On 71 Plays We Had 70 Missed Assignments

ScionOfSouthland

ScionOfSouthland

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Monday afternoon, Georgia Tech coach Paul Johnson showed his offense its mistakes from its loss to Notre Dame Saturday, corrected them and moved forward. There was a lot to correct.

“He didn’t sugarcoat anything,” A-back Isiah Willis said.

From a review of the game video of the Yellow Jackets’ 30-22 loss to Notre Dame, coaches found more than 70 missed assignments in the game out of 71 offensive plays. Johnson said the total was the highest going back to his first season as offensive coordinator at Georgia Southern in 1985 and triple the amount of a typical game.

“They played well, we played horrible,” Johnson said, referring to the Fighting Irish. “I don’t know if we could play any worse. We couldn’t offensively, that’s for sure.”

Players went the wrong direction on plays, used poor technique on the option, were “atrocious” in blocking linebackers, ran pass routes that were “horrendous,” didn’t carry the ball with awareness of defenders and blocked the wrong defenders, Johnson said.

“About anything you could do, we tried,” Johnson said.

On the opening drive of the second half, quarterback Justin Thomas had to alter his path on a run play from the designated route because two teammates blocked the wrong Notre Dame defenders. With the play broken, Thomas was met by two defenders who knocked the ball loose.

As a result of the mistakes, as well as Notre Dame’s aggressive and swift defenders, Tech converted just 3 of 15 third downs – failing on its first nine attempts. It was the Jackets’ lowest rate since their 0-for-10 game against BYU in 2012.


The Jackets gained 210 yards on their first 55 plays, 3.8 yards per play, before Notre Dame put the game out of reach. Tech gained 127 yards on 16 plays in its final two drives. Tech’s seven punts, all taken in the team’s first 12 possessions, tied for the most taken in a game in Johnson’s tenure.

It was all the more jarring considering the efficiency with which the Jackets had been playing. Last season, Tech tied an NCAA record for third-down efficiency last season (57.9 percent) and was ninth in the country in yards per play (6.72). In steamrolling Alcorn State and Tulane to start the season, Tech converted 9 of 15 third downs, averaged 9.1 yards per play and had punted three times in 25 possessions.

“I watched the tape 10 times,” Johnson said. “I don’t know that I’d do anything different other than execute a little better.”

Part of the problem, too, was the number of team members playing in their first road game and doing so in a boisterous environment.

“I think some of them thought, ‘Oh, man, I’m playing at Notre Dame,’” Johnson said. “And it doesn’t take much because they’ve got a good football team now. You’re playing a top-10 team on the road and all you have to do is go the wrong way a couple times and turn the wrong way and, next thing you know, you get to punt seven times.”

Johnson said that the defense was O.K. in spots – “I’ll emphasize ‘spots,’” he said – but gave up too many plays and third downs. In the first quarter, the Irish hit the Jackets with a 46-yard touchdown pass on a 3rd-and-20 and in the second quarter converted a 3rd-and-9 and a 3rd-and-7 in their own end to extend what turned out to be a touchdown drive.

It was part of a message that all involved – coaches and players – fell short in preparing for and playing Notre Dame, but also that the problems can be fixed.

After the corrections, No. 20 Tech began preparations for its game against Duke Saturday in Durham, N.C.

“We’ve got to play better,” Johnson said. “If we don’t, we won’t win any more games.”
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That is actually encouraging to me. It's something very fixable. It was really hard to see if that was the case watching in person rather than on TV.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G850A using Tapatalk
 
Hope he addressed root cause for the missed assignments which was the shifting defense. From here on out, the team should expect the opponent to shift their defensive formations prior to the snap.
 
cincyjacket said:
Hope he addressed root cause for the missed assignments which was the shifting defense. From here on out, the team should expect the opponent to shift their defensive formations prior to the snap.
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Seems like an easy way to do this would be "prairie-dog" offense. We line up under center every play anyhow...we just need to get to the line faster. May have to scrap running out the A-back with the play every time in order to do this though. And switch to signals.

Cue..."Paul Johnson is stubborn and won't change :BigCry"
 
Skov going the wrong way on a play and JT trying to hand the ball off to air was pretty much indicative of how it went.
 
JJacket said:
Skov going the wrong way on a play and JT trying to hand the ball off to air was pretty much indicative of how it went.
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I think we did that against Tulane and still gained 4 yards. Our team totally thought everything was fine.

It ain't.
 
cincyjacket said:
Hope he addressed root cause for the missed assignments which was the shifting defense. From here on out, the team should expect the opponent to shift their defensive formations prior to the snap.
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That wasn't all of it. There were people running the wrong way and we were getting beat man on man.
 
GT1992 said:
That wasn't all of it. There were people running the wrong way and we were getting beat man on man.
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It is very tough task to block anybody in space. To block a superior athlete in space is very difficult.
 
andrew said:
That is actually encouraging to me. It's something very fixable. It was really hard to see if that was the case watching in person rather than on TV.

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-G850A using Tapatalk
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This exactly. I just got back from Chicago and watched the game. Lots of mental mistakes more so than getting physically dominated like it looked in person. We correct the mental mistakes and we will be fine.
 
At what point do the coaches confront the likelihood that they did a lousy job of getting the team ready for the game?
 
cincyjacket said:
Hope he addressed root cause for the missed assignments which was the shifting defense. From here on out, the team should expect the opponent to shift their defensive formations prior to the snap.
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In his press conference he said they were actually shifting INTO the defense that we wanted them in...but we still ööööed it up.
 
So we had 781 individual players on the field for those 71 plays. Sounds like we are successful 89% of the time to me!

All aboard the hype train folks! Hop on...it's safe.
 
00Burdell said:
At what point do the coaches confront the likelihood that they did a lousy job of getting the team ready for the game?
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He did say that. He made a comment to the effect of "we gotta do a better too... Having the right plan and play call doesn't do anything if they don't know how to it"
 
wesleyd21 said:
So we had 781 individual players on the field for those 71 plays. Sounds like we are successful 89% of the time to me!

All aboard the hype train folks! Hop on...it's safe.
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Thanks for that. I feel better. Hype train back inservice. Gonna take a lot more missed assignments to derail this train.
 
I thought this kind of problem was supposed to go away with 4 out of 5 returning on the OL. Were the missed assignments by all the new players? I doubt it.
 
bonham said:
I thought this kind of problem was supposed to go away with 4 out of 5 returning on the OL. Were the missed assignments by all the new players? I doubt it.
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Players can have bad games. It happens. I think CPJ is also doing his best to rally the troops and say, "a lot of it was on us." So as not to kick the guys confidence too much.
 
Does a "missed assignment" include bad blocks, or is it just not getting to the right guy?

BTW, I'm pretty sure Johnson has previously said that a good game is less than 20 missed assignments.
 
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