Game #10 vs. Morehead State Brown Field 1pm

[JD24]

Morehead State is going to score. They have scored over 30 points in every league game except vs. Drake. Beat Butler and jacksonville. Lost to Drake, Dayton and Davidson.

They can be run on and they prefer to move the ball by the pass. That doesn't mean they either don't give up passing yards or can't run the ball. They just play in high scoring games.

Opportunity for a win here.

[valpofb16]

Looking for a big win here side notes

#32 Cam Brown has left team, film looked really nice out of high school, from Arizona. Wish him the best

Roster down to 89, 18 of which are seniors. looking at 71 heading into spring with 39 open roster spots. Would like a few of those spots to be Duncan, Zajac, Biggs and Goebel.

[IndyValpo]

Looking for a big win here side notes

#32 Cam Brown has left team, film looked really nice out of high school, from Arizona. Wish him the best

Roster down to 89, 18 of which are seniors. looking at 71 heading into spring with 39 open roster spots. Would like a few of those spots to be Duncan, Zajac, Biggs and Goebel.

Since Biggs and Zajac are currently starting and probably will next season hopefully they will consider returning

[usc4valpo]

Valpo wins by 7. 34-27.

[JD24]

41-35 valpo

[JD24]

Not too swell thus far. A massive overhaul to the offense appears to be needed from the staff to the talent. Everything run looks so difficult to carry out for the O.

[JD24]

Did Coach Fox change the offensive staff at halftime? Now we have guys wide open.

[JD24]

and now the WRs decide they want to win some defensed passes. Tie game.

[VULB#62]

WAtching on game tracker inside the 10 twice and blow scores now have, I think, three missed FGs.

[VULB#62]

Very disappointing ending to what could have been a win.   

[JD24]

The passing offense in the 2nd half has been very good. WRs winning a number of well defensed balls and Duncan has been on the mark.

Missed kicks just killed them. I get the longer one but the other two can't happen. Throw in the big plays given up on defense and it adds up to a loss.

[usc4valpo]

Latsonas is in a real funk. I feel bad for him. This should have been a W for sure. The good news is that Butler really sucks this year.

[JD24]

Latsonas has been wildly inconsistent this year. As mentioned on the broadcast, he kicked 4 vs. Stetson. The team needs him as, while the offense looked good in the 2nd half, the O is not high powered enough to be giving up points when they get down the field either because of misses or because the coaching staff is afraid to attempt a field goal.

I assume, since the coaches haven't run anyone out there to kick anything other than the one punter and one kicker/kickoffer, that the staff either doesn't have faith in anyone else, wants to preserve a year for someone else or doesn't want to ruin the confidence of who they have.

A likely recruiting focus off season.

[football1960]

OMG what kind of play calling in the first.... 8 to 9 in the box and you are running stretch plays dam. At halftime the OC and the Head Coach must of got into it. Great 2nd half Duncan was on fire, and the WR caught the balls. Penalty killed the red zone TD to take the lead. 2 easy field goals missed.

[VULB#62]

Shoot. Out of frustration, I turned off my computer on that 4th down run that made the score 27-14 with less than 2 minutes left. Had no idea till now that we actually came back and scored another TD. Glad that we did that, but that made me even more frustrated cuz we had that game in our hands to win. We just couldn't get it done in the red zone. We were in 4 down territory inside he 10 twice that I recall and walked away empty (at a minimum 2 missed FGs and at a max 2 TDs).  I do not think it was the players' fault. On one drive in there we ran twice for 7 yards, then passed incomplete, remained 3 yards short, only to try (and miss) the FG.  Another 2 yard run would have put us in a great position to try for a 1st down inside the 4, I believe, or score a TD.

I did get a chance to see about three minutes at the end. Remember when I wondered previously where was the elephant? I found it!  It is alive and well in Morehead, KY. MSU's last offensive play was out of a "jumbo" formation on 4th and short in Valpo territory. It caused Fox to call a TO. And then when they ran for it out of the formation out of the TO, they scored a 34 yard TD to ice the game.

[JD24]

OMG what kind of play calling in the first.... 8 to 9 in the box and you are running stretch plays dam. At halftime the OC and the Head Coach must of got into it. Great 2nd half Duncan was on fire, and the WR caught the balls. Penalty killed the red zone TD to take the lead. 2 easy field goals missed.

Yeah. I didn't understand what was going on in the first half and then in the second half I think they finally just decided to play football.

