Real Kato Blog: College Football Recap: Week 1

Michigan starts slowly against Western, but pulls away in the third quarter before lightning ends the game; N.C. State struggles to put away FCS school Liberty.

Michigan 34, Western Michigan 10.
For a while, Western's short-passing game was picking Michigan's secondary apart, making the defense look uncomfortably like last year's defense. But when Greg Mattison started to unleash some blitzes, Western quarterback Alex Carder got a bit rattled. In the second quarter, with the game tied and Western threatening to score, Brandon Herron intercepted a pass tipped by Jake Ryan and returned it 94 yards for a touchdown; that was clearly the turning point in the game.

The game was suspended for a while due to the threat of lightning. (To all bloggers, commenters, Facebookers, and Twitterers out there: the sparkly flashy thing in the sky is "lightning"; "lightening" with an "e" is what bleach does to your laundry.) When the game resumed, Michigan sacked Carder in the face and returned his fumble for a touchdown. Then Michigan's offensive line began to dominate, opening up holes for big runs by Fitzgerald Toussaint and Michael Shaw. The game was suspended again near the end of the third quarter; after a brief delay, the schools' athletic directors agreed that Michigan had the game in hand, and that the 34-10 score would be the final.

I wasn't terribly impressed by Michigan's defense early in the game. All across the field, it seemed like players were out of position, whether it was redshirt freshman defensive end Brennan Beyer giving up the edge on a rushing play, or linebacker Brandon Herron sprinting with his back to the quarterback trying to get out to cover the hook route.

Here's an example of what I mean with Herron. I saw something like this more than once during the day. In the picture below, Herron is circled. The two safeties appear to be covering deep halves of the field. The corners appear to be in man coverage, or there are four short underneath zones. So who is covering the split end on the right and/or the hook route area?

Herron sprint defense

Apparently it's Herron! He will come sprinting from all the way across the formation, in an attempt to get out to his coverage.

Herron sprint defense

This coverage has no chance of catching the split end, who is dashing to the first down yardage mark... as everyone should have expected on third-and-seven.

Herron sprint defense

The receiver catches the ball with no defender within three yards of him.

Herron sprint defense

So I don't get this. Either this is the way the play is designed (trying to disguise the coverage) or Herron is simply in the wrong place. Either way, this has zero chance of working against an experienced quarterback. Hopefully we'll get this fixed quickly. It's hard to be down on Herron on a day where he returned two turnovers for touchdowns, but after all, it's just Western Michigan here... we'll have to play much better next week against Notre Dame.

Grades: Offense B, Defense B. We didn't get to see much of the offense, but they were mostly solid. Zero turnovers, one penalty, good ball possession, and an apparent willingness to use some spread concepts along with our pro-style MANBALL offense. On defense, it looked shaky early, but I think we're starting to see the benefits of having an NFL coordinator with a bazillion clever blitz packages. Jordan Kovacs is the hero of the day; he came free on blitzes several times, and broke up a few pass plays as well.

N.C. State 43, Liberty 21. The score looks pretty respectable for the Wolfpack, but the truth is that State struggled to put Liberty away all day. If not for Liberty coughing up the ball seven times, this is a game that State could easily have lost. Liberty passed for 295 yards and outgained State 406-318 overall. Quarterback Mike Glennon is clearly not the playmaker that Russell Wilson was, and State has some work to do before next week's game against Wake Forest.

Other Notable Games:
Northwestern held off Boston College to score a minor upset; this is a good win for the Wildcats, who were playing without Dan Persa.

Baylor upset TCU in a wild 50-48 shootout. TCU had some BCS buzz going again this year, but this game will throw a damper on that.

Michigan State beat Youngstown State in fairly ugly fashion, 28-6. Looks like there are a lot of teams with week 1 jitters.

South Florida upset Notre Dame 23-20 in a lengthy game that was twice suspended for lightning. Notre Dame benched starting quarterback Dayne Crist in favor of Tommy Reed, re-opening the quarterback controversy that was supposed to be closed. The most fun part of this game was watching Irish coach Brian Kelly turn purple with frustration as he screamed at his players. Temper, temper, coach. To be fair, the frustration was understandable, as turnovers and mental mistakes cost Notre Dame several opportunities to score.

LSU beat Oregon 40-27 in a game that wasn't really that close. LSU's defense is for real; I may have to reconsider my "LSU is overrated" idea.

Boise State beat Georgia 35-21... still, I can't tell if this means Boise State is good again, or if Georgia is bad again.

South Carolina struggled for a while against East Carolina, but pulled away in the second half and won 56-37.

Appalachian State got whomped by Virginia Tech, 66-13. So instead of that game, the FCS upset of the week came from the Richmond Spiders, who beat Duke 23-21. It's almost hard to call this an upset, what with Duke being so terrible. I laughed during the off-season when sports writers predicted this year to be a turnaround year for Duke. I think the optimism will be somewhat more muted now.

Ohio State blasted Akron 42-0 in Luke Fickell's debut. Quarterback Joe Bauserman seems to have the starting job locked up, though Braxton Miller had some highlights as well. Still, it's just Akron... OSU will have a slightly bigger test next week against Toledo.

Purdue struggled to eke out a win against Middle Tennessee. Meanwhile Indiana lost to Ball State. It doesn't look like a good year for the state of Indiana.

USC squeaked by Minnesota 19-17. I think the days of USC dominance are over for now.

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