First The Offense: Kirk is a mediocre to below average offensive coordinator with the way college football is played today. You have to score 24-30 points a game to realistically win and he doesn’t try to do that. When faced with a sliver of adversity he has no answers. Although he might have plays deep in his playbook to counter what the defense is doing he refuses to use them. One simple example from Nebraska and from Wisconsin contrasted with Chip Kelly and Ohio state against Oregon yesterday . Ohio state had a first and goal . What did Chip do? He brought in his 2 top backs, with a H back or full back in between them and put his QB under center. Ran a simple handoff with the 2 other guys blocking g and guy walks in for easy TD. Had another 4th and one later and ran same play for easy first down.
What does Kirk do ? Has no blocker for Kyle , doesn’t put his QB under center to threaten a sneak as well as set up play action , and prays defense doesn’t get penetration. Guess what Nebraska and Wisconsin got penetration and Kyle had no chance. He doesn’t even consider putting Kyle in the pistol if he insists on shotgun , where he would be picking up speed. It is mind numbing that he did it against Nebraska and was stuffed and he made no adjustment the very next game against Wisconsin. He has run the Kenny Fletcher play since the success against VA. Tech and it has been on film for Washington , Nebraska , and Wisconsin. That play has gone for either 0 to 1 yard since it was put on tape. He hasn’t even
run another receiver behind him that will likely be wide open , a play run by the entire NFL and 90% of college football .
His failure to either run any misdirection when he has a tailback the entire defense is running to stop is unfathomable. Yesterday , for one of the few times all year , Kyle was pitched the ball to the short side of the field ( 2 plays before the 4th and 1) but 4 Wisconsin guys were there because of their focus on him. If he ran that play and Kyle hands it off to Ben Black on a reverse he walks in for a TD . Even if it didn’t work , you make the defense think about their overpursuing and maybe not on Kyle as fast as white on rice. Not even considering having 2 backs in considering how good a blocker Kyle is as well is coaching malpractice.
Kirk ‘s play calling after turnovers is the worst in America. At Nebraska after Dixon’s interception and against Wisconsin after Djabome’s caused fumble , he didn’t try once to go to the end zone or down the seam. He literally made Athan throw sideline throws , all 6 against Wisconsin with half of them out of bounds. The number of passes that are thrown out of bounds with the wide receiver having no chance to catch it , are a part of Kirk’s offense. Just one time it would be nice for Athan to look to sideline pass but see it is covered and come back to his second or third read. It doesn’t exist in Kirk’s offense or Athan cannot do it. That is flat out bad offensive coordinating . It literally cost us the Nebraska game and cost us an opportunity to tie the Wisconsin game at the half.
The QB. Athan only throws a good pass when his feet are set and he can show off his arm to the sidelines where he gets a lot of completions although he has sailed a few. But when he doesn’t set his feet , he throws behind his receivers , throws inaccurately both short and way high over their heads. He doesn’t naturally move up in the pocket and panics instead of sliding to get more time to throw. He has been really inaccurate for a few games now. So one can conclude he is not the upgrade we needed to win. Frankly he has been bad for a number of weeks and even though there were drops yesterday those throws were not all accurate and the only drop against Nebraska was his second best throw of the day and costly but until that drive where he hit Black for the 40 yarder with his best throw of the day , it is not enough. He has been terribly inconsistent as well as Gavin was last year and not the upgrade we need to succeed. . Kyle McCord has thrown for 300 yards in 5 of the 6 Syracuse games where they are 5-1. If we had Kyle McCord who is clearly more accurate than Athan we likely are 6-0. Not being able to score is demoralizing to a team and especially a defense that has tried to keep you in the game. Not scoring at all , but not scoring TD’s , for the first 3 quarters against Nebraska and Wisconsin , is an indictment of both Kyle and Athan. We are stuck with both and I want to puke because Kirk will not do one thing to help Athan when he is struggling and doesn’t want to use his whole playbook but rather wants to run the same play over and over despite the defense coordinator taking it away and he having no answer to counter because he is too stubborn . Resignation has set in and it sucks.
