Post Practice Notebook (OU Defense, 10.21.14)
Posted on: October 22, 2014
Mike Stoops
– Mike talked a lot about the stress that modern offenses put on the defense. Really emphasized that, not only do offenses use the entire field but the skill level of offenses continues to increase, the creativity continues to grow and people are taking the use of quarterbacks to their furthest extremes. “They put a lot of the pressure on your defense down in and down out…they’re a hard team to defend”.
– On that note, he was (and we believe rightfully so) clearly bothered by the fact that Kansas State is being allowed to throw the ball despite linemen being more than 3 yards down the field. He called it “ridiculous” which coincides with what K said about it yesterday when he noted,
The refs need to put an end to this nonsense.
Cannot overstate how much those plays frustrated Mike Stoops. He even said, “football has gotten stupid…it’s not even fair…that’s not the way football is meant to be played.” I know it’s easy for folks to simply say, “well adjust to it” or “that’s an excuse” but you have to bare in mind that a defensive staff teaches their kids to read keys based on the premise that certain rules exist. If those rules aren’t being implemented in completely alters their ability to accurately read their keys.
– Mike offered up a bit of unsolicited note about the morale of the team saying that “our players are motivated…no one is panicking…we’ve got to be more precise”. He did say that “we’ve got to do things better” but there was an air of hope in his comments and it seems that, while he admitted they might be a long shot to make the playoff, he seemed to imply that the fact that there is more unknown this year gives them some hope.
– Mike talked about the safety play and said that the safeties are getting better but said that they are inexperienced. He said that even Q.Hayes, while a senior, is only in his second year as a player on the field. He said that Steven Parker is coming on.
– Mike also talked a little bit about the need to really recruit corners that can cover. Said that, anymore, you can’t give your corners much help so they have to be able to cover.
– He also said that the busts that have occurred in some of these games as of late have to do with miscommunication. He said, in general, it’s difficult to show a player every look that they’re going to see in a game and that can cause a misalignment.
Jay Boulware and Michael Hunnicutt, “The Competitor”
– Coach Boulware spent some time talking about Hunnicutt and his overall mentality after the missed field goals the other day. He really emphasized that Hunnicutt has “a lot of toughness…he’s a competitor…I’m not saying everything is going to be perfect from here on out but he’s going to compete and that’s all you can ask”.
– Hunnicutt came in and spoke to media on Monday and he said simply, “you’ve got to put it past you.” He demonstrated the mental toughness that Boulware noted in the way he handled himself with the media and answered the questions directly and confidently. “I know I’m a good kicker…it’s just one those days”. It’s obvious that the missed field goals weighed on him but he said he wasn’t going to let that performance define him (nor should it).
– Interesting that coach Boulware said that despite the fact that a lot of folks wouldn’t fault Rip for getting kicked out of the game, he said that Rip is still taking it hard. Boulware said that Rip feels like he let the team down (a very selfless young man!).
Charles Tapper
– Tapper talked about how this bye week is like a reset week and it almost feels like “two-a-days”. He said, “obviously we’re doing some things wrong…we have a lot of work to do to stop the big plays were giving up and the big runs were giving up.”
– Also said that, “as a D Line we’re not as active as we were last year…we’re not flying off the ball like we were last year”
– But the thing that kept coming up in Tapper’s discussion with the media is what an effect the wide-splits have been having on the defensive front and how much time they are dedicated this week to making sure opposing offenses can’t use that against them.
89 Comments
Not impressed. Done drinking the kool-aid.
Aubrun held K-State to 14 points if I remember correctly. Fact is simple, defense will not be elite until we start recruiting elite defensive players.
You can scheme from now till the sun goes down, if the defensive players are not elite you will get an average defense everytime.
There’s definitely some truth to that, but I don’t think you can overstate how difficult it would be to stop an offense that isn’t abiding by the rules. Players have to be able to read a play to react correctly. If they cannot rely on their ability to read the defense, modern offenses will do whatever they want.
We will be having this same discussion after Baylor scores 4 touchdowns on illegal picks…
^^This, so tired of the excuses. I don’t care if they are throwing the ball with linemen down the field. If your a 7 point favorite and the better team, you should not be losing at home.
The bottom line here is this team has been poorly prepared and coached for three weeks running. While I agree on the POP pass and the linemen illegally downfield, we look more and more like a John Blake comedy of errors with every passing week.
