Defensive line was a major disappointment against OU's soft/injured offensive line

OU replaced 4 of their 5 OL from last year
In the game this weekend, both their LT and RT were out due to injury.
OU has not used the same OL starters more than 1 game this year

With all of that, our DL gets zero sacks and only a couple of tackles for loss?

How the hell is that possible?

Kansas DL gave the OU offensive line all kinds of problems the week before.

 

Coaching. OU's fakes looked more consistently like the real thing than I've ever seen from a team over a full 60 minutes before. Probably froze our guys in place a lot and made them less effective.

And then sometimes we just didn't have enough guys in the box. They'd have 2 RBs plus Hurts in the backfield along with the 5 OL and we'd only have 5 or 6 in the box. Easy for them to pick up yardage on runs, hard for us to get to the QB on passes.

 

BC has a brutal article about how we were out coached.

Coaching, Physicality and the Texas-Oklahoma Game

 

All we do is bull rush...No stunts......Pitiful excuse for a defense, and it isn't the players fault. They are just trying to do what they are coached to do...which isn't much...and it isn't the Dline coach's fault either. He is coaching what Orlando wants done.... SMH

 

I think Giles teaches a variety of techniques. But bull rushing immobile beef is seldom a good strategy when a team has a speed advantage.

 

Wow. That’s quite an indictment. And he’s not wrong.

I only hope the coaching staff take the opportunity to read it.

 

We attempted some variations of counters/counter tray type plays. The biggest problem I saw on some of those was that #90 was pushing Shack backwards and cutting off our pulling lanes, creating a traffic jam pile up in our backfield, and nowhere for the RB to go.

I’m not down on Shack. This is probably the only DL he’ll face all year where he’s outmatched. Sometimes we’ll face individual mismatches. We probably should have doubled #90 a lot more. That may open up some other defender (LBs) to go unblocked, but if you can’t stop the NT from wreaking havoc in the backfield, you’ve already lost. Counters and misdirections mainly fake out LBs and Ss anyway. Also how about we trap #90. This isn’t some high level/professional level coaching stuff. It’s some pretty standard ways of dealing with a mismatch up front.

 

My 2 pesos on the defensive front. We’ve got to improve the pass rush or we’ll continue to bring up the rear on D in the Big 12—that should be an embarrassment to our staff.

Either go back to a 4 man front with some quick pass rushing DEs, do some shifts up front right before the snap to confuse the OL, stunt on occasion, play one of the stronger LBs as a fourth hand-on-the-ground DL who sometimes drops back in coverage and sometimes rushes, or even run the gimmick ‘Cowboy’ defense a fair amount against Tech, Baylor, and other pass happy teams. If Herman doesn’t intervene, I’d expect Orlando to do the Cowboy D option, but none of the others above.

And, of course, tackle, including in the open field.

A very good offense and a lousy D will get us Herman’s UH level results and 8-4 or 9-3. We won’t regularly beat the OUs or LSUs until the D improves.

 

and add TTU under Leach.

 

Gallimore is definitely better than Shackleford. Why in 4 quarters did we never come up with any counter to this? Roach is better than their backup OTs (before he stupidly took himself out of the game) and this rarely helped us any because their staff found ways around it.

 

Is #90 better or more highly rated than Coburn. I think not but as has previously stated our DC does not believe in defense. He is a bend but dont break guy. Texas will field the worst defense in its history this year and for no other reason than the DC. Back in the Mackovic days, we used to be a RB's dream game because we could make him a heisman winner just from 1 game. Think Rashan Salam. Hope Herman makes a DC change but doubtful. The other thing is back to the Vince/Colt days, the QB and receivers could read the D and when a blitz was apparent there was a hot play to change to. That concept is lost on this teams OC.

 

Yep, I read that yesterday and thought about posting it. Scipio absolutely nailed it.

 

Orlando had no plan/scheme to take advantage of what should have been their weakness. The 3 man line with a blitzing db coming from well off the line doesn’t work. In my opinion we needed a four man front (3-4 look with rush end/backer). The line needed to attack on every play and try to get in the backfield regardless of pass or run play. Orlando’s first year he seemed to blitz from one side on a overload and have the d-line slant away from where the blitz is coming. I don’t recall seeing that this year. With the issues at db, the d-line cannot play on its heels trying to read and react. They didn’t read and certainly didn’t react. I think Herman and Orlando thought they would win one on one battles upfront and they were sadly mistaken and/overconfident.

 

I at least would take Gallimore over Coburn.

 

2016: Gerald Wilbon 3-Star 5.6 rating
D Christmas Giles 4-Star 5.9 rating
Malcolm Roach 3-Star 5.6 rating
2017: Taquon Graham 3-Star 5.7 rating
Jamari Chisholm 2-Star 5.4 rating

Upperclassmen on the two/three deep

Just indicating that our better (recruiting ranking) players are not 21-23 yet.

 

Yeah, we got outcoached on Saturday.

Fortunately, I don't think Herman is too stubborn to make some necessary changes.

Largely due to good recruiting, very good S&C, and good individual technique coaching, Hand has gotten used to situations where our OL outmatches (or at least equally matches--LSU) the opposing DL. There was at least one noticeable mismatch against us up front on Saturday. He's got to scheme around that--our guys aren't Supermen and nobody has 5 All Americans up front. There will be the occasional DT who is flat out better than our guys. Traps, double teams, etc. There are things that can be done, and it needs to be recognized very early in the game, and adjustments must be made.

 

For now yes--no doubt. Of course, Coburn is just a Freshman, so he may well exceed Gallimore's production as an upperclassman. Interestingly, Gallimore is from Canada.

 

I don’t think there was ANY unit that stepped up on Saturday. There were some good individual efforts, but no unit stood out as a bright spot, imo

Total team failure

 

Coburn will merely take up a blocker and have very little as far as stats as long as Orlando uses the scheme he uses. Its obvious all our DLmen do is tie up a blocker. They don't seem to even try to GET OFF a block and make plays.

 

Not sure I agree with the absolute there Maj, Roach definitely has gotten off some blocks this year.

 

Is anyone else in the upper echelon of college football running a defense like ours? Schematically that is--I know none of the top teams are performing like our D has performed thus far.