A shot across Bobo’s bow?
It’s rare to see this level of public introspection by Georgia’s coach:
But Bobo going all ultra-conservative again in the fourth quarter frustrated even his boss, who said he wished they’d handled it differently after Georgia got the ball back with just over 8 minutes and only burned a couple of minutes, going three-and-out playing it safe on the ground. That “pretty much put more pressure on the defense there,” Richt said. “If we’re in that situation again, we’d better be able to put it away.”
I know at that point the offense was probably shell-shocked from the penalty disaster on their previous series. Up until that point, Georgia was still throwing the ball quite a bit in the 4th quarter with their lead. The drive that included all of those penalties had been conservative – i.e., no deep passes or trick plays, but it also had strategic purpose. Georgia mixed the run and the pass to get into at least field goal range before the penalties hit. Murray was having success on short, relatively safe passes.
It also didn’t help to have (another) Justin Anderson penalty torpedo this particular drive before it could get going. Richt wasn’t quite as amused with that penalty.
That fourth quarter drive aside, the offensive game plan was solid. Richt made sure to note that the offensive staff “did a good job of putting a plan together” that gave him confidence to be decisive about some of the riskier calls he made. The plan was surely knocked on its heels by Crowell’s injury, but they did a good job recovering.
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James
October 10th, 2011
2:42 pm
The key penalty was on the TE for holding not the interior lineman. If the TE does not hold, the downs and distance reset because Thomas has the 1st. The play calling from Bobo from that point in [3 or 6] is different. It would be good to see the Dawgs go to a 3 TE set inside the 10-15. Their jumbo package is dual FBs set to the strong side. Somewhere down the line this will change.
Jim
October 10th, 2011
3:16 pm
The good in what we did offensively was that we were confident in putting the game into the hands of our defense. I am not saying we should always call the plays ultra conservatively in the same situations in the future BUT, for the first time in awhile, we can have confidence that our defense can shut our opponent’s offense down.
I have seen the Pittsburgh Steelers win a lot of games with their defense. Without a great defense in some of those years the Steeler’s “don’t finish the drill” and win championships.
Again, not saying we don’t need to do better offensively but at least it seems when we leave points on the field there is more confidence it won’t come back to bite us, as in losing the game.
Dawg Stephen
October 10th, 2011
3:59 pm
Happiest I have been in a while was the 1st quarter. Our own 30 something yard line..4th and 1.. we have the best punter in america… no thanks, line up.. we want the ball.
Go Dawgs
Thomas Brown
October 11th, 2011
8:24 am
All 3 of the replies miss the entire point of this blog. Let me see if I can re-direct what was trying to be pointed out to them :
“That “pretty much put more pressure on the defense there,” Richt said. “If we’re in that situation again, we’d better be able to put it away.”
That folks is a wake-up call for Mike Bobo.
Or, to quote Greg McGarity last night : “those teams have really struggled. I don’t know if there’s a (conference) win among them. You’ve got to keep things in perspective”
I am sorry, but we are not a very good offense. You can make up excuses about it all you want. At some point, even the most ardent only speak positive type poster for us, one would think, would have to concur with this blog’s subject today, that it is glaring how we do nothing on offense. Especially, I might add on 3rd Downs.
Bobo beat Florida, but it took a few years
October 11th, 2011
12:41 pm
Something happened against UT that made me feel a little better about Bobo: we sorta lost Crowell early in the game.
But we moved the ball methodically, nonetheless… that’s telling…
It tells me that Bobo and Richt have 2 offensive gameplans each week: one that involves Crowell, and one that omits him completely… which is critical because we don’t have a similarly-styled RB as a back-up… as in, we pretty much have to run a completely different offensive package with our other RBs (I-form only with Samuel and shotgun-read with Thomas…)
And we were successful (albeit, against UT, but we still DID it!)…
I was at the ’97 JAX game… Bobo was a senior and we hadn’t beat UF since like 1989 or something… we all hated Bobo until that season… but his senior year, he somehow “got it” and we had a pretty good year, beating Florida and a good Wisc team in the Outback Bowl…
So, hopefully, he’s “getting it”
Go Dawgs! Cuz you gotta love ’em.