Ok. that is just a crazy comment. John Blake? Really? I was a student and an often attendee for those years…and sir..this team and coaching staff ain’t no John Blake era team or staff. So, with that being said and before this deteriorates to name calling like some other boards. Could you validate that comment with your football knowledge? Not perception…x’s and o’s
these guys keep saying “we” and whatnot but if you look at their profile and see their old conversations, me thinks they’re just disqus whores who get on and talk about other crap and run into OU stuff. him and the other creepy guy with the picture. they’re brand new to this site(not saying they couldn’t have just found it, but i don’t think so). so sort of wierd, old guy, happenstance sort of trolls. “oh yeah, i can do some research and go on here and act like i know what i’m talking about….but hey kids, want some candy”
100% agree. These Sooners are in no way looking like a John Blake Sooner team.
I won’t defend what Herman said but I will say we are not prepared. To me, that reflects the some of the same issues as J Blake. I can see maybe one TO due to the play clock running out but after a TO or a commercial TO? Wrong packages on both off/def which has caused TO’s. It isn’t one game, it’s been since JH & MS has been here. Now before you lose it on me, I’m a fan of the staff. However, when you’re out of TO’s due to being unprepared, it’s not the kids. Also, I came to this site last October so I’m not a fly by troll. I just wish we could clear up the TO’s so we could have better clock mgt.
Haha. I wasn’t implying you. Hope you didn’t think that was aimed at a lot of people, just the 2 new creepy old guys with the uber closeups. Its just getting close to Halloween and I thought maybe they were looking for a new clientele to try their “candy” out on
LOL
lol. I don’t often lose it. Especially over things I have absolutely no control. You make valid points, but the instances would have to increase exponential to be Blakesque…not game by game…but play by play… If this was a Blake team OU would have lost by 5 touchdowns…oh and a safety..lol
LOL, I was at OU for the end of the Blake era and beginning of the Stoops era. I still remember Blake playing 5 QB in a game. That was such a cluster. Stoops was definitely a big difference.
I sat through every single John Blake game. The idea that this team looks, even remotely, like a Blake coached team is crazy talk.
The craziest of crazy talk!
Haha. So you’re gonna blame a kid or kids who “read their keys” and everything is saying run that he’s supposed to ignore all that and just turn and run with a guy or hope that if a ball is thrown the refs will do their job and call ineligible down field? A 7 pt favorite playing against a team who can’t follow the rules is still supposed to cover that spread? So, if a wr goes into the stands for a dog and a beer, our corners supposed to watch him and make sure he’s not coming back in and the 1st to touch the ball and hope the ref sees it? Everybody needs to be held accountable. Mike at times, players at times but yes refs and other coaches who wanna stretch rules need to be held accountable too. If you can’t win without breaking the rules…don’t play
7 point home favorites probably lose more often then you think.
So, if you and I were playing 5 card draw, and I allowed myself to draw different cards twice…while making you follow the rules…you’d be okay if you lost? And if you weren’t okay, and tried to explain why you were upset, I just said “that’s an excuse…you lost!”. You’d be fine with that? No, you wouldn’t.
K-State also threw a tipped interception in their endzone and missed multiple field goal attempts. They had the day OU just had in the redzone.
Does anyone know if Mike is the only coach that has played KSU of being critical of the refs on KSU linemen going downfield on passing plays??? Does OU send film to Big 12 showing this. If true, why are these officials on the field???
I have a feeling this is going to cause KSU issues down the stretch. Everyone now knows what’s going on, and I suspect officials will be more aware. It’s too late for us to benefit from that, but it could cost KSU some games before the season is over.
Jimbo Fischer complained very loudly to the refs early in the game when Notre Dame got away with an illegal pick against FSU receivers. And look what happened? He go the call at the end of the game that saved the win. If the coaches bring this to the attention of the refs, they will start calling KSU on it.
Exactly, just like KSU’s D, so many elite players running around they were able to stuff the vaunted Auburn O……..wait.
I don’t know if you’ve noticed but Auburn’s offense is nothing compared to what it was last year. They lost some key pieces. They have not been close to being as potent as they were last year.
Btw an average D ia rated over the season, not off one game. Lets see where K State’s D is ranked at the end of the season. They sure didn’t look very good versus OU.
