Monday, October 3, 2011

Offense Shines As Defense And Special Teams Collapse in Loss

For the first time in this season the UConn offense did it's job, limiting turnovers and creating points off long drives.

For the first time all season the UConn defense failed to do it's job, giving up big plays at the most inconvenient times allowing Western Michigan to claw back after the Huskies gained their first lead of the game. It can't all be blamed on the defense though considering Blidi Wreh-Wilson missed the game with injury and all of the offensive yards gained by the Broncos came through the air. The defensive backfield for UConn was already without depth and WMU took advantage to the tune of 479 yards and 5 touchdowns. On top of these struggles the special teams failed to deliver the performances Husky fans have come to expect, Dave Teggart missed another field goal to go to 6/10 on the year and just 2/6 from 40+ yards. Teggart was automatic last year and has fallen from the savior of the season to one of the many reasons they have a losing record. Punting and the kick offs weren't much better as the punter struggled to get anything over 40 yards and late in the game with the score tied after a beautiful pass from McEntee the kicker kicked the ball out of bounds receiving an illegal procedure penalty pushing the starting field position for the Broncos to the 45 before two plays later they went up for good.

Lyle McCombs came back strong from his game against Buffalo with 136 yards and Johnny McEntee threw for 300 and 4 touchdowns in what can only be described as the best game of his career. This game really defined what the offense can do, the problem is that it came at the same time as the defense let down and resulted in another loss for a UConn team that with a couple different breaks could be the 5-0 I predicted and instead they are 2-3 with a significant chance of failing to become bowl eligible. With a trip this weekend to Morgantown to play West Virginia there is a good chance that this team will fall to 2-4, and there aren't any winnable games left on the schedule if all the pieces don't come together in one game. My prediction of a season record of 9-3 is all but impossible at this point and it's hard to see how this team can pull off 4 more wins given the continuous problems they seem to create for themselves.

Check back later this week for my prediction for this weekend's game.

No comments:

Post a Comment