...But I warned people not to underestimate ECU. Many people I talked to were saying. "Yea, but Virginia Tech isn't the VT of old. They have QB issues and this and that and blah blah.".... yea well...surprise.
The Pirates are better than you thought and they're out to prove it. Patrick
Pinkney has played more like Peyton Manning these first two weeks of the 2008 season. While his numbers aren't huge, its his decision making that's been outstanding.
Pinkney went 22 of 28 (78%) for 236 yards and 1 touchdown against the Mountaineers. He posted similar numbers against the
Hokies completing 19 of 23 passes (82.6%!) for 211 yards 1 touchdown and 0 interceptions. With decision making like that is it any wonder that our inexperienced
DBs got shredded by #15? Our D-Line and
LBs could do nothing to put pressure on
Pinkney and he was as calm in the pocket as he would be in practice.
The look on Eain Smith's face tells
the story of what happened in Greenville.
I presented a question to fellow mountaineer fan and online community contributor, DougityDog. (You can find his youtube page here. ) I asked, "Dougity, was ECU that good today or were we just that bad?". He simply replied, "We are that bad. ECU is good."
I don't know if we are that bad...but we were for at least one saturday. No one could block. Our "Best Offensive line in the nation" got pushed around like the UHS JV vs. The Pittsburgh Steelers. Okay maybe not...but still pretty bad. Pat White got sacked 3 TIMES with minimal pressure. That was also due to the fact that he couldn't find anyone open down field, and if he did they dropped passes. Patrick was phenomenal against cupcake opponent Villanova, against which he completed 25/33 passes (75.8%) for 208 yards, 5 TDs and 1 interception off a deflected ball that should have been caught. There were at least 4 other dropped balls that day. Excellent day for Patrick.
Not this day though. This day he looked more like he was playing for Syracuse. Poor Pat completed 11 of 18 passes for a mere 72 yards and if it hadn't have been for a penalty that called it back, there was an interception in there too. It wasn't very often that #5 threw the ball down field. Most of the passes seemed to be 10 yards or shorter, and when they were beyond that, they were dropped. Ridiculous.
He also carried the ball 20 times for 97 yards, which isn't bad, but it could have been a lot better if half those weren't desperation runs where he didn't want to throw down field and would take off with every little gap he thought he saw, only to be caught after only a few short yards, if any at all.
We also didn't try very hard to establish the running game which I though working decently when we did run it. Noel had a couple of nice runs, but even on those he had to do most of the work, breaking tackles behind the line because the play wasn't executed very well as far as the blocking scheme. In my opinion, we should have taken the ball first, established the run to open the play action pass and set the tone on the opening drive. Instead we elected to play defense first, got steamrolled, panicked and with a little help from the officials (I'm not even going to get into that) found ourselves in a hole 17-0.
Actually I will get into the officiating...it was pretty fair as far as the amount of penalties...ECU got called for a bunch of holding calls...we got a personal foul and whatnot...but how about dumb calls concerning the spot of the ball? Everyone in that stadium could see, whether they want to admit it or not, that Pinkney got nowhere near where they spotted that ball. JT Thomas came flying over the top, nailed him right in the shoulder and stopped him dead. He should have been at least a yard short....and then theres the "fumble". The thing that bothered me most about this call was not the call itself. It was questionable. Admit it. The thing that bothered me most was that no one bothered to review the damn play! Why the hell not!? Ridiculous..I love Bill but his QB is telling every member of the staff that it wasn't a fumble and no one believed him enough to make the call to challenge the play.
Cant put all the blame on the coaches for that one, though. I credit Pat for making the extra effort to get the first down, but come on! You cant put the ball out there in the open like that, Pat. Seniors cant do that crap. If you re gonna make the extra effort, tuck that ball to your chest and dive. If you come up short, its only by inches and you can probably convert.
I don't know. Ive lost my train of thought. Overall, our performance was terrible. Noel is the only one I didn't see make a huge mistake. Pat wasn't at his best. WRs dropped passes and didn't block well. O-Line was awful. Jock fumbled. The defense as a whole got run all over by C-USA RBs. The D-Line got shoved around as much as their offensive counterpart. Linebackers seemed to be non-existent as the ECU 'backs constantly made their way to the secondary who didn't defend the pass any better, possibly worse than the 2006 secondary that got shredded by offenses and analysts on a weekly basis. Did I mention that no one could tackle on any level? Christ.
I don't know whats left to say. We've got a bye week that will allow us extra time to prepare for Colorado. Hows that game going to play out? I don't know. I could go over all the things they could fix, but Ill just say this; If play opposite of the way the played against ECU, they'll be great. If they don't improve greatly in that game, we're in for a long thursday night...
