Perspective

[EWU98]

I know this last game was not what we had all hoped for . . . .a all out Eagle butt kicking, but remember this was the second round of the play-offs everyone is here because they are damn good!
They were a tough team that played great!
From here on out we will be seeing league champions or league runner ups.
Every team knows how to win and will be leaving it all on the field. Our boy's played great! Big Ups!! :notworthy: :notworthy: :notworthy:
I am just glad our guys don't have to hopscotch across the country week after week!
One down one . . . .

 

[LDopaPDX]

Our defense just doesn't seem to string together 3 nice plays and get themselves off the field. It's like we make some good plays, but then we'll have one where we miss 4 tackles and give up 20 yards.

Plus, we've got to do a better job hanging onto the football. You simply can't be -3 in turnover margin and beat quarterfinalist teams.

 

[LDopaPDX]

Plus, we've got to do a better job hanging onto the football. You simply can't be -3 in turnover margin and beat quarterfinalist teams

Just ask Cal Poly, who turned it over 3 times to Sam Houston State's none and lost by 2 points.

 

[MLEagle]

The 2 fumbles were bad, but the interception was absolutely bs call by the ref. You are right that we can't be negative in the turnover category and expect to beat playoff teams.

But, I have to disagree with you about how the defense played. Other then a couple busted pass coverages we played really solid. That qb was very strong and not easy to get to the ground. I will take fg over td's all day long, especially considering the field position the defense was having to deal with for much of the game.

 

[Dozy]

Our defense just doesn't seem to string together 3 nice plays and get themselves off the field. It's like we make some good plays, but then we'll have one where we miss 4 tackles and give up 20 yards.

Plus, we've got to do a better job hanging onto the football. You simply can't be -3 in turnover margin and beat quarterfinalist teams.

Did our D turn it over 3 times?! No. Did Wagner get the ball inside our 30 twice off of turnovers and score? Yes. Why do you have such a yeast infection for our D?! Layoff already....

 

[marceagfan5]

A win is a win...I'll take it! Wagner was tough, type of team that holds the ball forever and never let our O get into sync. We didn't look great, but so what, we won.

We are in the final 8! I don't care how we played to get there, we are there! Can't wait for Saturday! Enjoy the ride!!!

 

[LDopaPDX]

Our defense just doesn't seem to string together 3 nice plays and get themselves off the field. It's like we make some good plays, but then we'll have one where we miss 4 tackles and give up 20 yards.

Plus, we've got to do a better job hanging onto the football. You simply can't be -3 in turnover margin and beat quarterfinalist teams.

Did our D turn it over 3 times?! No. Did Wagner get the ball inside our 30 twice off of turnovers and score? Yes. Why do you have such a yeast infection for our D?! Layoff already....

Maybe you saw our defense out there playing a game of sheer beauty, but I didn't. We made a lot of plays, the problem was we never made them consistently enough to get them off the field. Their goal was to chip away and use up clock, thereby keeping our offense off the field. They gambled, correctly, that if you force us to make tackles for 3 straight plays, eventually someone will miss a tackle and they'd get a first down. They just drove all over the field because our defense couldn't get them into a 4th down situation.

That said, the D did a great job keeping them out of the endzone. They also had to deal with an offense and special teams unit that kept turning it over and giving Wagner short fields.

The problem with this game, as I saw it, was that we allowed Wagner to play to their strengths of keeping our offense off the field by whatever means necessary. Coach Hameline played the only game that Wagner could play against us that gave them a shot at winning. Big credit to their coaching staff for getting their team so well prepared. You could tell they were a lot more ready for what we'd try than we were ready for what they were doing.

It all worked out, simply because we have better players than Wagner. But it won't work out next round if we allow long drives and turn the ball over. The good news is that playoff form seldom runs from game to game. We had possibly our worst outing of the season (except the no-show in Bozeman) against North Dakota State in 2010. We followed that up with our best game of the season against Villanova. We're gonna need that huge improvement to beat Illinois State next week.

 

[LDopaPDX]

double post, sorry

 

[Rjones61]

Our defense just doesn't seem to string together 3 nice plays and get themselves off the field. It's like we make some good plays, but then we'll have one where we miss 4 tackles and give up 20 yards.

Plus, we've got to do a better job hanging onto the football. You simply can't be -3 in turnover margin and beat quarterfinalist teams.

