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Execution woes continue to plague Owls

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Rice football has scored three points in their last eight quarters of play leaving the team’s poor execution the glaring culprit in the aftermath of a string of defeats.

For the second consecutive Saturday, the Rice offense was kept out of the endzone. The poor offensive showing against UAB came on the heels of a puzzling offensive performance against UTSA. At the heart of both losses was a critical failure: execution.

The coaches don’t run the plays. That somewhat obvious fact will be the source of several hard conversations taking place at South Main this weekend. It doesn’t matter how well the coaches prepare the team or how well the team understands the gameplan on any given week if they’re not able to step on the field on Saturday and put that knowledge into practice.

“That’s what you’re seeing.” Mike Bloomgren said as he leveled with the media following the game. “When you can’t block people in the run game … and when you can’t block long enough in pass protection, there’s not a whole lot you can do in this game.”

He wasn’t alone in his initial assessment. Linebacker Dylan Silcox said team lacked “proper execution” that resulted in big plays for the UAB offense. Freshman quarterback Evan Marshman, who saw his first action for the Owls on Saturday, echoed those sentiments. “I want to convert on third downs and I want to lead us on successful drives. Obviously, that didn’t happen,” he acknowledged.

The coaching staff, the defense and the offense all came away with the same message, albeit one that’s hard to take to swallow. There are players that continue to excel at their one-eleventh, the phrase Bloomgren used to stress the importance of every individual performance on any given play. They’re just not doing it together.

If there was a silver bullet this coaching staff would have fired it long ago. Instead, it’s back to the practice field and back to the X’s and O’s. Captain Zach Abercrumbia remarked during fall camp, this is Rice University. It’s not a question of if these players can understand the gameplan, it’s when. There’s no better time than the present.

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Owls offense shut out for first time since 2000 in loss to UAB

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Rice football dropped their Week 7 home contest to the UAB Blazers as the Owls’ offense was muted for the second week in a row and the defense surrendered a few big plays.

A week removed from a 3-point performance against UTSA the Owls’ offensive struggles continued against UAB. Things got worse against UAB. Rice football was shut out for the first since they lost 37-0 against No. 11 TCU in 2000, a span of 210 games.

Head coach Mike Bloomgren and his staff will once again be forced pick up the pieces after another disheartening loss which dropped the Owls to 1-6 overall and 0-3 in CUSA play. Here are some initial reactions from the loss.

1. The secondary is still getting beat deep

The UTSA game will more than likely prove to be the highwater mark for the season for the Rice secondary. That’s not to say this unit won’t have more days, but holding any team to under 50 yards passing is an extremely rare feat. Even knowing this week would more than likely feature a higher yardage total, the results were still frustrating.

Justin Bickham and Brandon Douglas-Dotson were both beat down the field for long touchdown passes. The secondary as a whole allowed several UAB receivers to get behind the last line of defense and were fortunate to some degree that they were either overthrown or not targeted.

The defense allowed 274 yards through the air and two passing touchdowns. Both were improvements from their season averages coming into the game, but each number could have been better … or much worse. Needless to say there will be plenty of film to watch and things to be corrected from this game. That goes for the front seven as well, who were equally unproductive against the run.

2. The offensive line remains out of sync

The offensive line is Mike Bloomgren’s area of expertise. Before being elevated to the offensive coordinator position at Stanford he was the offensive line coach and run game coordinator for the Cardinal. He has proven success in the trenches, but thus far the offensive line at Rice hasn’t been able to gel.

After hearing rumblings of potential changes throughout the week, Rice started the game with true freshman Jake Syptak at left tackle in place of Ozuma Osuji who had started the Owls’ previous six games. Joining him were Jack Greene, Shea Baker, Joseph Dill and Sam Pierce.

With just under seven minutes to play in the first quarter Rice found themselves in fourth and one. They went to the jumbo package, with all 11 players jammed into the middle. Jordan Meyers got the carry and went nowhere, turning the ball over on downs. That’s the kind of situation that Bloomgren lives for making it equally frustrating when the result was a short loss.

The unit struggled with pass protection too. UAB picked up three sacks and two quarterback hurries. Shawn Stankavage and Evan Marshman were decent when each had time to throw, averaging 10.5 yards per completion with a few nice balls thrown downfield by each of them. If the line does not improve the offense is not going to get much better.

