Golden Rules of Bisonville:
Being self-aware is knowing your head is firmly planted up your ass
Never let facts get in the way of a good argument
Surefire Successful Bisonville Conversation Starters: Move to FBS, Scream Yellow, Zipper Merge, Pickleball Championships, Transfer Portal, The Rainforest, Fire Vigen Save Season, Fargodome Expansion, Toxic Locker Rooms, Marlboro Matt, Veer Offense, Whale of a Game, Rainin' Bitches, Frisco Cruiser Bus, BYU Fan Voting, Frisco is biased towards NDSU
Although we had our field goal block on the second to last drive I liked that drive the best. Everyone knew we were going to run and we burned 5ish min off the clock. Their D was getting tired by that point.
Interesting that last defensive play was successful with a 3 man rush. That package got more heat on Schor that game than it's taken on Bisonville over the past two years.
I've gotten through rewatching the first half, and here are my thoughts:
1. To echo Ross U., Bruce ran hard. On top of that, it was not like early in the year when he was plowing into piles when he should cut; there were no cut back lanes, and he just pounded it. I loved it.
2. The defensive line, as a whole, was simply outstanding for NDSU. It was little things like keeping the QB in the pocket, not losing contain, closing quickly, knowing their fits and gap control that were just done so well. The blitz calls were also excellent with excellent timing based on snap count. I can't say enough about their play.
3. Shep and RJ struggled with finding the sticks on their routes. And the time RJ runs a perfect route, he is completely mugged with a no call.
4. Stapleton for JMU was the real deal. That catch versus Hayes along the sideline was phenomenal and they needed those extra yards over the PI.
5. Clock management bit Coach K in the rear again. If you have 4th and 1, and you are NOT going to go for it, you need to let the clock run. They had about 18 on the play clock when they took that TO. That gave JMU 3 points later. At least they then tried to draw them off, and it was a believable situation that they were going for it since the took the TO. (I agree kicking was the right play; the time management is my issue.)
6. Conversely, and I was highly critical of the JMU coach during the game for this, when they got that first down with 15 to go, they have to take TO. To make it worse, they subbed making the ref cover the ball, and they ended up wasting about 8 seconds. That likely cost them 4 points as they had NDSU reeling. I am convinced these "tempo" teams think they are so smart and good they can stay in it, when in reality, they need to be is a more traditional 2 minute offense at this point so you can take multiple shots. I consider it the blunder of all coaching blunders in the game. I hope the JMU fans are raking him over the coals on that as they would have had time to take two shots and they could have used the entire field since they still had a TO.
I'll probably have some more thoughts after the second half is reviewed, not that anyone cares!
I love the game in retrospect. JMU was good, there's no doubt about it. We never trailed in the game but it also never felt like it. Code Green was as good or better than any defense in the FCS this year.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
When it's third and ten, you can take the milk drinkers and I'll take the whiskey drinkers every time. -Max McGee
“I really thought you had to run the football to control the game,” Erhardt once said. “You had to throw the football to score but had to run the football to win.” - Ron Erhardt
Same could be said last year in the semis. Polasek made a lot of play calls that were mistakes, allowing an injured PGT to play was a mistake. I mean, this argument is infinitely regressive, no?
We took the L last year, they can take it this year. We'll see how this shakes out in the future.
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
The first drop of Alls is the one JMU fans are all saying he would have scored had he not dropped it. They are partially right, if the ball is in the right spot, he walks into the end zone as he had Dempsey beat and Grimsley wasn't close enough to make the tackle. The part they fail to mention is even if Alls catches it, he would have been down at the 3 yard line because the pass was thrown behind him. Why was the pass thrown behind him? The corner blitz made the throw come out almost right away which resulted in the bad pass. But obviously that had nothing to do with NDSU, so NDSU is very "lucky" that he dropped the pass.