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I am wrecked. I'm alternating between Chloraseptic spritzes on my throat and slathering aloe on my poor, deep-fried knees. One of the bigger cheers yesterday was for a big, fluffy, glorious, beautiful cloud that offered an all-too-brief respite at one point in the second half.

Anywho, on to the observations.

1. Who the hell was that guy? Kris Moll. Linebacker. Sophomore. Miami, Florida. Was sent in to spy Banks, and that's what he did. Dude forced two turnovers. One, a fumble that the gazelle-like Garrett Marino scooped and scored. The other, an interception that snuffed what was looking like a promising drive, and should have resulted in points right before the half.

2. Okay, so who the hell was THAT guy? Kailon Carter. Redshirt Senior. Boutte, Louisiana. 2 catches, 49 yards. One a 45 yard circus catch that flipped the field, after starting a drive in the shadow of our own goalposts. A word on that. Our receiving corps is turning into a pretty damn good unit. Add him to the mix of Wilson, Lisa, Ubosi, and the nice surprise of Kendall Parham, and you will be forced to account for them. Which means...

3. We are going to run the damn football The three-headed monster of Brown, Davis, and Stanley abused Tulane on a day it topped out at 97F. To wit, that game-winning drive was a real soul-crusher. 13 plays. 93 yards. Over 7 and a half minutes. 12 rushes. One pass. Big boy football. The freight train's a-comin', Wave. Stop it if you can. They couldn't. 269 total rushing yards on the day, with a long of 21. Friggin' brutal. In the words of Lyndon Johnson, "It's like a west Texas dust storm. You can't run, you can't hide, and you can't make it stop."

4. Okay, I KNOW who the hell that guy was. Fitz Mofor. Linebacker. Junior. Brookeville, Maryland. Six tackles on the day and was closing holes all afternoon. We are better off at linebacker than I thought we'd be.

5. That was fun Tyler Johnston. Redshirt Freshman. Spanish Fort, Alabama. I'm still an AJ guy, and think he'll be fine, but wow, that guy adds a spark when he gets on the field.

6. Vogeltron Nick Vogel. Junior. Jacksonville, Florida. Dude is a weapon. Hit all his kicks and made Tulane go the long way every single time. That's almost like having a 12th man on defense. Think that doesn't matter? Remember giving teams a 50-60 yard field all the time during the Callaway years?

7. The award for delivering a healthy dose of karmic justice goes to... The UAB defense. The "lower team" held Tulane to 355 yards. 3 of 13 on third down (and it was ALWAYS third and long). They had a 27% completion rate. Forced 4 turnovers (including the TO on downs in the first half) and put their less-than-prudent quarterback on his ass 6 times. Yes, they gave up some big plays, but they came up big when it mattered. Just to revisit the point of what a strange and magical year 2017 was for us, the guy who planted Banks with sack #6 to end the game was Kylen Binn, who spent the bulk of last year as our #2 quarterback.

8. Yes, the tight end is an eligible receiver. Scott and Lee both had 1 catch for a total of 21 yards, the last 14 being the game winner. When Bill Clark was asked what his offensive philosophy was in 2014, he said, "I want to make you defend every blade of grass on the field." That has to include these guys.

9. Keep doing what you do. Andre Wilson. You are going to take one the distance one day soon and the only laundry on the field will be opposing jock straps.

10. Food. Friends. Football. Tailgating remains one of my favorite parts of game day. Some of you guys (and you know who you are) put a lot of time, energy and money into it and I don't tell you how much I appreciate it nearly enough.

11. Strike up the bands! All-Star band day was cool, like it always is. This is apparently an important recruiting tool for your Marching Blazers. It was also cool to include Tulane's little bitty band. Yes, band smack. I'm not apologizing.

The Good

4th Quarter Blazers. When Tulane tied the game, it was teetering, and was eminently losable. Instead, we bowed up (nod to you old-schoolers) and made play after play after play. Both sides of the ball. That's what good teams do. Tulane had no answer.

The Bad

2 interceptions. Interceptions are bad, but those two were particularly bad. We statistically dominated Tulane and but for two red zone turnovers, probably run them out of the stadium. Erdely made some great throws yesterday, and a couple of truly awful ones. I'm not dismayed, though. We won the game, and he was a pivotal part of it.

