Special Teams

[DCWV4life]

I THINK most of us would agree ST played a gigantic role in keeping Maryland in this game.

Just from the Maryland game:

Positives:
Blocked punt for safety

Game winning FG

Negatives:
Muffed punt inside our 10....I do not know what Thompson is thinking sometimes, but lets get him off punt returns and let him focus on WR.

Bringing it out of end zone so we start around the 10(we did score on that drive) but damn take the 25 yards and be done with it.

Punt coverage..I check this off to poor tackling and one change they need to get Callichio off this team...yeah he is a great shield blocker for the punter (6'9" 315 lbs) but he is not going to tackle anyone in open field so it is as if we are 9 on 11 when we punt since O Toole isn't really that great at tackling either. Put a LB or safety back there

Blocked FG...I am not sure if that is on Lambert or the line....I tend to say Lambert since his 47 yard FG had to have a lower trajectory than the 42 yard FG.

I am not going to say fire Defo just yet, if it would have not been for special teams we would not have been in the Bama game...hopefully this is their bad game and he fixes these issues. It is just frustrating to see the players make the same mistakes on PR and KR...at some point as a coach you have to get them to fix this or just take them off that particular team.

A lot of work to do for this week...as some have stated and I agree you can't make these special teams errors against good teams. Last year against Oklahoma was a perfect example, defense would get stops and the ST would give them the ball right back takes the wind out of any momentum we get.

 

[WVUDAD]

I THINK most of us would agree ST played a gigantic role in keeping Maryland in this game.

Just from the Maryland game:

Positives:
Blocked punt for safety

Game winning FG

Negatives:
Muffed punt inside our 10....I do not know what Thompson is thinking sometimes, but lets get him off punt returns and let him focus on WR.

Bringing it out of end zone so we start around the 10(we did score on that drive) but damn take the 25 yards and be done with it.

Punt coverage..I check this off to poor tackling and one change they need to get Callichio off this team...yeah he is a great shield blocker for the punter (6'9" 315 lbs) but he is not going to tackle anyone in open field so it is as if we are 9 on 11 when we punt since O Toole isn't really that great at tackling either. Put a LB or safety back there

Blocked FG...I am not sure if that is on Lambert or the line....I tend to say Lambert since his 47 yard FG had to have a lower trajectory than the 42 yard FG.

I am not going to say fire Defo just yet, if it would have not been for special teams we would not have been in the Bama game...hopefully this is their bad game and he fixes these issues. It is just frustrating to see the players make the same mistakes on PR and KR...at some point as a coach you have to get them to fix this or just take them off that particular team.

A lot of work to do for this week...as some have stated and I agree you can't make these special teams errors against good teams. Last year against Oklahoma was a perfect example, defense would get stops and the ST would give them the ball right back takes the wind out of any momentum we get.

I do not get why you argued the opposite on the other threads, though.

 

[DCWV4life]

I forgot one more negative, Thompson letting the ball bounce on that last punt that rolled down to the 5....here is a kid that goes out of his way to catch punts and this one he lets fall...that is why sometimes I am like is the efforest or is this kid just not getting what we are trying to do.

 

[bbwvfan]

I would add KO coverage as a positive. The Maryland return team was dangerous… and, WVU did not allow a big return all day.

Until the punt return for TD, the punt coverage had been very good this year too. I have to put some of the responsibility for the TD return on the punter. He hit a low punt right down the middle of the field. That had to be a mistake.

I'm sure Thompson's confidence was shaken after his muffed punt. If he cannot block out the mistake, WVU should go to another returner.

If I remember correctly… both Jock Sanders and Tavon Austin had their same issues the first 2 years of returning punts for WVU.

 

[DCWV4life]

Tavon Austin had their same issues the first 2 years of returning punts for WVU.

Tavon had a couple his last year as well...Oklahoma St stick out to me.

Thompson issues are more than just drops though, he makes horrible decisions fielding the ball...wasn't it Alabama where he was basically in a backwards sprint to field a punt on our 5? I guess he just has not done enough to keep the job in my opinion and the negatives far outweigh the positives for him. I have heard coaches say you need a punt returner with nerves of steel, forget the last one quickly cause we need you in the now.

Let him focus on WR and give someone else a chance back there....IMO

 

[WVUDAD]

Punt returner is a position in college where it takes a LOT of coaching to teach the kid that he is competing against much better athletes than he was in high school. A lot of the kids returning kicks in Div 1 were like men among boys in high school, they could field the punt, get to the sideline and outrun most of the kids defending the punt, that is not the case in college, and they need to be taught as such. I agree with the philosophy of having your best players on ST, that is something that somewhat defines "Beamerball" BUT if poor decisions are constantly made, a different kid needs to be doing the job, but from what I see in the play calling during games, the kids MAY be coached to roll the dice on every punt return???????????????

 

[GoldRusher]

I would add KO coverage in the plus column as well. Maryland has some very dangerous return men back there and we did a good job of keeping them in check.

Squirt should be gone from the PR job IMO. Enough is enough, the kid has struggled at it for 2 years now. It's time to let him focus on WR and find someone who is willing to focus on PR as his primary role on the team for the next year or so. Some are calling for Dravon Henry or Gibson but IMHO I think that would be a mistake, those kids future are as starters on offense and defense respectively, what we need is a guy that is fine with playing at PR as a starter and backup at another position for the remainder of his career in Morgantown. A true specialist at his job of returning punts.

