Don’t bury the lead…this is a bad football team and in year 4 of Bloom. Houston is not a great team. They are an average football team and not as good as prior years. Looking around results of others that are improved in C-USA..over/under on Rice wins is going to be 4.5.
Pros
Rice plays TSU after Texas. They lost by 60 to Baylor tonight.
May be in minority but D is improved compared to prior D’s of the past 10-years. Yes, long 3rd-downs were horrible tonight but overall, the tackling and swarming to the ball is improved. The fact that offense can’t move the ball and they are on the field for most of the game (stat sheet misleading due to Bloom’s late in game antics) is not all of their fault.
A bit of a reach for a pro..but did like the play action on third and short in the 1H with the ‘heavy’ personnel in. Run that same play against Arkansas last week on 4th down in red zone (vs Myers getting stuffed) and maybe a different outcome for that game.
Cons
McCaffrey is at this third school for a reason and only reason he is at Rice is due to a personal connection. He is the teachers pet, not the answer. Jovani is one-dimensional and can’t throw. Green makes a nice play but on next one seems to turn the ball over and/or trip over his feet. Thus with no good/consistent QB play, it is difficult to win FBS games. Theme for the Bloom era and common theme of DB era sans CC and McH. Good QB’s can win games and average/bad QB’s don’t win games against decent competition. I want to apologize to D. Jackson from years ago. I was critical of him compared to CC and McH era but he now looks like a rock star compared to what has followed him since his departure.
OL was horrible. Really poor execution of pass protection schemes against common defensive stunts/alignments. McCaffrey running for his life on non-blitz situations.
Play calling…especially in 2H which was playing to avoid getting blown-out vs. playing to win. Gotta believe the play calling is a function of not having talent around McCaffrey to make plays. Yes..a couple injuries but now in year 4 of the program..need more depth than Pitre and Rozner to make plays.
Defensive schemes and execution on third and long. Breakdowns in both man and zone coverages on basic route combos being run by Houston receivers. 101 stuff, not grad-level stuff that Coogs were running.
Special Teams. Yikes. Regressed.
Was not at game but compared to prior Bayou Bucket games at HRS, attendance looked disappointing.
To earlier post about Stadium Club being empty in the 4Q…expect more apathy for remainder of year. Why would one come back? Apathy will be in full effect.
I will be betting any line that is < 35 points for next week. Horns and Sark will need a punching bag to take frustrations out on.
I still want to see McCaffrey for a few more games. We know what Green brings. McCaffrey had some moments. Shoving the ball between the tackles for very little gain on most 1st downs does not do him any favors. And I agree that he was often running for his life. I certainly my was not blown away with McCaffrey’s performance, but it seems silly to give up on him after a single game.
Defense will probably bounce back, UH had just enough playmakers to keep things going. Hope the defense stays healthy, I believe they will generally keep Rice in games and let us mostly focus our disdain on the offense.
Attendance was horrific. Actually think rice may have had more fans. But uh "crowd" seemed to grow post kickoff. May have had to do with lack of gate personnel. At the NW gate there was 2, one was a bag checker. When autry reopened, CDC had more takers and ushers the entire season (at one of those d3 dec games, there may have been more than fans) than seemed to be at hrs yesterday.....
Yeah I was also surprised UH has had as few fans as they did considering they had a good week leading up to the game with the Big 12 announcement. At best, I'd say it was 50-50.
Another negative from the first two games seems to be our conditioning. We had a lot of guys hurt after each play it seems, although none (?) appeared to be major.
A positive was that the stat crew had a good day with the new stat program. Not that it matters much, but I'm happy at least with the last note.
I'd like to see us utilize Jordan Myers in a different way. With our WR injuries, why not line him up as a receiver? The offense needs all the playmakers it can get.
(09-12-2021 06:10 AM)texowl2 Wrote: Attendance was horrific. Actually think rice may have had more fans. But uh "crowd" seemed to grow post kickoff. May have had to do with lack of gate personnel. At the NW gate there was 2, one was a bag checker. When autry reopened, CDC had more takers and ushers the entire season (at one of those d3 dec games, there may have been more than fans) than seemed to be at hrs yesterday.....
Concessions also ran out of food before halftime. I stood in line most of the second quarter, including our scoring drive, just leave empty handed.
As for the game, I don't have a lot of good or original thoughts there. The defense was better than the offense but not impressive. UH started fast, just like against Tech. When they put up stops for the second quarter, I thought it would be competitive. The inability to turn 3rd and long into stops in the second half was baffling. We started the half trying to blitz in those situations, leading to quick long completions with yards after catch. After that failed twice, the next three times we tried to sit back in coverage and, because we got no pressure, gave a mediocre quarterback enough time to find gaps twice and then committed pass interference on the fifth straight third and long conversion after halftime.
