Game thoughts

[vike_king]

Watching the game, I had the feeling that once we got a 16 point lead the team played with the confidence of knowing that they were going to win. In fact, from the beginning of the game, the team never seemed to really play with the urgency that last week had. That isn't to say they played badly, in fact, I felt that the freshmen really played well, as did Dakota ( his block that sprung SJ for the TD was a thing of beauty )!

The defense seemed to play with the confidence that they would not be beat. It is true they allowed the 18 points, but I didn't see any panic or fear in the team. And, the one TD that was taken off the board by the ref's would have made the game 36-18, which was about how the team looked like they played.

I just saw a replay of Johnson's touchdown on Coach McEndo's twitter. Prukop's block on that play was amazing. Easily the play/effort of the game, if not the year so far.

Knight did NOT appear to be hurt, he mentioned on twitter that he was confused?????

We did well for having so many #1's on the sideline. Show's team depth and good recruiting.

[onceacat]

Watching the game, I had the feeling that once we got a 16 point lead the team played with the confidence of knowing that they were going to win. In fact, from the beginning of the game, the team never seemed to really play with the urgency that last week had. That isn't to say they played badly, in fact, I felt that the freshmen really played well, as did Dakota ( his block that sprung SJ for the TD was a thing of beauty )!

The defense seemed to play with the confidence that they would not be beat. It is true they allowed the 18 points, but I didn't see any panic or fear in the team. And, the one TD that was taken off the board by the ref's would have made the game 36-18, which was about how the team looked like they played.

Not to pick nits, but the defense only allowed 11. The first TD was scored by the UND defense. And the cats scored a FG after the chop block, so only a 4 pt difference.

[catsrback76]

Watching the game, I had the feeling that once we got a 16 point lead the team played with the confidence of knowing that they were going to win. In fact, from the beginning of the game, the team never seemed to really play with the urgency that last week had. That isn't to say they played badly, in fact, I felt that the freshmen really played well, as did Dakota ( his block that sprung SJ for the TD was a thing of beauty )!

The defense seemed to play with the confidence that they would not be beat. It is true they allowed the 18 points, but I didn't see any panic or fear in the team. And, the one TD that was taken off the board by the ref's would have made the game 36-18, which was about how the team looked like they played.

Not to pick nits, but the defense only allowed 11. The first TD was scored by the UND defense. And the cats scored a FG after the chop block, so only a 4 pt difference.

Yes, I agree! But, it is what it is and they played well enough to win this game! Next game, now that's the game to tell what we have as a road team. Going to be interesting.

[TomCat88]

Strange game. Here's a list of things that made it that way, in no particular order:

The wind blew steadily at 20 mph. MSU scored six points on two FGs and had just 79 yards going into the wind (250 going with it). UND did better, but had a 54-yard play that ended in a fumble and threw a pick-six on their first pass into the wind. Even moving with the wind proved nettlesome with Prukop overthrowing a wide open Salanoa badly right after just overthrowing Paige on a flea-flicker. The pass to Salanoa came the play before he was sacked and UND scored on the fumble return.

UND's play calling. They stuck with the run until the last drive despite being down by nearly 20 most of the game. They only passed three times on first down going into the final drive where they passed on every play (13). 21 of their 37 passes came in the fourth quarter. They were 12 for 21 for 89 yards in the fourth, which isn't bad defense, but what you'd expect when in prevent.

UND did a great job of draining the clock in the third quarter. They held the ball for nearly 11 minutes going into the wind. I think this was the main reason you didn't see MSU walk off the field without over 40 points. This was the same quarter MSU failed on 4th and 1 and later couldn't get a first down after having it 2nd and 1. MSU was fortunate to sneak in the 67-yard pass to Gates on next to last play of the quarter.

UND came out with a new package on passing downs. MSU wasn't prepared for it and their unorthodox front made it tough for MSU to put a "hat on a hat" as Ash says.

MSU starting two true frosh at WR in Paige and Herbert. I think this had something to do with play calling on shortage.

Players sitting out Flotkoetter, Roderick, Fa'anono, and especially Knight. I felt Knight could've made a big difference in this game with his inside running ability.

MSU only had six penalties, but four of them were costly as they either cost MSU the possibility of more points (2) or killed drives (2).

Despite the numbers (36 carries, 62 yards) the run game wasn't that bad. The RBs combined for 23 carries for 99 yards (4.3 per carry). What hurt MSU were the two big lost yardage plays when Prukop was sacked (-25) and the bad snap (-19) and UND's ability to corral Prukop. Even if you take away the sack yardage (-32) he only had 14 yards on nine carries.