3. Creative playcalling not enough to jump start the offense

Don’t miss the forest for the trees here. Offensive plays that pick up big yardage aren’t automatically “good play calling” and plays that result in negative results aren’t “bad play calling”. First and foremost, the Owls have an execution issue. Poor execution renders any sort of playcalling futile.

After a dismal offensive performance against UTSA the Rice offense needed some kind of spark. Credit is due to offensive coordinator Jerry Mack and the rest of coaching staff for coming up with some new wrinkles to add to the Owls’ repertoire on Saturday. The execution wasn’t there, not just on the new looks, but on the basic fundamentals of this offense.

Freshman running back Juma Otoviano saw his first action of the season, coming in as the Owls’ wildcat quarterback and picking up a few yards on the ground. Rice also incorporated a shovel pass, some creative reads and just about everything but the kitchen sink.

It’s clear that this offense is stuck in neutral and needs to figure out how to move the ball consistently. They didn’t find the answer against UAB, just like they didn’t figure things out against UTSA. There are a host of plays that the offensive staff is going to want back, but poor execution is just as much to blame as the playcalling, if not more so. The execution was so spotty on Saturday that even the better play calls fell flat.

4. It’s time to talk about the quarterbacks

The head coach and the quarterback get too much credit when a team wins and too much blame when the team loses. That’s never going to change, but it’s important to make a distinction between individual performances and collective offensive issues when evaluating quarterback play.

With that disclaimer, here are the stat lines for the Rice quarterbacks against UAB:

  • Stankavage: 7-for-12, 79 yards
  • Marshman: 6-for-16, 57 yards

All of the Rice quarterbacks spent as much time under duress as they did looking down the field. The fear of the oncoming pass rush was noticeable for Stankavage, who looked uncomfortable in the pocket from the start of this game.

It was another game in which Stankavage wasn’t awful, but didn’t show the same growth in the offense as he did early in this season. He just hasn’t progressed enough as a passer. That, combined with a struggling offense, had opened the door for someone else to take the reigns on offense. Bloomgren’s hand was forced, though, as Stankavage left this game in the first half before returning to the sideline with his left foot in a boot.

5. Final thoughts

It’s not fun to lose. Rice fans know that as well as anyone else in the country, and so does Bloomgren. If Rice wanted to try and catch lightning in a bottle with an up-and-coming coach they could have gone that route in the hiring process. Instead, they opted for Bloomgren. Someone who’s had tremendous amounts of success and recruited extremely well. He has a plan, a great coaching staff and he’s building for the long term.

Recruiting is just as much a part of a new coaching staff as installing an offense, defense and special teams. The talent at Rice needs to get better for the Owls to compete, and the coaching staff needs to continue to grow as well. Those aren’t mutually exclusive, and they’re not things that happen overnight. Grow pains hurt. They’re not fun, just like Saturday wasn’t fun, but they’re a part of the process.

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Keys to victory over UAB

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Rice football has their eyes set on their first conference victory. Here’s how they could find it at home against the UAB Blazers in Week 7.

The offense worked in spurts against the Owls’ first three opponents. The defense was effective all game against UTSA and the special teams have been the rock of this team all season. So far, though, Rice hasn’t been able to get all three phases of the game working in unison.

They’ll need to get each phase fully functional to beat a strong UAB squad in Week 7. Here’s how they get it done:

1. Control the running game

New England Patriot’s head coach Bill Belichick is famous for his approach to defensive gameplanning. His objective every week is to take the team’s biggest strength away from them. For Rice’s opponent in Week 7, that’s the running game.

The UAB offensive line consists of four three-year starters. They’re big, strong and committed to opening up lanes to run the football. It’s no mistake then, that the Blazers lead CUSA in rushing offense, averaging 237.6 yards per game on the ground and at an impressive clip of 5.2 yards per carry.

UAB is going to grind it out up front, which presents the crux of the Owls’ first objective. Stop the run, because UAB isn’t going to do anything else. They’ll push the ball through the air too, but getting sophomore running back Spencer Brown and his fellow backfield mates going will be their primary objective.

2. Create five explosive plays

What Rice might lack in terms of consistency on offense they hope to make up for with their home run ability. Austin Walter, Emmanuel Esukpa and Aaron Cephus are all dynamic athletes that bring a certain set of strengths to the game. Each one of them has made big plays for Rice this season and has the potential to put the team on their backs and make more big plays against UAB.

