I will just say, don't point out how out of control Shane Beamer was on social media unless you're ready for some really awful blowback.
That's pretty hilarious - it speaks to how easy it is to change someone's wikipedia page and will be taken off soon, but it's fun while it lasts
He was schooled by the old man
In fairness to them, they had a new OC for this game, Mike Shula, given their OC took a HC job, so some of that could have been the lack of smoothness in the operation to get the play call in rather than an intentional strategy - that was my read at least. Obviously on a couple of occasions they had to sub twice to get the right personnel in, which is usually a sign of disfunction rather than a strategy. Bret took advantage of that of course - as he should. This is not a new rule, the announcers being critical of the officials is pointing blame in the wrong place - teams have known you have to get your subs in right away on offense to allow the defense to sub and the officials are going to stop you from snapping the ball until they do have their subs in. How fast the subs are running onto the field is not something the officials dictate, in fact, forcing 320 pound defensive lineman to have to sprint 30 yards onto the field so you can snap the ball, favors the offense. It's clear in the rules, it's the offense's responsibility to sub with ample time for the defense to sub in response.
Thing is, it's very easy to avoid the situation, and it's what every other team does: don't substitute on offense late.
Why not specify offensive subs must begin with at least 25-30 seconds left on the clock? That would have prevented Beamer from shooting himself in the foot.
I viewed Sanders and Pat Bryant as a wash. Not having Kennard was a big loss for them though.
I mean there's already a rule, but I could see them altering/fine-tuning it. Maybe making it a flat 15 seconds after the offense makes a substitution instead of 3 seconds to recognize the substitution and then 15 seconds to make the change. Coaches wanted this change in the first place because they didn't like the no huddle substitution on the fly offenses that could make changes while not letting tired defensive linemen off the field increasing risk of injury. This change helped level the playing field. Could they shift it back entirely in the offense's favor? I guess it's possible but in my opinion, it's unlikely they get rid if the current rule.
This referee had trouble spotting the ball all game.
You don't need a rule to prevent the offense from shooting themselves in the foot. The rule now does that, as Bret showed us throughout the game.
While we don't have another PB on the roster, Franklin and Beaty are pretty darn good and we had guys who could stretch their defense. SC doesn't have anyone close to Sanders skill set on the roster. Without him, SC in essence had no running game outside of Sellers, and our game plan was designed to keep Sellers bottled up. We couldn't have gotten away with that strategy if Sanders had played. I love PB, but for purposes of this game it was far from a wash
Does Franklin have eligibility left?
just now posting after digesting everything - what a game/season and time to be an Illini!
They had zero answer to our Barge.
