Even though this one felt kind of "Meh" after the 1st quarter, we remain in the drivers seat for the division.
Everyone is wondering about Boyd's condition after the weird fall, and the word we have currently is that the X-rays on his leg came back negative and the injury is not his knee. It was diagnosed a hip injury and he is currently having a MRI on it. Both Dabo and Chad Morris intimate that he'll be back, and Dabo said he was walking in the locker room. I can only speculate, but it could be a hip flexor strain or partial dislocation. Its pretty painful and he could be held out for Maryland, but I doubt he'd be out longer.
Chad:
"In the preliminary, x-rays were negative. He's getting an MRI right now. That's all we know at this point. It's his hip, which is good. I thought it was his knee. I thought he was on track to have a career night. He was unbelievable. We'll evaluate Tajh. We'll see tonight and go from there. Just like everybody else, we're crossing our fingers right now. He's a competitor. He'll be back."
Update: MRI is negative, he's listed as Questionable for the MD game.
Offensively, the way this game went made paramount the importance of having an inside running game. We had ample opportunities to blow the game wide open and settled for 5 FGs because we couldn't move people inside. Andre Ellington finished with over 100 yards, but a chunk of that came on the one Power play TD we scored late since BC misadjusted to the FB motion. They tell us he's 100% but I'm not convinced. Had we been able to move them on the inside zone, the game might've been 50-14 at least. Considering the lack of talent up front for BC's defensive line, I am disappointed in the OL play. Too many times I see our guys being stood up. I was surprised that we didn't try a few more sweeps. BC could be beaten to the outside.
Tajh and Cole both played well, and aside from a couple dropped balls theres nothing you could complain about. Cole executed the offense very well after not seeing much action at all this year, which tells me one thing I already knew: Chad Morris knows how to coach a QB. However, if you noticed we did not test them downfield with Stoudt in the game. For the record, I do think we can defeat Maryland with Stoudt in there.
Mike Bellamy was held out of the 1st half intentionally as a team discipline issue. I imagine because of the FB comment he made earlier this week. Stephone Anthony was held out due to an injury in practice Thursday and will be back next week. Brandon Thompson left with an injury and returned.
Defensively, I am still not happy with the tackling. On several longer plays we still had multiple missed tackles. I don't really believe their scoring is a result of anything they were doing that we were confused about, or that we had all the backups in (because we didnt until much later), but because we lost all of our focus and intensity when the offense spotted us 17. The 80 yard drive is a result of nothing other than that, in my opinion, but tackling remains a fundamental issue with this defense. Steele chewed their asses for it and they did tighten up after that, but BC was able to move us off the ball and I'm never happy with that. If this defense can tackle better and keep focus up for a whole game, then it could creep into the Top 25 again. We warned you in the preseason that they'd be a little spotty but get better as the year went on, and that is still what I think of them.
The bright spot of having 5 FGs is that Catman got the work he needed to become a better kicker in live situations. Special teams was good all-around. The snaps worked and Zimmerman kicked a couple to the endzone on kickoffs.
On to Maryland, who played a well-fought game against GT today.