Writing the Pine

I don’t want to make any more excuses for my Illini.  We stunk it up.  Our “high-octane offense” hasn’t scored a touchdown in two of the three games played so far this season.  Today’s playing conditions were exactly the conditions that we would not be good against.  Despite our past success in running the football with Pierre Thomas and Rashard Mendenhall, this team’s strengths are now in the passing game.  Whenever you have rain pouring down and a slippery field, you’re going to see a running battle.  Aside from a few nice runs from Mikel LeShoure, I think it is clear that our running game is lacking.  I heard we were going after one blue-chip running back recruit for the 2010 class, and boy was today a great game to pitch to the kids: “Look at our offense.  Amazing receivers, right? Well none of our running backs can get it done, and we need you to come in here and take over.  Do you like roses?”  The slippery turf and ball created many turnovers for both teams; turnovers that probably would not have happened if it didn’t rain.  But the Ohio State Buckeyes capitalized on our turnovers, and we did absolutely nothing with their turnovers.  However, I don’t think anyone should give up on our season just yet.  Here are some thoughts from the game:

Jim Tressel is a douchebag with no class.

One reason why I find it so hard to root against Ron Zook is the fact that you can see that he’s such a great guy.  He’s a nonstop worker, a competitor, and is a first class citizen.  He has shown his class numerous times when he was caught in tough situations, most recently when Florida head coach Urban Meyer took a shot at him for no reason five years after Zook’s departure from the program.  Tressel’s decision to go for it on 4th-and-goal with less than two minutes to go in the game was classless and pathetic.  I’m not sure if the media is going to play this up or mention it at all this week, but I thought that this should be discussed to some extent.  There’s no reason to go for it in that situation.  The game’s already won.  Kick a field goal and enjoy the win.  No reason to kick a team when it’s down.

Our defense was pitiful.

I was going to brag about how we “held” Terrelle Pryor to zero hards of passing in the first half, but the guy only had two passing attempts.  Terrelle Pryor, Boom Herron and Brandon Saine absolutely ran through our defense, even when we knew they were going to run the ball.  Just a bad effort and poor tackling.  Our young and inexperienced linebackers showed their youth at many points throughout the game.  Ian Thomas has to make that missed sack on Terrelle Pryor.  It’s not easy at all to bring down a 6′6 240 lb. elusive athlete, but when you are on top of him with both your arms fully wrapped around his body’s upper half, the man must come down.  In the second half, when Terrelle Pryor actually started to throw some more, he had open receivers to throw to every time.  Pryor reacted better than I expected when he saw blitzes, but the guy still doesn’t have the touch of a pocket passer.  However, we can’t just place the blame on the defense.  Our defense gave up 30 points.  It’s not a good job by any means.  But our offense our team absolutely no chance to win games.  You can’t win games when your team scores ZERO points!

On Juice Williams, Eddie McGee, and the quarterbacking situation.

Juice had a bad game against Mizzou.  He got injured on the first play of the Illinois State game.  He was off again today.  Every pass he threw was shaky.  His feet weren’t set and there was no confidence in his throws.  It looked like his pump fakes looked like they were caused by his hesitancy and not his desire to fake opposing defenders.  That said, you have to look at two key things: (1) This is the same Ohio State defense that performed well against USC and shut out Toledo last week.  Ohio State lost James Laurinaitis Jr. and Malcolm Jenkins to the first round of this year’s NFL Draft, and people were speculating a weaker, rebuilding Ohio State defense.  However, people forget that this is Ohio State.  They routinely have the top two recruiting classes in the Big Ten every year.  Their backups are just as good and sometimes better than most other teams’ starting units.  (2) Eddie McGee is a worse version of Juice Williams.  Eddie and Juice are very, very similar players.  Their running games are about even.  Eddie’s passing game is much more rawer than Juice’s and he is a turnover machine (which is saying a lot because Juice doesn’t protect the ball well).  Eddie has never proven that he would be a better alternative to Juice.  When Juice got injured in our last game, McGee finally had a chance to prove that he was ready.  He played well, but was clearly not better than Juice.  Today, he showed us again why Juice is our starting quarterback.  There is not a thing that Eddie brings to the table that is better than Juice.  Juice was often criticized for not knowing when to get rid of the ball and lacking touch on his passes.  Eddie didn’t show that he was better than Juice at either of those things.  Not only was his performance lacking, but he admitted to Coach Zook after the Illinois State game that he hadn’t prepared as well as he should have because he wasn’t expecting to play.  Not exactly the qualities of a guy you would want to be taking the starting QB position.  I really hope Eddie improves his game and has a productive senior season as an impact player next year, either at quarterback or wide receiver.  But I hope this game finally shut the retarded “BENCH JUICE, EDDIE’S BETTER LOL” fans.  This game reminded me of last year’s Eastern Illinois game, when McGee came in for a few snaps when we were up by a lot of points.  He immediately turned the ball over on two straight possessions, causing Zook to put Juice back in the game.  Doesn’t look like much has changed.

