to 3.7 yards per play for Colgate, a 4.9 yard differential, is a dominant discrepancy. For some perspective, it compares to a 5.1 yard differential in 2018 against Rice, a 4.6 yard differential for Boston College last year against Colgate, Utah's 5.4 whooping of Stanford last year, and of course Cal's 6.0 rout of Stanford last year.
3. My evergreen comment in these posts is that Shaw's coachspeak does not account for quality of opponent as he evaluates performance. His relatively sanguine description of how we did in both run blocking and run defense annoyed me. This was Colgate! I do not think four rushing first downs against Colgate is acceptable, nor is giving up nine rushing first downs. A winning program would have had a different (salty/unsatisfied) tone in the post-game press conference. Instead we got Shaw's even-handed, ostensibly high standards analysis but revealing that he doesn't actually have very high standards for us in the trenches if he thinks this was "physical" or the run defense played "very well," followed by the most low energy/swagger RB1 seen to date. At least Williamson talks a bit like a confident but unsatisfied major college football player, but it didn't wipe the taste of Stanford mediocrity/irrelevance out of my mouth.
4. Overall McKee played quite well but started better than he finished. His rhythm with Yurosek just seemed off and the interception was a blemish but he made a lot of nice throws and was certainly both efficient and decisive. The least of our concerns. For Smith, it was the good (the home run to start, moving the chains in the passing game), the bad (a pretty sizable chunk of ineffectual rushes after his first two), and the ugly (the fumble). Will have to wait for real competition to know what we have in Smith. Great to see Tremayne back out there adding value after the gruesome injury and Wilson looked like a legitimate WR1, though the continued recurrence of drops is agitating as Shawfense remains vulnerable to drives stalling with individual awry plays. Humphreys reminded us he's a very good starting WR option and is just blocked on our depth chart. This week's moving the chains (first down) list: Smith (5), Wilson (4), Humphreys (4), Tremayne (2), Filkins (2), Reuben (2), Patu. I didn't key in much on OL play since I was watching on a phone but PFF thought Rouse and Hinton (will wait for real competition but certainly nice to see our worst starter build some confidence) acquitted themselves nicely while Rogers was the weak link. Rogers being the weak link raises the urgency of Bragg coming back.
5. We need more data points to judge the defensive scheme changes but provisionally it looks like pass defense remains stronger than run defense. In terms of usage, the nickel (2-4-5 or 3-3-5 depending on how you count the edge guys) was our predominant defense and Miezan, DiCosmo, and Moi are the super subs. In terms of performance, to the extent the scheme change unlocked anything for the front seven, through one game at least, it was much more the inside linebackers than the edge defenders. Edge guys were non-factors almost entirely until Herron's late sack. The linebackers, in contrast, flashed. Miezan in particular had maybe his best game at Stanford. In just 26 snaps, he had a half sack to force a field goal attempt, a QB hurry that caused the pass behind the receiver into Williamson's arms for the interception, a third down stop to force a punt, a stop for three yards and 1st and 10, a stop for two yards on 1st and 10, and a stop for one yard on 2nd and 8. Mangum-Farrar forced a fumble, tackled a pass catcher on third down to force a punt, and had a run stop for three yards on 1st and 10. Damuni led us in tackles, had a pass defended (albeit a gift he probably should have intercepted), and had a tackle on 3rd and long to force a punt, although PFF wasn't impressed. Sinclair tackles forced Colgate special teams on to the field twice and he added two other run stops. Even Jorgensen in garbage time had consecutive run stuffs to force a punt. It's way too early to judge the scheme but through one game at least we had more impactful ILB play than we've tended to see in recent years. I'm going to view this as primarily a confidence building game for the young DL. They didn't fill up the stat sheet but Moi and Buckey (the real hero on Damuni's pass defense) hurried the QB, which is great to see. Colgate didn't have a passing game to test the DBs at all, but Williamson had a nice all-around game.
