Washington Snowflakes: The Coaching

Is it really coaching if you run the ball 56 times and just hope you have more points at the end?

This was not coaching. I don't know what it was, but it wasn't coaching.

I sure hope they know what they're doing. This is the worst I've ever felt after a 3 TD win, and I'd be thrilled to be proved wrong and feel silly for it later.

Love the win, but we need a passing game.  If they don't have faith in Cade or he can't do it, go with JJ and have the team reach for its ceiling.

O-line looks solid, D-line looks solid and that's a lot more than I expected before the season began.

If Cade or JJ can be a gamer, this team can compete.  If we handcuff the QB and are 1-dimensional, a B1G championship isn't happening.

I have no illusions that this game means Michigan will win the conference or even go 8-4. And they will need to throw the ball at some point. But they just ran for 350 yards and won by a comfortable margin. Why stop running when you're moving the ball that well on the ground and winning the game?

Not often does OSU lose and michigan win on the same day.. Still some questions but overall looked good

Not often does OSU lose and michigan win on the same day.. Still some questions but overall looked good

Not often does OSU lose and michigan win on the same day.. Still some questions but overall looked good

Here is something most arent talking about. 1st I couldnt be happier we kicked ass out there. That being said UM fans want future NFL WRS and Qbs this isnt going to get them to sign with us. Yeah its one game no big deal and if we win 10 games ill take my chances. Still its going to keep the kind of players we want away. 

I'm amused by all the people claiming that this won't work against good teams.  Maybe.  Maybe not.  It's a moot point.  We weren't playing those other teams tonight, we were playing this Washington team.  If you can win a game convincingly by simply running up the middle on every play, then that's what you do.  It's not complicated.

It's hard to fault the coaches for rolling with a gameplan that was working and that Washington seemed incapable of stopping.

Apparent lack of confidence in the passing game doesn't doesn't portend good things against better teams, but for today, they called a good game and did everything they needed to do to win comfortably and I refuse to get too mad about that.

All these fans complaining about not throwing would also be complaining if Michigan had a quick three and out or an interception.  “Corum’s averaging 9 yards a carry, why are you throwing Harbaugh?” would be the party line.  

I predicted several weeks ago that we would be conservative and vanilla offensively and ride our good Oline and running backs for the first 1/3 to half the season or so, to keep Cade from making mistakes/getting in his head….looks like they are doing what smart coaches do and playing to their strengths. I feel like with Bell out, the next couple weeks are going to be spent with Cade getting more cozy with the receivers on the roster since his security blanket receiver is gone, this partly explains tonight’s game plan I believe. I expect Johnson to have more big catches like he did that one in the first half, was hoping to see more out of Eric All tonight as a receiver. But this is the best running team we have had since Hart carried the ball. I think these next 2 weeks however are crucial for putting together a truly competent passing game going into Wisconsin. However, loved that we can run at will on a legit defense. 

I sort of care that they didn’t pass much. But… the first drive after the half, M went 73 yards in 8 plays, all runs, and scored a TD. What are you supposed to do with those data? 

Coaches are obviously confident in the OL and the ability to get tough yards on 4th down. Loved going for it in our own territory. And the fake punt was a great call.

All in all, I'm happy. Keep winning.

Looks like Sherrone Moore can coach a bit. 

Good work Coach Moore on putting together a line that works together and opens holes.

Good work Mike Hart.

On play calling, all I'll say is that after last week's post game interviews where it was mentioned how taking the top of the defense with a long pass or two made the running easier, I expected one or two of those tonight.

If the early possession 1st& Goal had been punched in, it would have been a mercy rule game. A pity...

Play action. Why no play action?

We were favored by a td. We won by 3 tds and it didn't even seem that close. Yet people here act like it was a disaster. We should take things one week at a time and enjoy it while we can,

"Washington has a big powerful veteran O-Line, a deep set of RBs and two now veteran QBs. All 8 positions rank in my Top Units in the front of the magazine. They have my #5 secondary in the country and Jimmy Lake has 8 starters to work with on D and always produces one of the nation's finest...They only face my #58 schedule and while road games at Michigan and Stanford will not be easy, they have the talent edge to win those...Four of my nine sets of power ratings call for an unbeaten season."

- Phil Steele, May 2021.

Note how the secondary is specifically called out as excellent. I don't see how you can reasonably complain about a run-first game plan in this game if it works.

Definitely a reversion to form, and you can take that however you want. We suffocated a one-dimensional offence and bludgeoned the defence on the ground until we could get five yards on demand.  We know Harbaugh can win this way and that’s not bad in abstract.

What we didn’t see was a team that could string together multiple scores in a hurry and threaten the whole field.  We didn’t have to this game.  Maybe we can when we do, but it’s far from clear that we are even capable of that.  And to be fair, this is only game two with the revamped staff so maybe it’s not fair to expect a well oiled spread passing machine at this point.  Maybe it’s still marinating and maybe we will show it when the time is right, but right now we won’t know if we can complete a meaningful forward pass for over 15 yards against live bodies and we have a lot of evidence saying we can’t.

It's still early, but the entire team seems to be playing with a lot more energy. Young coaching staff? Flashes of dominant line play and improved (probably can't call it "excellent" or anything) play in the secondary. Another thing I noticed is there's more 'guy(s) going over to help teammate up after the play' going on. And I love seeing that.

The other encouraging thing is it seems like there's some pretty rational game planning occurring. UW has a really good secondary and DTs that they rarely rotate? OK, let's pound the rock and take their souls. UW's QB is struggling? Let's take away the run. People are upset about the lack of a passing game tonight, and I agree that UM isn't going 14-0 with 50 ypg passing every week, but the team did show a nice mix in the opener hitting Ronnie Bell deep (216 yds passing when they probably could've Washington'd WMU without throwing). It remains to be seen if Gattisbaugh can get the offense to take the next step w/o Ronnie Bell, but I am encouraged that 2020-level play, at least, seems to be well in the past.

Most importantly, Michigan needed to win this game.  And they did.  By 21 points.  So, mission #1 was well accomplished.

Good coaching is doing what works to win.  Fans complain if a team keeps doing a thing that doesn't work.  Here, running was working great.  So they kept doing it.

Even though the team won by 21 in the end, it wasn't a comfortable-enough lead for most of the game to abandon what was clearly working in order to practice other things.

A good running game isn't low complexity compared to a good passing game.  There's a lot of strategy and complication that goes into what blockers are doing in the running game.

Take heart in the running game working well against a team with highly rated players and a history of having great defense.  Michigan's run game carved them up.

Especially since it looks like OSU's weakest link is against the run.