We've got more proof that changing the QB again isn't a panacea for this team. The core weakness is the offensive line that struggles to open running lanes against the first team defense and cannot seem to create a true pocket in pass protection this season. This is supposed to be Bloomgren's specialty; there's no excuse for him to let it be this bad in year four.
It also looks like Bloomgren completely lost the locker room. I believe only the captains stayed on the field for the school song. The entire rest of the team immediately started for the field house as soon as the ref finished explaining that there would be no try for the last-second interception TD. Somebody on this board mentioned that Green might have gotten the start and the slight majority of play time last week as a courtesy to the players who voted him captain. I think playing McCaffrey yesterday to worse results in the Bucket cost him any goodwill the players had.
Stayed to the bitter end.
As a Houston native I've been following Rice football for over 50 years. I've endured winless seasons, but honestly if this isn't the worst performance in 50 years it's in the top two.
Two of the interceptions were just plain stupid and the third I thankfully can't remember. Does Rice have a quarterbacks coach? I realize these guys may have limited ability, but I mean really they must have thrown the ball in high school. Even wishbone quarterbacks threw the ball every forty-third play. Every other aspect of the team pretty much mirrored the quarterback play. You'd think no one has seen a hurry up offense.
What I can't comprehend is what all those whistle dicks not playing were doing on the sideline throughout the game. They weren't watching the game or getting instructions from any coach. Seemed to lack focus and/or discipline. Just on a lark. Maybe I'm too old school. I remember people complaining about the country club atmosphere and the lack of preparation under DB. I wonder how this compares?
Honestly if I were King after I fired the head coach and probably all of his staff, I'd run off at least a plurality of the players.
I know I sound extremely harsh, but living in the land of wishful thinking that things aren't that bad and that the team will improve is getting 'us' nowhere. Our best hope is that our competition is crap, at least on the day. This was a mediocre and poorly coached UH team who lost to TxTech that yesterday walloped SFA 28-22.
Just a reminder that, in Bailiff's final 32 games (that led, in great part, to his being fired), Rice was 7-25.
Rice, with Bloomgren as head coach, is 7-25.
And, if Rice (with Bloomgren as head coach) finishes this season any worse than 6-4 in the final 10 games, Bloomgren's first 42 games will have been worse than Bailiff's final 42.
(This post was last modified: 09-12-2021 07:48 AM by WRCisforgotten79.)
Don’t bury the lead…this is a bad football team and in year 4 of Bloom. Houston is not a great team. They are an average football team and not as good as prior years. Looking around results of others that are improved in C-USA..over/under on Rice wins is going to be 4.5.
Pros
Rice plays TSU after Texas. They lost by 60 to Baylor tonight.
May be in minority but D is improved compared to prior D’s of the past 10-years. Yes, long 3rd-downs were horrible tonight but overall, the tackling and swarming to the ball is improved. The fact that offense can’t move the ball and they are on the field for most of the game (stat sheet misleading due to Bloom’s late in game antics) is not all of their fault.
A bit of a reach for a pro..but did like the play action on third and short in the 1H with the ‘heavy’ personnel in. Run that same play against Arkansas last week on 4th down in red zone (vs Myers getting stuffed) and maybe a different outcome for that game.
Cons
McCaffrey is at this third school for a reason and only reason he is at Rice is due to a personal connection. He is the teachers pet, not the answer. Jovani is one-dimensional and can’t throw. Green makes a nice play but on next one seems to turn the ball over and/or trip over his feet. Thus with no good/consistent QB play, it is difficult to win FBS games. Theme for the Bloom era and common theme of DB era sans CC and McH. Good QB’s can win games and average/bad QB’s don’t win games against decent competition. I want to apologize to D. Jackson from years ago. I was critical of him compared to CC and McH era but he now looks like a rock star compared to what has followed him since his departure.
OL was horrible. Really poor execution of pass protection schemes against common defensive stunts/alignments. McCaffrey running for his life on non-blitz situations.
Play calling…especially in 2H which was playing to avoid getting blown-out vs. playing to win. Gotta believe the play calling is a function of not having talent around McCaffrey to make plays. Yes..a couple injuries but now in year 4 of the program..need more depth than Pitre and Rozner to make plays.
Defensive schemes and execution on third and long. Breakdowns in both man and zone coverages on basic route combos being run by Houston receivers. 101 stuff, not grad-level stuff that Coogs were running.
Special Teams. Yikes. Regressed.
Was not at game but compared to prior Bayou Bucket games at HRS, attendance looked disappointing.