Rice had 11 plays of 20 or more yards against Prairie View, their high water mark for the season. In their next two games against Houston and Hawaii they registered seven and six such plays, respectively. They totaled eight plays of 20 or more yards over their most recent three games, combined.

The athletes are there to create the spark. If one of those guys can get going against UAB they’ll raise the collective potential of this offense as a whole.

3. Start fast

The message to the team following the Wake Forest game was all about starting the first quarter at full speed. The Owls slowly warmed up on both sides of the ball against the Demon Deacons, falling behind by five touchdowns before either side of the ball was able to kick it into gear.

To some degree, the same issues reared their heads against UTSA. Not only did the offense not start fast, the engine never turned over at all. This has been a week of heavy maintenance – expect Bloomgren and his staff to come out with a well-orchestrated plan on that side of the ball.

This team wants to get the bad taste out of their mouth. They know what they’re capable of and that’s much better than what they put on the field against UTSA. If Rice starts fast they’ll have the opportunity to dictate how the game will be played, something that will be incredibly important to the final score.

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The Good and the bad at the midway point of 2018 season

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Rice football enters the second half of the season with plenty of good and bad displayed early on. What can the Owls fix and what questions remain going forward?

It takes all three phases and four quarters to win a football game. That’s something that head coach Mike Bloomgren has stressed to his team over the course of this fall. The Owls have been a mixed bag across the board thus far. What’s gone right? Gone wrong? And what questions still remain after the first six games of the 2018 season?

Offense

The Good – Austin Walter

Starting his freshman season in 2015, Austin Walter never missed a game. In three years he tallied 36 appearances, averaging 393.3 yards rushing per season. Rice has played six of their 13 games so far in 2018 and Walter has racked up 440 yards on the ground, 188 yards through the air and another 189 yards on seven kick returns. Add all those together and Walter enters Week 7 as the No. 2 player in the nation in All-Purpose yards.

Nobody, not even Walter could have realistically projected the senior’s incredible start. Emmanuel Esukpa drew most of the preseason accolades. He’s been great, but the importance of Walter’s contribution to this offense cannot be understated.

The Bad – Offensive line play

Part of what’s limited Esukpa’s efficiency and forced the Owls to lean on Walter has been the inconsistent play from the offensive line. The same five guys have started every game: Uzoma Osuji at left tackle, Jacke Greene at left guard, Shea Baker at center, Joseph Dill at right guard and Sam Pierce at right tackle. For whatever reason, they haven’t been able to get on the same page.

Sam Pierce said this unit needs to “get on the same page, communicate, and work within ourselves.” So far that hasn’t translated from practice to the games. Bloomgren’s frustration has been evident, but there hasn’t been any sort of wholesale personnel change. The success of this unit will largely depend on these five guys and their ability to get in sync.

Biggest question – Which offense will show up on Saturday?

Mike Bloomgren indicated the Owls struggles on Saturday weren’t a result of a game plan that was any more complicated than they’d implemented so far this season. They ran the same plays and schemes they’d run earlier on in the year, but with much different results.

Rice hung around in shootouts with Houston and Hawaii, and that was without all the pieces working in concert. We still haven’t seen what this unit looks like at full strength, playing as one. The question is whether or not we’ll ever see it in 2018.

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Defense

The Good – Secondary seems to be turning the corner

The stat book for the Rice secondary is one of the most bizarre juxtapositions of the good and bad that comes with in-season growth. Here are the Owls’ passing yards and touchdowns allowed by game:

  • Prairie View: 244 yards, three touchdowns.
  • Houston: 320 yards, three touchdowns
  • Hawaii: 319 yards, four touchdowns
  • Southern Miss: 428 yards, four touchdowns,
  • Wake Forest: 243 yards, four touchdowns,
  • UTSA: 43 yards, zero touchdowns

One of those things is not like the others. The impressive showing against UTSA, which included season-best results in both metrics, is a clear sign that something is working for the back end of this defense.

The composition of the unit has changed. Brandon Douglas-Doctson has fought through injuries, Justin Bickham is coming off the heels of a breakout game and freshman Prudy Calderon has been inserted into the starting lineup. With no Houston or Hawaii looming, this unit stands a great chance to be closer to their UTSA showing than their regrettable road result against Southern Miss

The Bad – Pressure on the quarterback remains an issue

Entering their Week 7 game against UAB Rice has tallied eight sacks. That’s the third worst total in Conference USA, particularly when you take into account the fact that the Owls have played six games so far. The majority of the conference has played five games or fewer.

