Getting Nasty Out There for A Coach

We work hard for the analysis and commentary that you find on SFN to be accurate. But, whatever is blogged here will almost always be blogged with uncompromising emotion because we are fans. In case you didn’t notice, the name of the site is StateFANSnation.

In today’s N&O, Chip Alexander highlighted most of the key on-field/execution problems surrounding NC State football this year and penned a nice article that was dead on with many of the observations that you have read here — just without the ‘fan emotion’.

In ‘Slumping Wolfpack seeks solutions’ Alexander goes into detail about:

(1) A SLOW-STARTING OFFENSE
(2) THE RASH OF PENALTIES
(3) THE TURNOVER MARGIN
(4) SHAKY KICKING GAME

Alexander also references a video that has popped up on YouTube highlighting many of the Pack’s problems this year by using the team’s video introduction that is played on the Carter-Finley scoreboard before every game. (Which is odd since we have never been able to find the actual Carter-Finley scoreboard intro on YouTube!)

The video that Alexander is referencing is actually the second video embeded in this entry. We are calling your attention to another video that was done last year in the first video below to highlight the consistency of the broken-record of the problems within NC State football regardless of what year the calendar shows.

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'06 Football Chuck Amato General

123 Responses to Getting Nasty Out There for A Coach

  1. Mr O 10/31/2006 at 12:04 PM #

    Here is our how the completions were distributed last Saturday:

    RBs – 3
    TE – 6
    WRs – 12

    We averaged 10 yards per completion and Evans threw for a career high 221 yards

    1st series(started at our 20)
    27 yard completion to John Dunlap
    Dunlap drops a sure first down on 3rd and 3 which would have given us a 1st down at UVa’s 40

    2nd series(started at our 28)
    1 holding penalty, two false starts – drive ruined

    3rd series (started at our 28)
    Amato plays not to lose by passing on first down, Evans sacked for a 13 yard loss – drive ruined

    4th series( started at our 20)
    three first downs gained, drive stalls at UVa 45 yd line
    -On first down from UVa’s 45, Long hurries Evans who has to throw it away.
    -2nd down run no gain
    -3rd incomplete pass on 3rd and 10

    5th series – Started at our 43(Not sure what the coaches were thinking here)Stone fumbles option for three yard loss on 1st down – drive went nowhere

    6th series (started at our 20)
    four first downs
    Barret 15 yard reception
    Hill 14 yard reception
    Bowens 17 yard reception
    Evans had an incompletion that was a 30 yard pass to Dunlap

    end of half

    7th series(started at our 28)
    3 and out, pass play incomplete to Blackman on 1st down

    8th series (started at our 35)
    1st down – pass incomplete
    2nd down – pass complete
    3rd down – Holding penalty on Leroy Harris stalls forces punt

    9th series(started at our 25)
    Rush on 1st and 2nd down
    Missed a 3rd and 4

    10th series (started at our 10 yard line)
    1st down -run
    2nd down – Evans scrambles on a pass play
    3rd down – Brown stopped short on 3rd and 2
    4th down – false start
    4th down false start

    11th series(started on our 10)
    Dunlap 28 yard completion
    Dunlap 17 yard completion
    Hill 10 yard completion
    Incompletions to Dunlap and Bowens
    Blackman 24 yard completion
    Dunlap 8 yard TD reception

    12 series(last drive-stared our 10)
    two incompletions to WRs
    1 interception

  2. redfred2 10/31/2006 at 12:05 PM #

    ^Chop (!!!)

    They are trying to develop balance, but doing it as conservatively as they possibly can. They aren’t into the defense’s heads early, and the rest of the offense suffers because of it.

  3. Mr O 10/31/2006 at 12:15 PM #

    We threw the ball 35 times on Saturday.

    After going through each possession, I feel a lot better about our game planning and play calling. That says a lot because I have been critical of Trestman.

    IMO, it really isn’t about what play we call or how many passes and runs we call. We really seem to have a nice mix and have success in both phases of the game. However, our execution is what puts our offense in a position where it is almost impossible to succeed. The penalties, a sack early in a series, and QB hurries where we have to throw it away get us in 1st/2nd/3rd and long situations which makes it tough for our offense to consistently move the ball.

    Average field position versus UVa – 23 yard line

    That absolutely kills us.

    Overall, I think it is more the execution of our offense by the players which is giving us problems. However, that is definitely something that is the responsibility of the offensive coaching staff in addtion to the players going out and playing intelligently.