To earlier post about Stadium Club being empty in the 4Q…expect more apathy for remainder of year. Why would one come back? Apathy will be in full effect.
I will be betting any line that is < 35 points for next week. Horns and Sark will need a punching bag to take frustrations out on.
The Stadium Club was only sparsely populated at the beginning of the game. Smallest group I've EVER seen up there.
Don’t bury the lead…this is a bad football team and in year 4 of Bloom. Houston is not a great team. They are an average football team and not as good as prior years. Looking around results of others that are improved in C-USA..over/under on Rice wins is going to be 4.5.
Pros
Rice plays TSU after Texas. They lost by 60 to Baylor tonight.
May be in minority but D is improved compared to prior D’s of the past 10-years. Yes, long 3rd-downs were horrible tonight but overall, the tackling and swarming to the ball is improved. The fact that offense can’t move the ball and they are on the field for most of the game (stat sheet misleading due to Bloom’s late in game antics) is not all of their fault.
A bit of a reach for a pro..but did like the play action on third and short in the 1H with the ‘heavy’ personnel in. Run that same play against Arkansas last week on 4th down in red zone (vs Myers getting stuffed) and maybe a different outcome for that game.
Cons
McCaffrey is at this third school for a reason and only reason he is at Rice is due to a personal connection. He is the teachers pet, not the answer. Jovani is one-dimensional and can’t throw. Green makes a nice play but on next one seems to turn the ball over and/or trip over his feet. Thus with no good/consistent QB play, it is difficult to win FBS games. Theme for the Bloom era and common theme of DB era sans CC and McH. Good QB’s can win games and average/bad QB’s don’t win games against decent competition. I want to apologize to D. Jackson from years ago. I was critical of him compared to CC and McH era but he now looks like a rock star compared to what has followed him since his departure.
OL was horrible. Really poor execution of pass protection schemes against common defensive stunts/alignments. McCaffrey running for his life on non-blitz situations.
Play calling…especially in 2H which was playing to avoid getting blown-out vs. playing to win. Gotta believe the play calling is a function of not having talent around McCaffrey to make plays. Yes..a couple injuries but now in year 4 of the program..need more depth than Pitre and Rozner to make plays.
Defensive schemes and execution on third and long. Breakdowns in both man and zone coverages on basic route combos being run by Houston receivers. 101 stuff, not grad-level stuff that Coogs were running.
Special Teams. Yikes. Regressed.
Was not at game but compared to prior Bayou Bucket games at HRS, attendance looked disappointing.
To earlier post about Stadium Club being empty in the 4Q…expect more apathy for remainder of year. Why would one come back? Apathy will be in full effect.
I will be betting any line that is < 35 points for next week. Horns and Sark will need a punching bag to take frustrations out on.
ESPN FPI gives us the following chance to win the remaining games:
@ Texas 4.5%
TSU 99.2%
Southern Miss 56.1%
@ UTSA 15.3%
@ UAB 19.8%
UNT 43.7%
@ Charlotte 38.7%
Western Kentucky 35.1%
@ UTEP 60.7%
La Tech 45.7%
Comical sports section has a full page front photo on the game and I can't type the headline. Not the Astros, not the whorns, not the Aggies, not opening day of the NFL. Tillman must be writing them some really big checks.
I get the sense that Rice football is sort of like this poor cat from the Miami-Appalachian State game last night.
The major question is can we save it?
Karlgaard just received a contract extension.
Can we save Rice football? Can Karlgaard have a baseball moment and take this football disaster in a different direction? How much say do Elizabeth and Bruce Dunlevie have in who is head coach in 2022?
(09-12-2021 08:45 AM)RiceOwls2019 Wrote: ESPN FPI gives us the following chance to win the remaining games:
@ Texas 4.5%
TSU 99.2%
Southern Miss 56.1%
@ UTSA 15.3%
@ UAB 19.8%
UNT 43.7%
@ Charlotte 38.7%
Western Kentucky 35.1%
@ UTEP 60.7%
La Tech 45.7%
Depending on how you crunch the numbers, that projects a 3 to 4 win season. That should not be enough to save Bloomgren.
(09-12-2021 07:25 AM)WRCisforgotten79 Wrote: Just a reminder that, in Bailiff's final 32 games (that led, in great part, to his being fired), Rice was 7-25.
Rice, with Bloomgren as head coach, is 7-25.
And, if Rice (with Bloomgren as head coach) finishes this season any worse than 6-4 in the final 10 games, Bloomgren's first 42 games will have been worse than Bailiff's final 42.
Ouch. It was still time to move on from Bailiff, but Bloomgren obviously was not the correct answer to the question.