6. Arguably the biggest story: two true freshmen immediately emerging as essentially starter-level players up at the line of scrimmage. Bailey broke the record for a Shaw true freshman's first game snaps (41 to the previous highs of 36 by Wedington and 35 by Little, shattering the previous front seven record of 16 by Vaughters. Were it not for Bailey, Moi would have the record thanks to his 19 snaps, which itself shattered the DL true freshman record of 9 by Booker. Presumably it will only go up for these two. Bailey, of course, has had constant, over-the-top hype from all comers. This was a learning opportunity. He only had two tackles, both first downs for Colgate, and was our worst starter on defense according to PFF (Yurosek actually graded worse). Moi is a guy whose hype has started to get really significant. If you listen to Troy Clardy's TreeCast from Thursday, Anderson is starting to talk about Moi like the coaches talk about Bailey. In this game Moi didn't fill the stat sheet but he did have the hurry and held us own at the line, with PFF liking what they saw (higher grade than all 15+ snap defenders other than Miezan).
7. Aside from those two, Reuben, Roush, Harris, Wright, and Daniels (even though it was a penalty and never got a real play in) saw the field, so start those four game countdowns to see who burns a redshirt (maybe all of them, though that would be strange in Daniels' case). The other true freshmen sat. Otherwise, we cleared the bench. I count only seven scholarship players who didn't play: the three injuries we knew about (Bragg, Aybar, Pogorelc), another guy I spotted out of uniform (Leyrer), and three others (Uke, Ungar, Edwards), who others maybe can say if they were suited up or not.
8. The special teams was ugly. Yikes. Need to clean up that punt return game considerably. Even beyond that, Smith had a crappy opening kickoff return and a backup kicker missed an extra point. Sanborn did ok, net punts of 35, 38, and 43. I guess Parsons' snaps were fine?
9. Game balls: McKee, Miezan, Sanborn (holding my nose here), Sanders
10. I can't wait to fly out in a few days, not least for the opportunity to tailgate and roam Chuck Taylor Grove on Saturday. Holler if you are going to be enjoying the best the Farm has to offer and want some company. TBD on whether the game itself is as enjoyable as the pre-game. In recent weeks I've allowed some optimism to creep in with regard to the season and, fundamentally, the Colgate game doesn't change that as I view an opener against an FCS team as basically irrelevant. Still, would have been nice to see more from Stanford's run game and run defense against such a lowly opponent. Season starts for real Saturday.
2. Neither the level of execution nor level of dominance against a massively outmatched team left me feeling great. On execution, the sloppiness in taking care of the ball was of course horrible with multiple offensive and multiple special teams turnovers. That's ugly. On dominance, the trenches did not look like what you'd expect from top 25 talent vs. top 200 talent, although I don't want to overstate it. With half as much sloppiness on turnovers the score would have looked like the oddsmakers forecast. The 8.6 yards per play compared to 3.7 yards per play for Colgate, a 4.9 yard differential, is a dominant discrepancy. For some perspective, it compares to a 5.1 yard differential in 2018 against Rice, a 4.6 yard differential for Boston College last year against Colgate, Utah's 5.4 whooping of Stanford last year, and of course Cal's 6.0 rout of Stanford last year.
3. My evergreen comment in these posts is that Shaw's coachspeak does not account for quality of opponent as he evaluates performance. His relatively sanguine description of how we did in both run blocking and run defense annoyed me. This was Colgate! I do not think four rushing first downs against Colgate is acceptable, nor is giving up nine rushing first downs. A winning program would have had a different (salty/unsatisfied) tone in the post-game press conference. Instead we got Shaw's even-handed, ostensibly high standards analysis but revealing that he doesn't actually have very high standards for us in the trenches if he thinks this was "physical" or the run defense played "very well," followed by the most low energy/swagger RB1 seen to date. At least Williamson talks a bit like a confident but unsatisfied major college football player, but it didn't wipe the taste of Stanford mediocrity/irrelevance out of my mouth.
4. Overall McKee played quite well but started better than he finished. His rhythm with Yurosek just seemed off and the interception was a blemish but he made a lot of nice throws and was certainly both efficient and decisive. The least of our concerns. For Smith, it was the good (the home run to start, moving the chains in the passing game), the bad (a pretty sizable chunk of ineffectual rushes after his first two), and the ugly (the fumble). Will have to wait for real competition to know what we have in Smith. Great to see Tremayne back out there adding value after the gruesome injury and Wilson looked like a legitimate WR1, though the continued recurrence of drops is agitating as Shawfense remains vulnerable to drives stalling with individual awry plays. Humphreys reminded us he's a very good starting WR option and is just blocked on our depth chart. This week's moving the chains (first down) list: Smith (5), Wilson (4), Humphreys (4), Tremayne (2), Filkins (2), Reuben (2), Patu. I didn't key in much on OL play since I was watching on a phone but PFF thought Rouse and Hinton (will wait for real competition but certainly nice to see our worst starter build some confidence) acquitted themselves nicely while Rogers was the weak link. Rogers being the weak link raises the urgency of Bragg coming back.