The Ugly

This is the part I suspect will draw the most chatter. It was hotter than high noon in hell on the 4th of July yesterday. The heat was brutal and unrelenting. 1:22 in the 4th quarter was a pivotal moment in the game for me personally, because that's when my seats were finally, mercifully in the shade of the pressbox. The water stations were both welcome and appreciated. A real life saver. That said, they were a tacit admission by the AD's office that the heat was going to be a problem. I know why we kicked off at noon. Those other schools were on TV later in the day, and we worry about attendance. I get it. This is not a new phenomenon.

But dammit, I am a dues-paying alumnus and season ticket holder. I was going to be there regardless, and did not enjoy sitting in a damn frying pan for for damn near 4 hours.

Okay, that's my word on that. I really don't have much to ***** about, because Blazer Gameday has made games more pleasant and welcoming than I can ever remember previously. But sweet Georgia Brown, that kickoff time.

So, what does this mean, Barbara?

It's a nice bounce back win against a perceived, if not actual "better" team after last week's train wreck. We took control in the fourth quarter like good teams do. That is something we can build on and carry with us going forward. We've got aspirations of a successful year, and last week was a blow to that. This was a must-get, and we got it. I suspect we grew up a little bit in the last two weeks, and I think we owe Charlotte an ass-whoopin' in two weeks. So rest up, get your grass cut and your honey-dos in next week, and I'll see you at the old ball yard on the 29th.

That's all I got. For now. I think.

Outstanding, Smaug! Outstanding!

I'm a little bit dismayed so far but it's still early. I expected cleaner football from this many seniors, including Erdely. He has as many picks in '18 as he had the entire season last year. I also don't remember him getting the signals from the sideline with his hands up like "What the hell?" so much last season. Maybe it's the OC that didn't recruit him or maybe it's the stache, but he hasn't been the same guy so far.

Too many mistakes and penalties from a senior laden team. Twenty-three penalties and 223 penalty yards in two fbs games! Somebody pointed out in the game thread yesterday that we make a lot of dumb mistakes and it's true.

The sloppy play has to be cleaned up or we won't make the postseason again. You can tell it's killing Coach Clark. He's got two weeks to get it cleaned up and I believe he will.

I think maybe the OC change hasn't been as seamless as we hoped. The penalties, I don't understand. The ones at Coastal all seemed to extend their drives. Very frustrating. Yesterday, the officiating was atrocious. When they called it a fumble for Tulane when it looked like a forward pass, I yelled, "You haven't gotten one right all day, but that one was okay."

Agree. From my view the fumble/pass that was called incomplete after review was not a fumble. The second reviewed play looked identical but was called a fumble on review. Maybe the ball was knocked loose before the hand moved forward. I sure was happy with that call. Nice review and I like the bit where hometowns are included.

The heat was brutal, I'm still trying to recover w/ the sunburns & normal aches today. Normal post game aspirin & soaking in the tub isn't doing it so far. We're still shooting ourselves in the foot way too often but unlike CC we were able to recover from most so a step in the right direction anyway for now.

I know UAB has a lot of seniors, but I remind myself that these seniors are really playing only the beginning of their second season back on a football field after two years off. It is sort of the opposite of redshirt -- a senior in name only so to speak.

A team full a seniors and a team with senior leadership are two different things, which is something Clark alluded to after Coastal.

I imagine some challenges were issued during the week, and the team responded.

Third hottest game I have been at not playing it. Our first trip to Tallahassee May have been hottest. I remember playing in some swealteing SE Texas games back in the day.

Nebraska

Hottest I remember

I would suggest that the game at Georgia in 2006 was a little hotter than Saturday's game. I had never paid $6 for a bottle of water before, but decided I wanted to live.

+1

(09-17-2018 11:33 AM)ATTALLABLAZE Wrote:  Third hottest game I have been at not playing it. Our first trip to Tallahassee May have been hottest. I remember playing in some swealteing SE Texas games back in the day.

I missed so much of the action in that game in Tallahassee because my eyes kept being drawn to the shadow that was slowly making its way towards us.