So would that also explain Mich St too?
The OU D would look a lot better playing against Big 10 offenses too. Don’t know why people overlook stuff like this.
No conference in the country can trot out the offenses that WVU, Baylor, TCU, and to a lesser extent OU, KSU, and OSU can march out. They just can’t.
I’d agree about B12 O’s being on different level, much of the SEC has been experiencing the same thing. Bama D has been getting hit pretty hard by many passing/complex O’s too. Just saying that typical recruiting rank doesn’t matter as much as many think as Bama is loaded with top ‘elite’ talent. I prefer ‘elite’ talent for our system, not necessarily the recruiting services grades. With that said, everyone knew we were going to have a weakness at safety with turnover this year, unfortunately it’s been too true at times.
The SEC offenses have actually improved a lot in recent seasons, but I think they are down some this year after graduating so many good QB’s last year. But you are right, when an SEC team has a good spread offense, they typically score a lot of points on solid SEC defenses.
& does TCU have top10 classes & recruits?
So one good game by TCU, or even a good season, and you try to make this point? Every now and again, teams/schools that don’t recruit well put together amazing seasons. Remember Kansas in the Orange Bowl? It happens. Let’s see if TCU can sustain this all season, or for multiple seasons, before we use them as an example of a team that wins at a high level with less talent than OU.
While true, it can happen occasionally, you’d be hard pressed to find anyone who would disagree that TCU’s D is a staple of their team year after year, regardless of recruiting. This is about D, not wins in a season. Both TCU, Mich St & many others are known for their D regardless of recruiting. I would suspect that schemes are largely responsible more than recruiting so called 5-stars, along with good evaluations. Development being the other portion.
True, but even that fails. You are right, TCU is known for their D, and they typically have good defenses. Didn’t stop OU from having some successes on them this year. Didn’t stop Baylor from putting up 61 on them. Last season they gave up 41 to Baylor, and 30+ several times to other teams.
While it fails periodically, it’s the whole that has to be considered. Brings to mind what I heard David Pollack say on ESPN couple weeks ago ‘I think lockdown D’s are a thing of the past generally with the new O’s’. That from a former all SEC LB. I agree with him ‘generally’ as there are some exceptions. But if Mike says the same thing people freak out as it being lowered expectations. I believe there’s significant reality to it as you have noted with SEC D’s struggling these days ‘generally’ with SO many more points being scored. If the SEC CCG last year would have been B12, everyone would have mocked them for no D – Bama/Auburn game as well.
Our defense plays scared. When we are good we are very aggressive, you take that away and we are average.
Where was the last three classes of MSST ranked? Its about a team coming together – and having that passion and leadership to lead us to the promised land. I give the stars associated with their names like 5-10% relevance in the overall scheme of things.
We gave up 24 to KSU.
Auburn gave up 14, but KSU threw to a wide open Lockett in the endzone who inexplicably let the ball bounce straight up in the air for an INT. Not to mention KSU missed 3 field goals. (41,42 and 22)
so its not like they were miles ahead of us there.
We also gave up a touchdown on an illegal play with the center 8 yards downfield. So I fault our defense for 17 true points
I rewatched the game on youtube and eventually stopped counting all the pass plays KSU had with olinemen more than 3 yards down field. Just inexcusable for the officials to continually let that happen.
Mike Stoops needs to quit dropping Striker in coverage and let him rush damn QB.
Any comments on the 28 yard punting average?
My comment on it – That’s terrible.
Or the 47.8 punting average against Texsa?
I’d take 43.8 every game & expect coach Stoops would too. I would, however, expect more consistency in dropping punts inside the 20 when given the opportunity.
If the refs aren’t going to flag linemen down field, why not add the scheme to our playbook?
As OUr team does it, it will be strictly enforced…
If that happens at least they will have to call it against the rest of the teams in the league.
true
the weekly press conferences are a waste of time ; more coachspeak and more player bloat, but no improvement on the field. Neither Stoops is getting it done on the sidelines and Heupel has shown his inabilities in the booth…The program has been slowly drifting toward mediocrity since the last title run in 2008 and I see no improvement this season. What the fans have to understand and get used to are more heartbreaking defeats and little chance of making another dominating 2-3 year run. Stagnation and status quo are the bywords of today, tomorrow, and the indefinite future..