    One thing in regards to penalties is that we don’t have the late hits, off-sides, personal fouls, pass interferences, taunting, etc….that used to give us major problems. People often talk about discipline…well IMO our discipline looks a whole lot better on the defensive side of the ball.

    The other side of the ball is where we seem to have a lack of discipline/execution that is making it difficult to score points.

    Maybe with Meyer being in his 2nd year and Trestman being in his 3rd, then we can expect the whole offensive unit to improve tremendously during the off-season. Overall, we seem to be pretty good at all of the skill positions and we appear to have a QB who can spread the ball around, throw it accurately, and minimize turnovers.

    It appears that the offense could break out at anytime. The only question is when and if.

  4. Mr O 10/31/2006 at 12:20 PM #

    One last thing that a guy at Packpride picked out when I posted the results of each drive:

    Our two best drives were both of the series where we went with the no huddle offense(excluding the last series of course).

    So no-huddle appears to be when we are at our best on offense.

  5. Woof Wolf 10/31/2006 at 12:23 PM #

    In 1A games this year our total points by quarter are: 3, 34, 23, 65.

    Our opponents have scored: 26, 51, 41, 39.

    Our opponents’ scoring is balanced with 77 in the 1st half and 80 in the 2nd

    We have scored 37 in the 1st half and 88 in the 2nd. We have scored 5 more points in the 4th quarter than in the other three combined.

    The numbers tell the story.

  6. redfred2 10/31/2006 at 12:34 PM #

    Mr O- Great work! Thanks!!!

  7. GAWolf 10/31/2006 at 12:48 PM #

    So Mr. O shows us playcalling is not as bad as “execution.” Who is held responsible for lack of execution?

    Like I’ve said before… we wore this argument out during the last few basketball seasons. It’s not the offense we run that loses our basketball games, but rather it’s the lack of execution.

    It’s all the same in my book. Pre-internet all that mattered was W’s and L’s. People didn’t have the place to disect every aspect of failure like we do here.

    Can we not look at the bottom line EVER? My opinion of the bottom line is pretty simple: we have not gotten what we were promised for our investment into this football program. Record-wise, we’re not a damn bit better than we were with O’Cain. I was not happy with O’Cain, but could he have maintained or improved with the upgrades we’ve put in our program since he left?

    We’re no better off, except for that which the hypemachine created… new facilities and more interest. The important stuff, the football, remains tragically the same. If that…

  8. JT 10/31/2006 at 12:54 PM #

    Penalties, penalties penalties. I’m so sick of seeing them kill Pack drives and it’s been happening for a few years now. And even if it doesn’t kill the drive, there’ll be one on a kick off or punt to hand 15 yards to the opponent at a key moment. It drives me nuts!
    With the penalties, I have no idea how effective the offense could be.

    Maybe the no-huddle forces the players into their comfort zones, keeping them from over thinking the game- thus less mental mistakes and a smoother offense. Pure supposition, but it’s possible. I just want to see State not screw themselves. That’d make me happy. No more of that beating yourself feeling.

  9. partialqualifier 10/31/2006 at 1:00 PM #

    Mr O- Great work indeed! I love it when people start in with the usual arguments that we run too much or we are too conservative! Great that u have listed the facts as they are. I would suspect to see far less comments from those folks in this blog now!

    As for those of you going on and on about Amato’s comments….I hope like hell you dont want Cowher as your coach in the future. Last week after the Atlanta game he spent a lot of his Monday presser talking about the need for balance on offense. I guess he’s an idiot too now.

    Execution of offense is the job of the coaches. Play calling is very over-rated! I am not angry so much at Trestmans play calling…but at his general inability to score points because of lack of exectuion by his players. You can call the greatest play ever invented….but if nobody executes the play properly what does it matter. On the other side…how many times have we seen great playmakers turn horrible plays into big gains? We need to execute the plays we are calling much, much better…and that is on the coaches.

    Great eaxample of this was in the first half on Saturday. We ran a toss sweep to the left to Andre Brown at about our 40. The formation was to the right…and UVA had overloaded that side. There was a safety in the middle of the field who would have to been Superman to catch Brown. There was only one player with any legitimate chance of stopping the play…and that was a corner lined in front of Bowen, our WR. Guess what? Bowen whiffed on the block and the corner stoppen Brown for a 2 yard gain. Great play design…great play call….terrible execution…no gain!