The lack of a pass rush has left the secondary out to dry on multiple occasions. It’s forced defensive coordinator Brian Smith to send more help than he’d like and left this unit vulnerable. The front four was thought to be one of the strengths of this team entering the season. To this point, they’ve only shown flashes of what they’re capable of becoming.

Biggest question – When will the turnovers start?

Four Conference USA teams have registered fewer than seven takeaways in the 2018 season: Old Dominion, Charlotte, Rice and UTEP. Those four schools have a combined record of 4-18. Turnovers matter and this defense hasn’t been able to generate enough takeaways so far.

That’s not to say they haven’t had their opportunities. They’ve knocked balls out and had passes deflect off waiting hands. The moments have been there. This defense has yet to seize them. UTSA’s points came as a result of takeaways and ultimately were the deciding factor in the loss. The Rice defense needs to reciprocate with some of their own.

Special teams

The Good – Jack Fox

Not enough good words can be said about Jack Fox. The good-natured former high school quarterback turned punter has been one of the most consistent members of this team. He’s shown up in every game, made the routine play and made a few incredible plays of his own. Whether it’s converting a fourth down on a gadget play or trapping a punt inside the 10, Fox has done it.

Without Fox, the Owls might be winless. They certainly wouldn’t have found as many opportunities in their close games as they did. He was named to the Ray Guy Award watch list earlier this year and to Ray’s Eight following the UTSA game. He’s one of the best kickers in the nation and Rice is lucky to have him.

The Bad – Rice special teams aren’t leading the nation in every statistical category

The job that Pete Lembo has done at South Main cannot be understated. He took a unit that was subpar a year ago and turned it into the national standard for excellence. Their only real detriment? Punt returns, and that’s being nitpicky.

The real reason for the Owls somewhat pedestrian 5.0 yards per return is their limited sample size. They’ve only fielded four returnable punts this season. Austin Trammell is electric with the ball in his hands, but he’s not been afforded many chances to break a long run.

Biggest question – Will the Owls run one back?

Jeremy Eddington, who took a kickoff 97-yards to the endzone against UTEP in 2012, is the last Rice football player to register a kick return touchdown. Both Walter and Trammell rank in the top 11 in the nation in yards per kickoff return. It’s almost unheard of for them to be stopped short, but they haven’t taken one all the way back for six, yet.

With the offense in a funk, the Owls could use points any way they can find them. A special teams score would be huge for this squad down the stretch. Given the caliber of athletes the Owls have fielding the ball it’s absolutely within the realm of possibility.

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Jerry Mack stresses simplicity the key for the offense against UAB

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The Rice football offense has some growing up to do. After a strong start to the season, it’s back to square one against AUB in Week 7.

It’s time to move on. That’s how offensive coordinator Jerry Mack described the mindset of this team following the Owls’ frustrating offensive performance against UTSA last weekend. They sustained one scoring drive, ending in a Haden Tobola field goal. No touchdowns. No explosive runs. They registered one play of 20 or more yards.

There wasn’t any semblance of momentum on that side of the ball against the Roadrunners. Something that head coach Mike Bloomgren promised to address during the week. He vowed to figure out what this offense was going to be able to do well and lean on its strengths.

The biggest change to the gameplan against UAB won’t be new plays or schemes. There won’t be any sort of personnel overhaul or new identity established. It’s going to be all about getting back to the basics. It’s cliche, but making things as straightforward as possible is something this team needs right now.

Mack said the goal of the coaching staff this week was to “simplify some things and compartmentalize some things a little bit better.” He asserted the issues unearthed against UTSA were “a lot of it was just base fundamental stuff that we screwed up on”, things like “a guy not taking the right step or a guy not communicating the way he’s supposed to.”

In a word, the direction for the offense this week is minimization. Communication up front with the offensive line remains an issue, and if the Owls can’t translate basic things like that from the practice field to Saturdays they’ll continue to find themselves in problematic situations.

There’s no rocket science being applied to the offense on South Main this week. As Macks says, they’re simply working on “taking the right steps.” It’s the same process, but hopefully one that produces different results on Saturday.

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