Your definiteion of mediocrity and mine are WAY different.
Where you see a mediocre program, I see a program that isn’t that far from undefeated or 1 loss seasons.
Even though I really understand where this guy comes from emotionally, I also know that there isn’t a team in the country that would make it through the Big XII undefeated this season. The sec has tough teams, but they aren’t any better than what we’ve seen in the Big XII this season. I guess this may be the new norm, although I hate to admit it. Next season could possibly be worse.
With the tough games on the road next year, excuses aren’t going to win games. This team has some growing to do as well as the staff.
So, you are suggesting we get rid of the entire coaching staff? That seems a little extreme, IMO. If you are making that suggestion, you probably have given it a lot of thought and have replacements in mind. Who do you think would be an improvement over the current staff?
I’d also add that in some ways we are better than last year. UT and Baylor stomped us last year. This year, we have two losses by a combined 5 points. Could have EASILY won both games. I know at the end of the day that doesn’t mean much, but I feel like we are closer to being good this year, than we were last year. Maybe next year we take that leap. I don’t know. But I’m not going to sit around tearing down the program over 2 loss seasons. That puts us in the top 5 of the nation if you look at programs over a period of seasons.
Hunnicutt needs 52 points to become the all-time NCAA kick scoring leader. This was his worst performance since his first year of kicking. This game was an aberration for him.
Do you remember the kicker Stoops had, who was automatic, but then missed a field goal against (guess who) K-State in the 2003 Big 12 Title game? Was it DeCarlo? After that, it carried over into the following year, until Stoops finally benched him for missing kicks.
I sure hope that doesn’t happen to Hunnicutt, but man, those kickers get something going on in their head, and it’s Scott Norwood 2.0.
For certain you will not have to worry about Stoops benching Hunnicutt next year.
I’m not concerned at this point, only if it becomes a trend.
On one hand I hope he gets it, but on the other hand that would mean we’re getting a lot more FG than TD. He needs 9 points a game from here on out. Not impossible.
Just a question and if this has been brought up I apologize. Does anyone else think that not having Walker or Dimon available to rotate in the middle of the defense has not only caused a limitation in interior pressure, but maybe a “re-scheming” so to speak in how we attack the offense? To me it just seems since they went down, we not only have had limited interior pressure on the run/QB, but have lead us to pull back the dogs a bit. I could be completely out in left field, but wanted to see if any one had the same leads as myself.
I think there is some merit to this. But not being inside the program I wouldn’t know what that weight should be. The experts can attest that any change in personnel within the 2 deep causes some level of “re-scheming” depending on the skill set brought to the table. But, I think they have been without the guys mentioned long enough to apply those changes. Maybe the same level of trust is not there? Thoughts?
Having those guys out sure affected the rotation. Had to leave the 1’s in most of the game and they got worn out.
Ok, I’ll say it. Redemption for the season can be earned by laying the wood on Baylor and their gawd awfeul chrome helmets. We put up 40 or 50 while holding them under 20 and I’ll shut up.
Rave on, that’s not going to happen!!!!
Double take on ‘need to recruit some CBs who can cover’. Discuss. Know we lost LJ but what about Stanvon and Dakota? Last year Tito was tearing it up in camps. Both Stoops have raved about JThomas. None of these guys can cover? Have PJ committed but who else does OU have a great shot at getting? Norman? Maybe Sheffield? Better sew up Patterson while they still have a shot.
I would like to take just a sec here to post my continued appreciation for the guys who run this site to all of us who read it and comment daily. You all are a great group of people. I appreciate that everyone can share their thoughts and opinions and even disagree but be respectful. I made the mistake of posting a comment (that many of us have made on here) in the comments of another site and was treated pretty harshly. I was reminded quickly why this is the only site I write comments on. Thanks to everyone for keeping it clean and mature.
Thank you for reading (and commenting)!
I just go to those other sites to get sick nasty. It just blends in there, and I don’t get judged…as a matter of fact, I’m usually accepted as one of them…I’m an online sufferer of Dissociative Identity Disorder. I blame Sooner Ray, mostly. He’s the one that gave me the idea…
hey, hey, hey, everyone needs a place to hang out and be nice. If I poor my beer in your boot just drink it and say “thank you”. 🙂
Indeed!