[JD24]

Shoot. Out of frustration, I turned off my computer on that 4th down run that made the score 27-14 with less than 2 minutes left. Had no idea till now that we actually came back and scored another TD. Glad that we did that, but that made me even more frustrated cuz we had that game in our hands to win. We just couldn't get it done in the red zone. We were in 4 down territory inside he 10 twice that I recall and walked away empty (at a minimum 2 missed FGs and at a max 2 TDs).  I do not think it was the players' fault. On one drive in there we ran twice for 7 yards, then passed incomplete, remained 3 yards short, only to try (and miss) the FG.  Another 2 yard run would have put us in a great position to try for a 1st down inside the 4, I believe, or score a TD. I did get a chance to see about three minutes at the end. Remember when I wondered previously where was the elephant? I found it!  It is alive and well in Morehead, KY. MSU's last offensive play was out of a "jumbo" formation on 4th and short in Valpo territory. It caused Fox to call a TO. And then when they ran for it out of the formation out of the TO, they scored a 34 yard TD to ice the game.

On the missed FG inside the 10 they got to 3rd and 4 at the 7 and that's a passing down particularly on a day that they really couldn't run the ball. To ask for 4 yards at that point I think is probably asking for too much.

The other time inside the 10, they got to 3rd and 4 and completed the pass for a TD but Larose got called for an illegal pick which wasn't necessary moving the ball back to the 19 and then Latsonas missed the kick.

I didn't have any problem with those calls based on how the game was going. The team had 22 yards rushing. 300 yards passing.

Coach Fox mentioned that they had two scores wiped out by unnecessary penalties. One on Turner's pick 6 with the pass interference on Scarsella. The other was the OPI for the illegal pick on Larose on Reese's TD. Humongous plays in the game. 

[valpotx]

Yeah, the pick penalty was a killer, and like you said, not even needed.  Their coverage broke down, with both defenders staying on the outside.  He could have fallen down, and it wouldn't have affected that play...

[usc4valpo]

This is a learning season obviously. destroy Butler, recruit well and apply jlessons learned.

[VULB#62]

Unaware that Nick had a pick-6 nullified. Dang! 

Not having seen 90% of the game and only following Gametracker when I could sporadically squeeze in a peek, the whole afternoon to me was one of squandered opportunities. The two positives I can take away from it, however, are that we (1) fought back from being down 14 - zip, and (2) we have been in the last three games into Q4 and pulled one of those out.

Short-term, this bodes well for competitive performances against @ Butler and at home against Marist. Long-term this, hopefully, sets a solid team/cultural foundation for the future.

[VULB#62]

Remember when I wondered previously where was the elephant? I found it!  It is alive and well in Morehead, KY. MSU's last offensive play was out of a "jumbo" formation on 4th and short in Valpo territory. It caused Fox to call a TO. And then when they ran for it out of the formation out of the TO, they scored a 34 yard TD to ice the game.

On the missed FG inside the 10 they got to 3rd and 4 at the 7 and that's a passing down particularly on a day that they really couldn't run the ball. To ask for 4 yards at that point I think is probably asking for too much.
The other time inside the 10, they got to 3rd and 4 and completed the pass for a TD but Larose got called for an illegal pick which wasn't necessary moving the ball back to the 19 and then Latsonas missed the kick.

I didn't have any problem with those calls based on how the game was going. The team had 22 yards rushing. 300 yards passing. Coach Fox mentioned that they had two scores wiped out by unnecessary penalties. One on Turner's pick 6 with the pass interference on Scarsella. The other was the OPI for the illegal pick on Larose on Reese's TD. Humongous plays in the game.

I was coming from the angle that inside the 10 in 4 down territory, having just proved you could punch out 3 yds per carry to get within 4 yds of a 1st down, you have 2 more shots to get the 4yds (and maybe possibly a TD). Of course, 20/20 hindsight after the missed FG plays into that as well.

But back to my Elephant/Jumbo set. That is the perfect package for just such an occasion. Morehead even took out the pass threat from their's which I wouldn't. When I was coaching (yeah, I know, back in the leather helmet no face guard days  ) I selectively employed variations of the idea in those tough yardage situations and I can't recall ever not gaining chunks. I joked about the leather helmet days, but if you freeze frame the Morehead set just before the snap it was Knute Rockney's Notre Dame Box formation.  And not to get too deep into that, but there is an entire offense that emanates from it that can drive defenses nuts. Ah, but that is for another discussion