Hadden played well and didn’t get too dramatic Dee Williams hopefully got his 1 fumble out of the way because he is a threat The defense seems as good or better against the run Linebacks actually running in pass coverage instead of watching Kick better now Joe was Joe but I hate he got robbed of a highlight. He really needs those and would have changed the feel of his performance. His stiff arm was nutsworthy. And he ran unscripted a couple times so that’s better. We are so used to deep threats that will unfortunately be his dipstick with many. But just win and it will sort out. Really liked the explosiveness of Wright. He find and hits the hole very fast McCastles looked smaller but faster than expected. That could come in handy The only thing that really sucked was kicking. I think we look a little faster on defense but it will take a DT QB to know for sure. Herring had a very solid game. Arion Carter is a specimen. Def one to watch
Anyway we can bribe UVA’s punter to transfer portal over to Knoxville? That dude could punt his ass off. The rugby thing where we punt a ball on the run 25 or 30 yards downfield makes me anxious
They say the punter looks better in practice so things may shift on that. Also, hopefully we won't punt so much if the offense gels better.
Wright is only going to get better now that he is committed to becoming an inside/outside workhorse. By October he'll be experienced in the flow of inside 2nd level defenders and by November he'll be drawing comparisons to the greats.
The fanbase also has to remember that we have proven under JH that we always get better offensively as the season progresses. Unlike 2010-2020, we don't have clowns running a circus in Knoxville anymore.
Punting needs to improve which I am sure it will. Dee is fun on returns but I would bet that is not his last fumble. He plays a bit loose with the ball. In critical situation I would rather have White back there. All in all I don't think we will really know what we have until the UTSA game.
Speaking of UTSA, do y'all think we held back a little on the playbook vs UVA? If we did, will we do the same vs UTSA? I really can't tell with this staff. I feel they just call what's there and say forget hiding plays. But I'm sure they work on little wrinkles for teams like bama and georgia.
UVA had safeties 18 to 20 yards off the ball, they weren't going to get beat deep, so Heupel ran 3 plays over and over again
I saw someone say they ran like 8 plays over and over with only a couple of one-off ones. I think they're building up the repertoire to make sure we have nailed our bread and butter, and maybe to make preparation tougher for Florida on.
Honestly it took Hendon till the Florida game last year to iron out some things. And that game was like lift off.
Also, we have a few guys that didn't get a bunch of touches that will probably figure into our plans more heavily as the season goes on.
Swinging it out to the backs in the flat was something Hendon never looked for. You start stretching defenses vertically, those swing passes are going to be there all day
Personally I don’t thing CJH subscribes to that old school strategy. He wants yards and points and wins. He took what they gave and we didn’t execute perfectly. He is a different dude. He isn’t here to win only. He’s trying to wreck shit. I think he doesn’t give a damn if you know what’s coming. He doesn’t think you can stop it. But he’s going to be super nice in the process while making the occasional dig…subtlety. I love having a coach that would prefer to beat you by 35 more than 34. Dude has a chip. And after last year, I give him some leeway. I mean it was just football cocaine until USCJr. We all knew it too.
you remember Guarantano swing passes? Milton throws them in the right spot. Guarantano at times looked like the Peyton NFL skit.
Speaking of UTSA, I watched them Saturday and, while small sample size, they didn't look anything close to what they did last season.
While it's UVA, we handled business. It was obvious we kept everything close to the vest and we still handled business. We're more talented than they are, but the gulf between us and them is closer than the (on paper) gulf is between us and the elite 4-5 teams. But, the moment that stuck out to me the most was when Milton threw a perfect ball to Keyton on the 3rd drive. I remember thinking "this will test his composure". In times past, that's usually when he gets tight and starts overthinking routes and missing his throws. After that throw, in the next 2 drives, he went 2/5 18 yards. The 3rd drive after that was when we started well but ended up at 1st and 25. That, to me, was the test of what Joe Milton we have. Game was 7-0 and it was halfway through the 2nd Quarter. The last 4 drives were 3 punts and a TOD. It was tight and Milton looked tight. 1st and 25. Milton goes 3/5 for 56 yards and digs us out of the hole and leads a TD drive. After that point he led 5 TD drives to only 1 punt. I know it's UVA, but I also know that that is the kind of game that we have absolutely failed to put away in the past 15 years. We fumble, have a bad drive or two and our D starts getting gassed. Opponent gets some confidence and makes it a game. We didn't allow that. It was good to see even if it was just UVA.