LOL, I wish I could like this more than once! I’ve got to find me one of those! I’m putting that at the top of my Christmas list.
You’re talking about the mustache, right?
Thanks for reading and commenting on here. Everyone has their own opinions. Right or wrong, everyone should be treated with respect on here. That’s our goal. Civil, intellectual conversation.
A little off topic but the Boz just gave his take on our sooners and IMO he nailed it. Everyone except for the coaches seemingly are seeing and saying the same thing. Very frustrating.
where
Sorry, meant to add that… College football live today.
He basically talked about confusion on both sides of the ball and wasting timeouts among a few other things.
People can talk about the missed field goals all they want (that second one was the worst field goal miss i’ve ever seen) but at the end of the day Knight’s pass for the pick 6 is the worst passing decision i’ve ever seen. Neal’s attempted pass to Shepard in the red zone was also one of the worst trick play decisions i’ve ever seen. What is the difference here? Knight got the chance to redeem himself by charging down the field and scoring a TD. Neal got the chance to redeem himself by stepping up and getting some amazing catches including his first TD of the year. Hunnicut NEVER got the chance to redeem himself because, once again, we RAN OUT OF TIME OUTS MIDWAY THROUGH THE 4TH QUARTER. No excuses for that. A 5 yard penalty is not worth wasting a time out. We have talented players who can get those yards, who can make up for mistakes (as mentioned above), but we have to give them the opportunity to do so. If clock management was a stat, we’d be laughed at.
Well I guess we will find out Sunday if we get our first linebacker commit or if we whiff on another target. Townsend set to announce sunday and I’m reading texas has been the favorite.
At some point you have to wonder if we go JUCO for LB’s. There are some hidden gems in HS somewhere but can we find them by signing day?
Were in a bit of a pickle I think. We are in on a lot of good prospects but most of them are waiting and we have others on hold that I think are pretty good players in whitfield and david long (who committed to wvu) but if we wait and 3 of these guys we are high on do end up here then it works out and you go after another couple guys to get to 4 total backers this year.
If we only end up with one guy out of our top 10 linebacker offers then we definitely lost out this year.
It’s going to be interesting over the late winter seeing who is left on the board.
They should have been looking for 4 years to find those little gems. There are fewer of those gems these days with the recruiting world being so big. Not everybody wants to go to OU.
True but hard to accept sometimes. Makes me wonder if the recruiters just throw offers to the highest ranked and never put in the work on a backup plan.
Vacate the K-State win upon further review up the chain of command? Rules are rules.
Seems like Striker was doubled a lot.
So from the sounds of it, for the rest of the year and building into next year, we need teams leaving the field knowing they just played Oklahoma. And then for that to lead to teams looking at the schedule and saying oh crap, we got OU next. In other words, snot bubbles for everybody
The Boz says bloody snot bubbles!
I have a question for anyone. When OU faces the wide splits, why can’t they put a rusher in the gap. I am thinking, what if you sent someone like bond or striker, they would almost get a free run at the play. It seems like they would get there a split second after the ball and while they might not make the play in the backfield, they would at least dictate what was going to happen to some degree. Any thoughts?
this team had it improved from game 3-4 on we would have beat TCU and KSU by 14 points. We lost by a total of 5 points. This team did have the elements to reach the CFB playoffs but didn’t. The coaches had a plan and that plan was to get them ready by throwing a ton at them on defense and working on all their weaknesses ( mostly Trevor’s) on offense every chance they got. It over whelmed the defense and got them all screwed up. The offense never got any rhythm. When Heupel finally used the offense that Trevor was comfortable with look at the results. He completed 26-32 passes and 2 were dropped and another completed but 6 inches too long.
As far as the defense the secondary just had too much thrown at them. I think the coaches had great plans to make this team special but the cart was before the horse and both the offense and defense never really settled in and got confident and comfortable. I don’t know about the rest of you but the stark contrast of the KSU coaches and players calm cool and collected on the sideline with all their timeouts versus the Chinese fire drill of my Sooners hit me square in the face last Saturday. Our 2 coordinators simply have turned in the worst coaching job of any Stoops year. We may have only lost 2 games by 5 points but quite simply this was the best Stoops team on defense since 2004 or 2009. It is 105th in pass defense. That is not acceptable with the talent at OU.