The Football Brainiacs

1st Quarter

– Great first call by Riley. Get’s a run action going left and rolls BM right looking for an open pass. Most would expect a run call on the first play so Riley shows the Vols a run action and gets the entire front 7 flowing away from the play. Unfortunately, BM just targets the wrong receiver.

– Offensively throughout this quarter the fault is all over the place. On some occasions it’s the offensive line. On some occasions it’s drop passes. On some occasions BM isn’t seeing guys. On some occasions the RB isn’t seeing the hole or being patient enough. I might get quite a bit of disagreement here but I don’t think the OL was as bad as the perception. The penalties obviously hurt.

– On that last note, you can see early in this game that Mixon is still in the process of acclimating to the game speed. Perine is patient and then decisive. Mixon is still in a bit of a hurry.

– Also related to the point above, the interior line pull well. There were a couple times where OU got some nice smash blocks from a pulling guard.

– Have to say that even though Orlando Brown didn’t have the best game. In terms of athleticism he looked a lot better getting out of his stance in pass pro. I was very concerned with how heavy footed he looked last week but the Vols pass rusher’s seem to bring out some of his natural athleticism and he just looked quicker and lighter on his feet. Clearly a ways to go but he showed more promise.

– Defensively the team played fine in the 1st quarter. Just settling in. No glaring issues. There was an occasional man out of position that gave the Vols just enough room to make something happen.

– Striker and Bond playing together in that 50 front really works when opposing teams are playing with a TE or H-back on the field.

– Bond plays to the boundary and Striker to the field. Both are natural when they drop. Really surprised at how well Bond drops to the curl/flat in cover 3. He had a batted ball and one nearly batted ball. He does a good job of reading the QBs eyes. Both are good pass rushers and both know how to play the run. The total ability between those two guys is certainly a plus for the Sooners. Bond is very good against the run.

– Alexander had a good first quarter. Was decisive. One of his best plays was on a short yardage situation where he quickly made his way between two blockers and tackled the RB. I love the decisiveness but he stopped his feet and contact and ended up on his back and the RB was able to get the first down.

– Thomas was much more decisive coming down field. Overall he looks like he’s playing faster and with more confidence.

– Parker is good. I know he got the TD scored on him but I’m not sure what he could have done better. They were matched up in a banjo/man coverage and he rode the guy outside well, broke well…just couldn’t quite close the space. Perfectly thrown ball. Parker is really decisive…really big…really fluid. He came down hill in a hurry on a beautiful overload field blitz call by Mike Stoops. They kept chipping Striker so Mike decided to teach them a little lesson and it worked perfectly.

– In the first quarter JT was giving a little too much space even when he was matched up in man. He breaks well but that balance of space for a DB is just one that takes a little time to master.

– Dimon and Romar are hard to move on the defensive line. Wade looked good as well. Romar really knows how to sit down and refuse to be scooped.

– Dom and Evans give OU some nice underneath matching coverage. They’re both able to ride routes well. I noticed that by alignment Evans had coverage responsibilities so Tennessee tried to trade the TE and get Dom in coverage and he did a nice job as well.

2nd Quarter

– 1st play of the 2nd quarter was a nice blitz call by Mike where he gets Tapper and Striker on a stunt. Nice to see him bringing Striker on an inside blitz. The play ends up being a screen that Oklahoma reads and blows up.

– Throughout the first half field position really hurt the Sooners defense. They gave up some plays but it was nothing glaring. The problem was Tennessee was just working with such a short field that any decent reception of 15+ got the Vols within striking distance.

– The TD that put Tennessee up 17-0 was just a great play call where the Sooners didn’t have numbers. Bond got cleared out and may have had outside contain and came too far inside. JT had no chance there with like 3 linemen running at him haha.

– Romar. This guy is quick.

– I was probably a little overly critical of JT on the long completion that set up the TD. I thought it was man to man coverage initially and felt JT played the route way to loose. Going back though, it appears to be a 3 deep and the receiver just got between him and Thomas. This issue was one that Baylor, KSU and other big 12 teams took advantage of last year against Oklahoma’s cover 3 defense where they get a WR between the CB and the middle safety. The Sooners going to have to find a way to tighten up the spacing on those skinny post routes otherwise it’s going to be something that Big 12 teams attack frequently. If JT doesn’t see a switch, I’d reckon he should play that tighter

– Mayfield was a mixed bag. At times he’s rushing things but it’s very likely because he doesn’t know how well his OL is going to protect him on any given play. On one play they protected him perfectly but he let go of the ball wayyyyy too early. Then the very next play he’s almost immediately forced to leave the pocket when the interior lineman let a man come free.

– I think the biggest concern I have with BM was his lack of accuracy on the deep balls. The Sooners are going to have to be able to stretch the field. Can’t say that enough. On back to back deep throws he missed by a lot. BM missed an open Jarvis Baxter for a sure TD as well. On a 1st down deep when the Sooners are backed up against their own goal he had Westbrook with a step and just way over shot him. This is the completion that a team like Baylor will usually make and just completely shut the crowd up. The Sooners need this element to come alive badly. It will change everything. It will open up everything. It’ll either pull safeties back, change the coverage calls or change the alignments. Regardless it’ll loosen things up underneath for both the run and the pass. Without that threat teams can play the Sooners very aggressively.

– Mixon had a great run. Showed his ability to break tackles and keep his legs moving. He also showed much better patience and vision in the 2nd quarter. Love that jump cut.

– When Baxter and Dede block well the RBs pay them off with nice runs.

– I’m telling you when Alvarez comes around the corner on a pull he is scary. He’s agile and has little wasted movement and is looking for blood. He dang near drove the Vol LB into the earth.

– In this quarter the Sooners started the run the ball much better which led to one of their bigger passing plays. The ability to run forced the Vols to play a little cover 2 (cover 2 sink) and gave Durron a little space and Mayfield put the ball right between the underneath receiver and the safety. If you can’t beat man coverage with any regularity in the passing game then you better be able to run against their front. The Sooners did that better in the 2nd quarter.

– One of my favorite things about the 2nd quarter is it showed you how well the Sooners can run when they play well up front. In other words, it tells you that issues that have running at times are not talent issues…they’re getting the kinks worked out. It helps having an OC that is patient with the run and let’s the OL find their groove. Can’t say that enough.

– OL had some critical errors in this quarter that stalled the only scoring drive and led to only 3 points. On one play they didn’t pick up the blitz. When the LT had to choose between two defenders rushing he wrongly chose the defender furthest away and left the interior rusher free. This forced Mayfield to leave the pocket early. Had him picked up the correct rusher then Mayfield would’ve had just enough time to dump the ball off to the RB. On another play the RT just got flat out beat and a designed roll out, forcing Mayfield to get rid of the ball early.

– Man that defensive play where the Sooners line up in their 5 front and slant right putting Bond 1 on 1 with the TE was lovely. Bond was able to dip and shoulder and bend around the corner beautifully and cause a fumble. I tracked the speed and Striker did beat him off the line but Striker was worked against a tackle and was pushed down as he tried to turn the corner. But the up-field threat of both those guys when they rush together is terrifying.

– Sooners had good field position and were able to move the ball towards the end of the 2nd quarter. But again a false start by the OL ultimately led to a stalled drive that yielded no points. The good news is that’s something that can be cleaned up.

– Man Walker is quick when he wants to be.