5. We need more data points to judge the defensive scheme changes but provisionally it looks like pass defense remains stronger than run defense. In terms of usage, the nickel (2-4-5 or 3-3-5 depending on how you count the edge guys) was our predominant defense and Miezan, DiCosmo, and Moi are the super subs. In terms of performance, to the extent the scheme change unlocked anything for the front seven, through one game at least, it was much more the inside linebackers than the edge defenders. Edge guys were non-factors almost entirely until Herron's late sack. The linebackers, in contrast, flashed. Miezan in particular had maybe his best game at Stanford. In just 26 snaps, he had a half sack to force a field goal attempt, a QB hurry that caused the pass behind the receiver into Williamson's arms for the interception, a third down stop to force a punt, a stop for three yards and 1st and 10, a stop for two yards on 1st and 10, and a stop for one yard on 2nd and 8. Mangum-Farrar forced a fumble, tackled a pass catcher on third down to force a punt, and had a run stop for three yards on 1st and 10. Damuni led us in tackles, had a pass defended (albeit a gift he probably should have intercepted), and had a tackle on 3rd and long to force a punt, although PFF wasn't impressed. Sinclair tackles forced Colgate special teams on to the field twice and he added two other run stops. Even Jorgensen in garbage time had consecutive run stuffs to force a punt. It's way too early to judge the scheme but through one game at least we had more impactful ILB play than we've tended to see in recent years. I'm going to view this as primarily a confidence building game for the young DL. They didn't fill up the stat sheet but Moi and Buckey (the real hero on Damuni's pass defense) hurried the QB, which is great to see. Colgate didn't have a passing game to test the DBs at all, but Williamson had a nice all-around game.
6. Arguably the biggest story: two true freshmen immediately emerging as essentially starter-level players up at the line of scrimmage. Bailey broke the record for a Shaw true freshman's first game snaps (41 to the previous highs of 36 by Wedington and 35 by Little, shattering the previous front seven record of 16 by Vaughters. Were it not for Bailey, Moi would have the record thanks to his 19 snaps, which itself shattered the DL true freshman record of 9 by Booker. Presumably it will only go up for these two. Bailey, of course, has had constant, over-the-top hype from all comers. This was a learning opportunity. He only had two tackles, both first downs for Colgate, and was our worst starter on defense according to PFF (Yurosek actually graded worse). Moi is a guy whose hype has started to get really significant. If you listen to Troy Clardy's TreeCast from Thursday, Anderson is starting to talk about Moi like the coaches talk about Bailey. In this game Moi didn't fill the stat sheet but he did have the hurry and held us own at the line, with PFF liking what they saw (higher grade than all 15+ snap defenders other than Miezan).
7. Aside from those two, Reuben, Roush, Harris, Wright, and Daniels (even though it was a penalty and never got a real play in) saw the field, so start those four game countdowns to see who burns a redshirt (maybe all of them, though that would be strange in Daniels' case). The other true freshmen sat. Otherwise, we cleared the bench. I count only seven scholarship players who didn't play: the three injuries we knew about (Bragg, Aybar, Pogorelc), another guy I spotted out of uniform (Leyrer), and three others (Uke, Ungar, Edwards), who others maybe can say if they were suited up or not.
8. The special teams was ugly. Yikes. Need to clean up that punt return game considerably. Even beyond that, Smith had a crappy opening kickoff return and a backup kicker missed an extra point. Sanborn did ok, net punts of 35, 38, and 43. I guess Parsons' snaps were fine?
9. Game balls: McKee, Miezan, Sanborn (holding my nose here), Sanders
10. I can't wait to fly out in a few days, not least for the opportunity to tailgate and roam Chuck Taylor Grove on Saturday. Holler if you are going to be enjoying the best the Farm has to offer and want some company. TBD on whether the game itself is as enjoyable as the pre-game. In recent weeks I've allowed some optimism to creep in with regard to the season and, fundamentally, the Colgate game doesn't change that as I view an opener against an FCS team as basically irrelevant. Still, would have been nice to see more from Stanford's run game and run defense against such a lowly opponent. Season starts for real Saturday.