  10. WolfPup35 10/31/2006 at 1:02 PM #

    Recently, I have started looking at CTC like I look at MOC…win the games you’re not supposed to win, and lose the games you should win. (FSU–1998 Baylor–1998….BC–2006 UVa–2006). Maybe, like MOC, CTC is just a better co-ordinator and positions coach than a head coach. There is no dentying that Amato is a hell of a DC, and MOC is a hell of a QB man, but head coaching just does not work for either of them.

  11. Mr O 10/31/2006 at 1:06 PM #

    Gawolf: Coaches and players are responsible for execution. However, our lack of execution appears to be on one side of the football. A lot of people talk about our program as being undisciplined – well that is true on offense, but our execution/defense looks as if it has improved on defense.

    The points I was making is that it doesn’t appear that we run too much, pass too little, don’t throw the deep ball, “play to lose” or whatever else typical reason the average fan spouts for ineptness.

    After looking at play calling from the game, we threw it 35 times and ran it 22 times. Yet, we have people on here saying we don’t throw it enough. Just the opposite a few weeks ago we had some people complaining we don’t run Andre Brown enough(those complaints stopped after he fumbled the ball twice causing us to lose two consecutive games).

    Again, the larger point is that our overall offensive approach seems to be sound. Our coaches just need to get the players to execute better.

    JT: Can you point out some penalties on special teams? They may have happened, but I don’t think they have happened many times this year.

  12. redfred2 10/31/2006 at 1:07 PM #

    There is no reason not to air it out, and EARLY. Take the incompletions, interceptions, and turnovers early on, but challenge, and put the thought in the defensive player’s minds.

    I do not understand how an offensive unit can march the ball 79 yards down the field, especially late when they’re behind, and score on a defensive team set up for and expecting nothing but the pass. If they are just “slow starting,” then make them get their slow starting passing game, which is responsible for the wins in ACC games so far, started in the first quarter and don’t let up until something happens.

    It is hard to watch at the end, when the receivers make one great play right after another, and then score, especially when it seems the staff is fearful and have made no attempts to exploit that superior athletic ability all day long. They’ll pull out all the stops when it’s do or die, absolute desperation time, but not before.

    Though some people would jump all over Daniel Evans’ case for it, it’s not any harder to suffer a loss because of an interception thrown in the first quarter, than it is the fourth. A loss…is afterall…a loss.

  13. legacyman 10/31/2006 at 1:17 PM #

    Very few, if any, folks are happy with the results so far this season. To place the entire blame on an assistant coach or the head coach is a bit simplistic. There is enough blame to spread around and there are enough folks to fix the problems…they just need time to do it. After all, we are into our second, brand new, QB this season after Marcus was demted. We are playing with almost a new Defensive team as we sent six or more to the NFL. Still no one is happy but some can see that the problems are slowly being solved. Chuck is the head coach and he shoulders all of the blame as well as any coach I can remember…he doesn’t dump on the players or coaches…he bites the bullet and, yes, he is paid well to do that.

    The comment above about Bowen missing a critical block…we have suffered from that for many years…our WRs don’t block well. Bowen is a true frosh or redshirt frosh so experience will help him.

  14. redfred2 10/31/2006 at 1:18 PM #

    Play calling…execution…lineup…late game…earlygame…defense…offense…change…development…penalties…run…pass…WHATEVER???

    It is all part of EXECUTION, and it IS all directly attributed to COACHING.

    You pick the particular one.

  15. RAWFS 10/31/2006 at 1:19 PM #

    O, thanks for the chart, and it is illuminating, but not completely.

    Refer to the PbP for the first NC State drive Saturday:

    1st and 10 at NCST 20 Daniel Evans rush for 3 yards to the NCSt 23 out-of-bounds. 0 0
    2nd and 7 at NCST 23 Toney Baker rush for a loss of 1 yard to the NCSt 22.
    3rd and 8 at NCST 22 Daniel Evans pass complete to John Dunlap for 27 yards to the NCSt 49 for a 1ST down.
    1st and 10 at NCST 49 Toney Baker rush for 5 yards to the UVa 46.
    2nd and 5 at UVA 46 Toney Baker rush for 2 yards to the UVa 44.
    3rd and 3 at UVA 44 Daniel Evans pass incomplete to John Dunlap.
    4th and 3 at UVA 44 John Deraney punt for 44 yards for a touchback, Nc State penalty 5 yard illegal procedure accepted.

