So, I just watched the game…in St. Louis, and I have to say two things. Either the Illini are going to have to step it up, or we are looking at another disappointing season. Secondly, Mizzou fans suck, not as much as packers fans, but they suck none-the-less.
About the Illini, I have never seen a team that just breaks down at a fundamental level like that. They don’t wrap up when they tackle, they just lower their heads and hope the guy falls down, the linebackers don’t move against the motion of the O-line, they just flow right into the blockers and away from the run. A rule in football is that the linebackers should not get sucked in with the motion of the line, because the runner is going to go through the hole that is at the offensive lines back, so if the whole line is moving to the right the runner is going to go to the left off the back of the outside tackle, but low-and-behold, there is no illini linebacker because they got sucked right into the blockers. I must also say that I believe Carry Davis is the worst fullback ever. He is completely inconsistent, he doesn’t hit the hole hard on blocks or on a run, he can’t cut upfield when he is moving laterally after a catch, and he frequently cannot catch the ball when it is thrown right to him. Do I see something that the coaches and people on the TV are missing, or am I missing something, because they talk about him like he is awesome, but I seem to recall J. Cook, the former fullback for the illini, being far superior to Davis. The new guy J. Davis, that saw some time looked much more impressive. He was more mobile and caught what was thrown at him, and he hit the hole much harder. I think the Illini would do a lot of good to get back to basics, Hitting, Wrapping, and Following through on tackles. Catching, turning upfield and running, and recognizing where your blockers are….all fundamentals, all areas the Illini are lacking in.
On the upside, Beutjer looked pretty good, very accurate, not a lot of mistakes. He threw a couple passes off his back foot, and led the DB’s a couple of time with his head far too long. But seeing that we were up against a not very talented D, which was getting away with a lot of passing interference (not a single interference call was made the whole game), he managed to get away with some stuff, where when we see Michigan and Ohio they are going to pick those passes off, but most of the stuff looked good. He knew the offense, and looked confident. That was refreshing to see with last years constant switch of quarterbacks.
Anyway, that is all I have to say about the game and all, now I will eat good food at my friend Jason Tice’s, so I will write again when I have something else to say.
-Ben
jeff says
wait a minute…
THE Jason Tice?!
The, lived on Snyder fourth floor in 1995/96 and was external vp of snyder hall his freshman year jason tice?
the roommate of my long lost friend tom the greek guy jason tice?
ben, if you really know that jason tice, i’m gonna freak out. jason, if you are reading this, do you remember me? your across the hall neighbor from freshman year? slacker guy?/ patrick gaddis’ roommate?
this is really weird…
rocky
Ben says
Well, Tice just crashed out to go to sleep, but seeing as how I know his freshmen year he lived in snyder, and after that he spent the next four years as an RA on Townsend 5 North, the substance free floor in ISR, and was my RA his super senior year on that floor, I would guess that it is the one and only, the infamous Jason Tice. I’ll ask him tomorrow when I wake up to see if he remembers you, and post something about it perhaps.
Ben says
So, yeah Jason remembers you, and wants to know if you remember when some people took Jasons roomate out and got him drunk on his birthday, and when they came back they covered the guy in tuna fish. He was laughing when he said this, but it sounds gross to me.
leque says
So yeah, I know Jason as well. He became the VP at Snyder because I stepped down as president and my Internal VP became president and the External VP became Internal VP so we “hired” Jason.
He probably doesn’t remember me…or perhaps vaguely. But he should remember my dear friend Yahara who was his president.
What the heck is he doing now anyway?
And tell him Jeff and I got married. That will probably wig him out.
Q
Dirk says
We told him that Jeff was married and had a daughter. It made him feel old.