Breaking down the Breakdown - Quarter 2.

We start the second quarter. I'm thinking "ok, maybe that first quarter was just rust." It was very ugly, with missed assignments and poor blocking...maybe this will be better. We start the quarter on our 46, with a second and ten. Shotgun. Great blocking. Murray hits Orson on a fifteen yard route, and he picks up 19 total. Perfectly run corner route. 1st and ten, their 35. Shotgun. Malcom Mitchel comes in motion, we fake it. We have six guys in protection. Initially, they bring four...then a LB comes on a delayed blitz. The problem? Bean turns inside when his DE rushes into the Guard. This allows the LB to come through untouched. Murray makes him miss, and breaks a tackle...but the defense converges on him for no gain. 2nd and 10. Sweep left with Crowell, 8 yard gain. Samuel comes in on third and 2. Play looks like it was supposed to be a shotgun-trap or a shotgun-counter play. I say supposed to be because it got completely blown up. Glenn pulled into the hole, which means Gates HAS to block the man on Glenn. The DE immediately crosses Gates's face, getting into the A-gap. Cordy Glenn's pad-level on his pull is awful, and he gets stuffed by a linebacker. This plugs the hole, and Samuel gets only one yard. Then comes the 4th and 1. I applaud Richt for having the WILL to go for it. That showed me that he's out to win more than just put 3 points up. And the execution was pretty dadgum great, with one small exception. NOBODY TOUCHED THE PLAYSIDE OLB! There is no way on God's Green Earth that the OLB isn't blocked in the play design. Either Charles was supposed to chip him, or Anderson was, or Ogletree was supposed to take the first thing that showed. I have no idea. It was an obvious missed-assignment and it resulted in the killing of our best drive of the game.

The D punches Boise off the field in 3 plays. To this point, the D has been playing pretty damn solid.

Malcolm Mitchell is back to return the punt, and nearly muffs it away.

1st and ten - We decide to move the pocket with a shotgun rollout. Zero pressure. He throws one far too high for Tevarres King...but probably more concerning was that he even threw to King on that play. King was between three players, but there was an underneath receiver running free. 2nd and ten. Shotgun handoff to Samuel. (At this point, Holly Rowe is interviewing Herschel in a split-screen and I may be the only Georgia fan who will say this, but I don't care anything about what Herschel has to say at this moment. I want the full screen devoted to the GAME ON THE FIELD) The play is blocked fairly well with the exception of nobody putting a hand on LB #36. I don't know the play design here, but from what I see, it looks as if the right side of the line was scoop-blocking, which is getting your face to the INSIDE of the player in front of you, cutting him off, and moving to the next level. #68 did not do this. Bean made the cut-off of the DE, which meant he was blocked. If 68 had run up into the second level, he would have blocked the LB, and Samuel might still be running tomorrow. Instead, He turned back and "aided" Bean, enabling the LB to make the stop. Gain of 5.

3rd and 5. My problem here is more with pre-snap than post snap. We line up in shotgun-trips right with the HB to the strong side. Then we send Mitchell in motion. Their corner slides inside our hash, looking to either be blitzing or faking the blitz. We need five yards. We have two receivers outside their closest defender, and no other DB within ten yards. I do not understand how Murray doesn't make a hot-route call there. There has to be some kind of check. The design of the play has one of the two receivers going deep, the other crossing to the middle of the field, with Mitchell coming back on the drag, and Samuel running a swing. All of this is long-developing. WTF?!?! Couple all of this with the fact that their Nose beats Ben Jones AND #68 with a simple spin move and the result is garbage. Murray avoids the initial pressure, then spins for no reason, and is tackled into the leg of Kenarious Gates...who misses the rest of the game with a high-ankle sprain. Awesome.

We punt.

Broncos run a slip-screen for 9. Boykin goes down with a cramp. 2nd and 1, We get no pressure and Moore throws a two-yard pass. Commings dives at the feet of the receiver, and they get about 20 more. 1st and ten, the D-line makes a good push, LBs stop Martin after a short gain. The running QB comes in and hands it off. 3rd and 7. We send heavy pressure, and Branden Smith intercepts a poorly thrown ball.