[catsrback76]

Interesting stuff Tom. I was a bit confused with UND's lack of passing until the 4th quarter, where once they started to sling it to the underneath receivers, they started to make positive yards. I think this gives Marshall some "MORE" tape to look at and see how we need to tighten down on those plays. I did like Singleton sitting in the lanes...wished he would have caught one of those, but hey, he's a backer what can you expect?

I felt like Ioane had the LB's not "flow" with the short routes on a series and it seemed to be very effective in shutting down that short passing stuff!!!

[MSU Toddler]

Good: The contribution made by the freshman! Defensive improvements. Throwback uniforms. Happy about the win!

Bad: The injuries to receiving core. Strange situations caused by calls on the field. The 3rd and 4th down conversion percentage.

Ugly: The Cats struggle to control the game when leading (UCA and UND). Our best weapon yesterday to run the clock down in the 4th was to let UND play offense (check time of possession in 4th quarter). Maybe that was there is some genius strategy I'm missing...but think we lose more games in the future than win with that second half effort.

[SpeedCAT]

Perhaps this has been posted already, but it appears that 47 was in street clothes. Which means we were 2 starters short on the D line.

Essentially 3 starters short on offense, if you consider Knight a starter (which I do because of the key role he plays).

Not a bad effort at all yesterday.

[kcatz]

Dees did not play yesterday. Everyone has been talking about all the starters on offense that didnt play but not having Dees and Fauanaunu (?) made as big an impact.

[onceacat]

Good: The contribution made by the freshman! Defensive improvements. Throwback uniforms. Happy about the win!

Bad: The injuries to receiving core. Strange situations caused by calls on the field. The 3rd and 4th down conversion percentage.

Ugly: The Cats struggle to control the game when leading (UCA and UND). Our best weapon yesterday to run the clock down in the 4th was to let UND play offense (check time of possession in 4th quarter). Maybe that was there is some genius strategy I'm missing...but think we lose more games in the future than win with that second half effort.

I'm sure that the entire coaching staff was more than happy to let UND drain the clock when they were down by 3scores. Lord knows that has been a weakness of the cats this season.

[cat_stache_fever]

Completely sober and lucid...I swear.

Good: uniforms were sweet! 2nd quarter effort was good. WR Herbert looks like the real deal.

Bad: 3rd down efficiency. Cats didn't play an entire 60 minutes.

Ugly: officiating was embarrassing. 3 points in the 2nd half.

An ugly win is better than a pretty loss, but that kind of overall effort wont fly against a better team. Thought we had a bit of a hangover from last week; seemed sluggish at times. I will NEVER be a fan of Marshall's scheme. THAT offense had no business moving the ball versus the athletes we have on defense. IMO, I feel our coaching staff will let up versus a lesser opponent, particularly on defense. We were bigger, faster, stronger across the board and at times it was hard to tell who the ranked team was.

[[cat_bracket]]

Ugly: we shot ourselves in the foot five times.

1 - on our first possession we had a bad snap turn a second and 4 into a third and 23.
2 - later in the first quarter we had an illegal block turn a second and goal at the 8 into a first and goal from the 23.
3 - another illegal block turns a TD run into second and G from the 21
4 - holding turns fourth and 3 into third and 24. Ends up giving UND the ball at midfield instead of 35 after a punt and they get a TD.
5 - tripping turns second and 4 into first and 25.

Need to clean that up vs SAC.

[CatBlitz]

Ugly: we shot ourselves in the foot five times.

1 - on our first possession we had a bad snap turn a second and 4 into a third and 23.
2 - later in the first quarter we had an illegal block turn a second and goal at the 8 into a first and goal from the 23.
3 - another illegal block turns a TD run into second and G from the 21
4 - holding turns fourth and 3 into third and 24. Ends up giving UND the ball at midfield instead of 35 after a punt and they get a TD.
5 - tripping turns second and 4 into first and 25.
Need to clean that up vs SAC.

3 and 5 never really happened. The ref just thought they did.

[cats2506]

Ugly: we shot ourselves in the foot five times.

1 - on our first possession we had a bad snap turn a second and 4 into a third and 23.
2 - later in the first quarter we had an illegal block turn a second and goal at the 8 into a first and goal from the 23.
3 - another illegal block turns a TD run into second and G from the 21
4 - holding turns fourth and 3 into third and 24. Ends up giving UND the ball at midfield instead of 35 after a punt and they get a TD.
5 - tripping turns second and 4 into first and 25.
Need to clean that up vs SAC.

3 and 5 never really happened. The ref just thought they did.

yeah, that "chop block" against newell was pretty bad, Newell pancakes his linebacker and the guy goes down and trips newel who falls on top, then out tackle is blocking the end who moves across and falls on top of newell and his guy.

the trip should not have been called either, I guess that he tripped him with his thigh.