 

[DCWV4life]

Where is Vaugh Rivers? lol That guy made good decisions and would catch the ball even if the entire coverage team was three steps away from him.

 

[Anotherwvufan]

We need to fix these fast. We won't get away with this in conference play.

 

[DBAR4WVU]

We have 5 days to fix it.... OK is not the Turtles.

 

[CoolBeans]

I think as the season goes on, you'll see Maryland does have one of the most special teams in the country. If you look at the USF game, they WON that game in similar fashion. A blocked punt for TD, excellent kickoff and punt returns. We have things to fix, no doubt. But remember at the end of the season I told you how good Maryland is. They will finish with eight to nine wins in the Big 10 East. They are better than Rutgers, Penn St., Michigan, and Indiana. They'll play Iowa and at Wisconsin on the West Side of the ledger. I think they split those. They play at Syracuse next week in the Orange HomerDome. They get both Ohio St. and Michigan St. at home. Look for an 8-4 or 9-3 Maryland squad. If they upset Michigan St. at home... they could end up in the Big 10 championship game against Nebraska. Not a bad first year.

 

[Mike]

I THINK most of us would agree ST played a gigantic role in keeping Maryland in this game.

Just from the Maryland game:

Positives:
Blocked punt for safety

Game winning FG

Negatives:
Muffed punt inside our 10....I do not know what Thompson is thinking sometimes, but lets get him off punt returns and let him focus on WR.

Bringing it out of end zone so we start around the 10(we did score on that drive) but damn take the 25 yards and be done with it.

Punt coverage..I check this off to poor tackling and one change they need to get Callichio off this team...yeah he is a great shield blocker for the punter (6'9" 315 lbs) but he is not going to tackle anyone in open field so it is as if we are 9 on 11 when we punt since O Toole isn't really that great at tackling either. Put a LB or safety back there

Blocked FG...I am not sure if that is on Lambert or the line....I tend to say Lambert since his 47 yard FG had to have a lower trajectory than the 42 yard FG.

I am not going to say fire Defo just yet, if it would have not been for special teams we would not have been in the Bama game...hopefully this is their bad game and he fixes these issues. It is just frustrating to see the players make the same mistakes on PR and KR...at some point as a coach you have to get them to fix this or just take them off that particular team.

A lot of work to do for this week...as some have stated and I agree you can't make these special teams errors against good teams. Last year against Oklahoma was a perfect example, defense would get stops and the ST would give them the ball right back takes the wind out of any momentum we get.

I don't blame efore, for the muffed punt return. That is just a player error, it happens. I blame him for the rest of the ST mistakes. He has done nothing good since he has been here.

 

[WVUDAD]

I don't blame efore, for the muffed punt return. That is just a player error, it happens. I blame him for the rest of the ST mistakes. He has done nothing good since he has been here.

Indeed, muffed punts and fumbles are on the players, NOT the coaches. The rest of the errors, though are coaches faults. When kids make bad decisions over and over, when kids field punts at the two, bring KOs out of the end zone only to get tackled at the 10, when we cant cover a punt, REPEATEDLY...... Anyway, I hope some productive work is done this week prior to the potentially most complete team on the schedule comes to town Sat.

 

[Anotherwvufan]

I don't blame efore, for the muffed punt return. That is just a player error, it happens. I blame him for the rest of the ST mistakes. He has done nothing good since he has been here.

I have seen nothing special from our ST all year. When you pay a guy 500K to coach ST, you should get your money's worth. I can see this becoming our Achilles heel this year.

 

[DCWV4life]

Ok devils advocate, when you say you have seen nothing good from the ST's:

100 yard kickoff return for TD that kept us in game with Bama

GW FG to win at Maryland

Blocked punt for points

I am not going to argue about whether he should stay or go game 3(my opinion right now we don't need that kind of shakeup) if it cost us a game or two this year then after this season can him.

 

[bbwvfan]

No one can argue with the improved KO coverage they've seen this year.

 

[Mike]

I realize we got to wait till the season is over for him to get shit canned, but it needs done.

 

[WVUDAD]

No one can argue with the improved KO coverage they've seen this year.

I think a LOT of that is having a kicker who kicks it deep, and opponents with sense enough to take a knee in the end zone. Also, what IS good kick return coverage? We are giving up around 20 yards per so far this year, seems pretty good, looks like the long for the year so far is 26 yds. Punt coverage, however could use some work.

 

[DCWV4life]

Say Special teams wins more games for us? You still want to fire him? Our special teams have been up and down for years, there was never a era where we did not have to worry about special teams....hell even when I thought we had some of the best we had in a while they came back and screwed us during 13-9, all facets of the game have their ups and downs....lets see how the season plays out.

 

[bbwvfan]

Say Special teams wins more games for us? You still want to fire him? Our special teams have been up and down for years, there was never a era where we did not have to worry about special teams....hell even when I thought we had some of the best we had in a while they came back and screwed us during 13-9, all facets of the game have their ups and downs....lets see how the season plays out.

Which is exactly why I said not to overreact to one game...