For those who have interacted with Bloomgren … is he particularly intelligent? I don’t think that is a requirement to be a successful football coach, but I think Rice’s next football coach should be someone who is intelligent and intellectually curious. Someone who hears criticism and gives it an honest evaluation to see if maybe they can make some improvements.
(09-12-2021 06:10 AM)texowl2 Wrote: Attendance was horrific. Actually think rice may have had more fans. But uh "crowd" seemed to grow post kickoff. May have had to do with lack of gate personnel. At the NW gate there was 2, one was a bag checker. When autry reopened, CDC had more takers and ushers the entire season (at one of those d3 dec games, there may have been more than fans) than seemed to be at hrs yesterday.....
I walked in and they didn’t even bother to scan my season ticket.
(09-12-2021 08:45 AM)RiceOwls2019 Wrote: ESPN FPI gives us the following chance to win the remaining games:
@ Texas 4.5%
TSU 99.2%
Southern Miss 56.1%
@ UTSA 15.3%
@ UAB 19.8%
UNT 43.7%
@ Charlotte 38.7%
Western Kentucky 35.1%
@ UTEP 60.7%
La Tech 45.7%
Depending on how you crunch the numbers, that projects a 3 to 4 win season. That should not be enough to save Bloomgren.
It shouldn’t be, but it will be. His buddy the AD with his new contract isn’t going to fire him.
(09-12-2021 06:10 AM)texowl2 Wrote: Attendance was horrific. Actually think rice may have had more fans. But uh "crowd" seemed to grow post kickoff. May have had to do with lack of gate personnel. At the NW gate there was 2, one was a bag checker. When autry reopened, CDC had more takers and ushers the entire season (at one of those d3 dec games, there may have been more than fans) than seemed to be at hrs yesterday.....
Most likely, the contractor who handles those things, and the concessions contractor, are having trouble hiring people.
(09-12-2021 08:45 AM)RiceOwls2019 Wrote: ESPN FPI gives us the following chance to win the remaining games:
@ Texas 4.5%
TSU 99.2%
Southern Miss 56.1%
@ UTSA 15.3%
@ UAB 19.8%
UNT 43.7%
@ Charlotte 38.7%
Western Kentucky 35.1%
@ UTEP 60.7%
La Tech 45.7%
Depending on how you crunch the numbers, that projects a 3 to 4 win season. That should not be enough to save Bloomgren.
Unless something changes dramatically in the offensive approach, I think the Owls will be lucky to win 2 CUSA games. A 3 win season, including hopefully, a win over a bad FCS team, TSU, should in no way save any coach in year 4 of his tenure. He’s playing predominantly with players he recruited. Such a poor level of success indicates he is either a bad recruiter, bad game coach, bad player developer, hires bad assistants, or just doesn’t care. I doubt it’s the last one. Likely a combination of the first four. In any case, he doesn’t deserve retention.
(09-12-2021 07:25 AM)WRCisforgotten79 Wrote: Just a reminder that, in Bailiff's final 32 games (that led, in great part, to his being fired), Rice was 7-25.
Rice, with Bloomgren as head coach, is 7-25.
And, if Rice (with Bloomgren as head coach) finishes this season any worse than 6-4 in the final 10 games, Bloomgren's first 42 games will have been worse than Bailiff's final 42.
Ouch. It was still time to move on from Bailiff, but Bloomgren obviously was not the correct answer to the question.
For those who have interacted with Bloomgren … is he particularly intelligent? I don’t think that is a requirement to be a successful football coach, but I think Rice’s next football coach should be someone who is intelligent and intellectually curious. Someone who hears criticism and gives it an honest evaluation to see if maybe they can make some improvements.
Watching Rice's last drive cemented the fact Bloomgren is not very intelligent. Once we ran for a couple of first downs any other coach would have used that drive to practice their 2-minute drill, but we never did. Never did we look like we wanted to score again, including the last play, which wouldn't have scored even if completed. Other than our pathetic offense, I've never been as down on Bloom as most on this board, but that has changed after yesterday's pathetic performance.
On the McCaffrey front, he's got more speed than Clement (although Clement was fast) and just as good arm strength. He needs an offense that plays to his skills. What this offense is trying to make McCaffrey do reminds me of what Hatfield did with Clement in '05. Clement only played on third and long when the defenses knew what was coming, and got pounded. In '05 Clement really didn't look like he would amount to much, but in '06 and at the end of the '07 season (when the players took over the offense from Bailiff's conservatism) he became the best player Rice ever had. I'm not saying McCaffrey could be the next Clement, but this putrid offense has got to go.
(This post was last modified: 09-12-2021 10:51 AM by wrysal.)
