(08-28-2014 06:56 AM)Domer4life Wrote: (08-27-2014 05:02 PM)mrbig Wrote: Welcome!
Rice's top 2 players on defense are DT Christian Covington and CB Bryce Callahan. Both should get drafted when they leave Rice. Callahan has a chance to set the Rice record for INT's this year and has great ball-hawking skills. Covington is a big, quick, beast on the inside. The rest of Rice's front 6 (in the 4-2-5) are fairly small and don't have tons of experience, so I imagine you guys will try to pound the ball at anyone but Covington and make Rice prove they can stop you.
On offense, our new QB is Driphus Jackson. He played occasionally the past 2 years. He looked great against Air Force in a bowl game 2 seasons ago, but otherwise hasn't really found his rhythm in games. He is quite athletic and we are all hopeful. We have good talent and depth at WR and RB. Jowan Davis in particular looked electric as a RB at times last year. He's the guy who looks like his calves swallowed bowling balls.
Good stuff. I knew that you guys have put out NFL talent recently.
A couple other notes. Rice was looking like Tight End U' a couple years ago, with a string of TE's drafted into the NFL with James Casey, Luke Willson, and Vance McDonald. But last year Rice's very young TE corp didn't make much impact and now our starting TE is out 4-6 weeks with a rib fracture. There is still some talent at the position, but basically no experience or production to date.
Defensively, Rice's safeties in the last decade often lacked the athleticism to stick with fast receivers, leaving Rice so suceptible to the deep ball in the middle of the field that it was often painful to watch. There was a little improvement last year and it sounds like the coaching staff has (finally) committed to more athletic safeties rather than run-stoppers. So hopefully this long-time weakness will show signs of improvement.
From a fans perspective, here are my keys to the game for Rice:
Offense - this all comes down to QB play and QB protection. Rice has talent at RB and WR, but we need Driphus Jackson to take advantage of his opportunities. And the o-line needs to give him some time to settle in. If he gets hit quickly a few times early in the game, I'm worried his limited experience might lead to some happy feet.
Defense - most people would probably go with the traditional concerns of applying pressure on the QB and not getting burned deep. And those are big things to watch. But I'm more interested (and concerned) to see how Rice's smaller, faster defense holds up against the run and Notre Dame's o-line. A couple years ago Rice's DE's were good size. Now our DE's are converted LB's, TE's, and WR's. So they have some quickness, but they do not have a lot of bulk. If they can't get around your o-line, you guys will run over us like a line of sumo wrestlers.