Did our D turn it over 3 times?! No. Did Wagner get the ball inside our 30 twice off of turnovers and score? Yes. Why do you have such a yeast infection for our D?! Layoff already....

Maybe you saw our defense out there playing a game of sheer beauty, but I didn't. We made a lot of plays, the problem was we never made them consistently enough to get them off the field. Their goal was to chip away and use up clock, thereby keeping our offense off the field. They gambled, correctly, that if you force us to make tackles for 3 straight plays, eventually someone will miss a tackle and they'd get a first down. They just drove all over the field because our defense couldn't get them into a 4th down situation.

That said, the D did a great job keeping them out of the endzone. They also had to deal with an offense and special teams unit that kept turning it over and giving Wagner short fields.

The problem with this game, as I saw it, was that we allowed Wagner to play to their strengths of keeping our offense off the field by whatever means necessary. Coach Hameline played the only game that Wagner could play against us that gave them a shot at winning. Big credit to their coaching staff for getting their team so well prepared. You could tell they were a lot more ready for what we'd try than we were ready for what they were doing.

It all worked out, simply because we have better players than Wagner. But it won't work out next round if we allow long drives and turn the ball over. The good news is that playoff form seldom runs from game to game. We had possibly our worst outing of the season (except the no-show in Bozeman) against North Dakota State in 2010. We followed that up with our best game of the season against Villanova. We're gonna need that huge improvement to beat Illinois State next week.

I agree with the yeast infection comment. The defense did a great job with the hands they were dealt. If you have anyone to be upset with, be upset with the offense and special teams turning over the ball. Without those turnovers, there is a good chance our defense would have held them to a single digit score.

 

[kalm]

QUOTES FROM EASTERN HEAD COACH BEAU BALDWIN
“I’m really proud of our guys. I’m probably most proud of the fact that we weathered a much early storm. When I say early, I mean early in the third quarter. It was a type of storm in terms of things not going right. A lot of times you can find you are on the wrong end of the ballgame because of it. Our defense showed resilience. The biggest difference was our red zone defense -- we had a blocked field goal early and then we were able to hold them to field goals rather than touchdowns. They did what they do. I set my mind to the fact that we were going to win the turnover battle, but instead we lost it 3-0. Our guys were able to weather that storm. You don’t win too many games when you lose the turnover battle 3-0. They are a very disciplined team and a very physical team. They just understand exactly who they are and do a great job of it. It was a battle for our guys all night long.”

On Defense in Red Zone: “It gets tighter down there and we were tackling well in that area of the field. I’d have to watch film, but I thought our tackling took another step up from where it’d been the last couple weeks against a quarterback that has some shiftiness, and the running back is a very good player. The tackling got a lot better down there. I just thought we understood our concepts and what we were doing. Everyone was doing their jobs. You saw the quarterback have to hang on to the ball, hang on to the ball. We were doing a good job of not letting guys get behind him, and not opening up big zones and forcing him to really hang on to it. I have to go back and watch film to make sure of that. We did a good job of taking away his options down there when they did get to throwing it.”

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1) We turned the ball over 4 times in the 2nd half and when the offense did manage to hold onto it, they were flat and ineffective...until the last couple of possessions. Defense was non-existent in the 2nd half giving up big plays in the run game. hno:

2) They turned it over 5 times and yet were still in that game late. Sloppy tackling by our D against a funky offense that was constantly getting to the 2nd level. :thumbdown:

3) You can't spot a quality opponent a three score lead like that and expect to come back and win.

Yep, we ALMOST didn't win a National Championship that year. :mrgreen:

Yesterday, we won by two scores against a team that played almost mistake free football. We gained 436 yards and though it may seem hard to believe, 99 of those were actually on the ground. We held them to 316 yards and without the two short fields, the score wouldn't have been as close. We were only a couple of plays away from this one being a highly efficient blow out victory.

I agree on some of the missed tackles like the corner blitz in the second half where two guys had him dead to rights as Dosher turned right into it but we somehow let him get away. But also credit Dosher who's a pretty damn good runner.

Gotta shore up the ball handling mistakes, force some takeaways, and run block better, but by no means do I think this was a bad victory. :nod:

 

[spaceap6pack]

We won. See you all next week.

EWU 2012!

One game at a time . . . .