Juice really needs to play better.  He won’t have an easier time next week when Penn State comes to visit.  We need to really limit our expectations for the next few weeks because it appears that our offense will not live up to its potential.  Because our offense has struggled mightily against Mizzou and Ohio State, I’m not expecting us to go out and score 45 against Penn State.  But Juice needs to find a way to get into a rhythm.

Our offensive line needs to improve in the run game.  We need better results from our running backs.

I think our line played well against the pass rush.  Juice often had plenty of time to make plays.  Sometimes he had too much time.  Great effort by our offensive line in that regard.  Our run defense wasn’t so special.  Aside from an astounding play by Jon Asamoah in the first half, there wasn’t any good blocking at all.  All of our runs were corner sweeps for five yards.  We were unable to do anything at all straight up the gut.  We need our running backs to play better.  Juice is at his best when we have a solid running game to properly complement him.

I’ve had problems with Coach Schultz’s play-calling the last two games.  I don’t think he utilizes the bomb enough.  We need to take advantage of our fast receivers who excel especially in the long-passing game.  But he didn’t have much choice today because of the rain.  We’ll wait and see next time.

Clay Nurse, Showtime and other bright spots on defense on an otherwise shitty game.

Wow, this guy’s confidence must be OFF THE CHARTS right now.  He had around four one-on-one battles with Pryor, and came out on top each and every time.  And you could see the progression in his aggressiveness, confidence and excitement with each subsequent play.  What was great to see was when he chased Pryor down to the sideline, slowing him down and Ian Thomas caught up and sacked him.  Nurse practically exploded with joy after the play.  It was great to see.  I felt so happy for him.  He’s worked his tail off.  He was behind Derek Walker and Will Davis (probably the most dominant defensive end tandem in Illinois history) for his entire collegiate career.  Now, in his senior year, he’s having his chance to shine.  God bless him.  Losing Martez Wilson for the season was unfortunate, and our linebackers are far from impressive, but I like what I saw from Evan “Showtime” Frierson. He seemed to be at the right place at the right time and showed some nice explosiveness on defense.  I’m not sure how good the linebacking corps is going to be, but we can only get better from here.  Let’s hope for the best.  I liked the one-on-one tackling displayed by Garrett Edwards today.  He made a few difficult tackles; he has definitely shown improvement from last season.  

What to look forward to in the future:

It’s hard to say what will happen in the future.  We can’t assume we suck and give up on our season after starting 1-2. Our two losses probably came at the hands of two teams that were genuinely better than us.  We can’t call for Zook’s head yet. Ohio State is a great team and Mizzou looks like a very strong team too.  We’re going to have to step up our game.  Michigan’s offense looks great.  Penn State looks like they will win the conference again.  Cincinnati looks like they are headed back to a BCS bowl this year and Fresno State has made teams earn their wins by scoring in bunches and fought through some difficult losses.  Indiana and Purdue are better than last year, and we look worse.  I am legitimately scared to shit that we won’t win another game this season.  It’s very possible.  Michigan, who I think is a better team than us so far this season, almost lost to Indiana, who is the perennial doormat of the conference, which really spooks the life out of me.  I think at this point we will be very lucky to make a bowl game.  We got one hell of a tough schedule.  Good luck Coach Zook, you are clearly going to need it.