1st and 10. Shotgun handoff to Crowell. Play is blocked well (this is assuming our friend #68 was supposed to turn-in, and not block the LB), but Crowell can't make #36 miss. 2nd 5. Crowell runs to the left, makes one guy miss, but gets cleaned up. Gain of 2. 3rd and 3.

The interception.

Ok, on TV they kept talking about how this was the fault of Isaiah Crowell. For the rest of the night, they wouldn't shut up about Crowell being in pass-protection and about how he probably didn't know what he was doing because he was a freshman. This play is not the fault of Isaiah Crowell. There are other issues. #1. Orson Charles. The man lined up on Orson blitzes. We need three yards. There is no one in front of Orson save for the safety who is standing flat-footed 8-yards down the field. There HAS to be a hot read there. Orson has to know to stick a foot in the ground, make a sharp cut to the middle of the field, and pick up the first down. He HAS to know that. Murray's first read was in that direction. But, he can't throw to a guy who isn't on that page. Orson instead continues his route all the way to the safety before making a cut. At this point, Murray has moved on. Problem #2 - He makes the throw toward Mitchell. Now, Mitchell never had good position on #4 (remember him?). So, I have to wonder why the ball was thrown. Here, we could come back to Crowell's block. Murray was rushed a bit to make a decision. However, he has shown escapability in the past. He didn't try to avoid the rush. This makes me think he wasn't extending the play, but instead was trying to throw the ball away. I could be wrong. It could very well be that he thought he could somehow connect on that pass, even though Mitchell was never in a spot to make a play on the ball. No, I think Murray was trying to throw it away, but didn't get enough into the pass. Maybe I'm just being kind.

1st and ten, we blow up their running play. 2nd and 11. Christian Robinson makes a bad jab at their TE trying to jam him. As a result, the TE comes open and picks up a first down on an easy completion. 1st and 10 - they can't move our line. Martin picks his way to 3 yards. 2nd and 7 - Jordan Love gets beat on a slant in man coverage. First down and 10. The running QB comes back in. Rueben Faloughi gets sucked in by the fake handoff. QB bounces it outside for gain of 12. 1st and ten at 11. They try the direct-snap to Martin. Loss of 1.

2nd and 11 at the 12. Touchdown on a short pass-and-run. This one is either on Boykin or Jarvis Jones. We drop into zone coverage, and nobody steps into the short zone on the hash. It looks like that should have been Jones' responsibility. Jones is watching Moore's eyes, and gets pulled too far to the center of the field. Boykin looks to be covering the wide side. In this case, Jones has to know that there is only one receiver on the far side of the field, and there are multiple guys there to cover him. However, Boykin also bailed deep with the receiver in front of him, though there were two safeties there to take care of him. Either Jones or Boykin busted on this one, and that can't happen against a QB like Moore.

Kickoff - Boykin gets the ball to the 15. Jeez.

1st and 10 - shotgun - 4 wide. Screen pass to Samuel. Tevarres doesn't make much of a block downfield, and #68 is too slow in getting out on the Screen. Play gets blown up. 2yard gain.

Sweep to Crowell to close the quarter. We're down 14-7, and playing sloppy.

As they go into the half, the commentator says the Defensive line is getting whooped by the Boise State Broncos. This is a fallacy. The D-Line has been very strong for the majority of the day. We haven't sent much pressure, most likely because we're afraid Moore is gonna slice us up. When we have sent pressure, it has paid off. My thought going into the half - dial up the pressure in the second half. Overall, I'm not excited - but I've seen enough to know that we can play with these guys (Jesus, I can't believe that's my thought at this point).

I'm watching this game for the second time, and since I know the ending, I'm not as emotionally pained by what I see. My mind has switched to pure diagnosis - and the things I'm seeing are fixable by week two. I don't know why they weren't there in week 1...but they can be corrected.