    What do you see?

    A repetitive pattern still at play: conservative play calling followed by 3rd and long. Yes, Evans completed a long 27 yard pass…on third down. Why not on second down? Or first?

    That in mind, let’s not be so fast to shift all of the blame over to players failing to execute.

    You can review the whole game play by play here:
    http://sports-ak.espn.go.com/ncf/playbyplay?gameId=263010258&confId=1

  16. redfred2 10/31/2006 at 1:22 PM #

    ^They don’t mind putting all of the pressure on their own defense late, but they just can’t seem to open the offense early, to avoid the need.

  17. GAWolf 10/31/2006 at 1:23 PM #

    Mr. O: My complaint about our offensive playcalling is not numbers of plays but the type of plays. I agree that we need to “air it out” occasionally. I think we need to throw DOWNFIELD. If 50% of our throws to our receivers are for two yard gains (or in some cases 2 yard losses) that’s a wasted pass as far as looking strictly at the numbers. If we are 3rd and 20, please throw the ball at least 20 yards. It’s a simple concept that our staff clearly fails to accept.

    I understand what you’re getting at and to some extent agree with you. I just felt that this clarification takes a little from just the sheer numbers with respect to play calling.

    Also, I don’t understand why we continue to run slow developing running plays. When our O-line is terrible, why give the D-line even more time to penetrate and hit our backs in the backfield. It’s elementary.

  18. redfred2 10/31/2006 at 1:32 PM #

    The UVA game is a perfect example of two defenses who held their own pretty much all day long, then had all of the pressure to perform in a do or die situation, dropped squarely on their shoulders.

    Some set up, some tighten up, but nobody performs the same under that kind of pressure. UVA’s defense slipped late, so did ours. They had the offense to make up, we……..

  19. redfred2 10/31/2006 at 1:33 PM #

    ^ TYPO- Some “step” up,

  20. choppack1 10/31/2006 at 1:49 PM #

    RAWFS- But you see, when we run on 2nd down, we get closer to that key metric “balance.”

    I’m not against trying to establish the run. My only point is this, we’ve got to try something different – like going no-huddle faster – in order to score some points.

    I am encouraged that we did pass more on first down than last weeks scoreless fiasco…but the result was the same – and we really weren’t trying anything radical, which IMHO is really needed to jump-start this offense.

    It will be interesting to see how we respond going up against what is probably the ACC’s best-coached defense.

  21. Woof Wolf 10/31/2006 at 1:52 PM #

    Maybe my numbers didn’t speak for themselves as I thought. Let me try again. In the seven games against 1A teams we have scored 65 points in the 4th quarter. We have scored a total of 60 points in the other three quarters combined. I don’t see how anyone can look at those numbers and believe we aren’t more conservative in the earlier part of games.

    Except for the Southern Miss game no one has had a big enough lead to empty thier bench or back off defensively. We only scored seven in the fourth quarter of that game. We are obviously running different plays with a different mindset late in the game when we are behind.

    All we are asking is for some coaches look at what we’ve be doing in the 4th quarter and try to play that way from the start.

  22. redfred2 10/31/2006 at 1:59 PM #

    Woof Wolf

    Sorry I didn’t comment, but your numbers spoke very loudly to me, as they should have to everyone, the first time. Thanks for bringing it back up again.

  23. choppack1 10/31/2006 at 2:19 PM #

    Woof wolf – but playing that way early is keeping us in the game…

  24. tcthdi-tgsf-twhwtnc 10/31/2006 at 2:34 PM #

    WTF is Amato writting down after each penalty? His grocery list? It sure as hell isn’t which kid needs some ‘coaching’ from him when they return to the sideline.

  25. Wolfpack4ever 10/31/2006 at 3:08 PM #

    RAWFS Says: “Einstein was considered by his teachers to be not too bright also, not that Chuck is an Einstein by any stretch of the imagination.�

    4ever, your analogy is absurd. Comparing Chuck Amato to Einstein. What’s next, a comparison of Chuck Amato and Vince Lombardi?”

    RAWFS, Surely you can tell that the analogy isn’t about comparing Amato to Einstein. The analogy is about making inaccurate assesments based on biased opinion. Einstein’s teachers were biased to preconceived notions. I can explain this further if you don’t get it. “not that Chuck is an Einstein by any stretch of the imaginationâ€? is a dead give away that the comparison wasn’t as you seemed to think.

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