Tennessee Postgame Discussion

[Cuse On 3]

UCONN looks great, they could bury us

Stick to horse racing

 

[Trueblue25]

my concern is OL, LB and Safety.

Our OL looked absolutely lost on pass blocking assignments.

LB was non existent. Stopping the run or creating pressure. Disappointed that Sparrow hasn’t earned a starting spot, he was so promising.

Safeties were awol on deep balls which id imagine is on ERob. If there’s going to be no safety deep inside over the middle, then why the hell do we play just two LB’s?

Samuels nearly recovered nicely on that deep ball but we had literally no one covering the inside pass.

 

[HRE Otto IV]

Agreed I had high hopes for Brown. We are going to have to hit the portal again and again for some depth back there.
We've not done great with it minus this year.
Might be the biggest piece missing not have a Wax, Franklin, etc running the defense.

IMO we need to change our portal strategy on D. I feel like on O we can get trickle down talent from the bigger programs. So it is a net positive. On D I think the opposite is true in regards to the bigger programs/talent. I think we need to pull up talent from G5s and even FCS.

I also don't think we can go for kids in the portal with ideal measurables. We either need to A. find good undersized CFB players who aren't NFL guys or B. find guys who can change position like we used to with HS kids. For the latter find big Ss who aren't good enough to be a P4 S but could easily be moved to LB. LBs who can move to DE. DEs who can move to DT. I don't think we can find enough plug in types in the portal on D. On O yes, but not D.

 

[Nick44]

my concern is OL, LB and Safety.

Our OL looked absolutely lost on pass blocking assignments.

LB was non existent. Stopping the run or creating pressure. Disappointed that Sparrow hasn’t earned a starting spot, he was so promising.

Safeties were awol on deep balls which id imagine is on ERob. If there’s going to be no safety deep inside over the middle, then why the hell do we play just two LB’s?

Samuels nearly recovered nicely on that deep ball but we had literally no one covering the inside pass.

Grant was in the wrong spot on that deep ball. I think it was the defensive call that caused for it to happen. Heupel must’ve been laughing his jelly rolls off when he saw a freshman DB sitting on an island all alone.

 

[Trueblue25]

Grant was in the wrong spot on that deep ball. I think it was the defensive call that caused for it to happen. Heupel must’ve been laughing his jelly rolls off when he saw a freshman DB sitting on an island all alone.

That’d make sense. It was bewildering to say the least.

 

[AngryOtto]

People are complaining that we played Tenn and got exposed on D. I’d rather play a good team in week one and get exposed than a cupcake that tells us nothing. At least now we know areas we need to work on from week 1 to 2. This should help us when we play Clemson, ND, Miami etc. playing cupcakes the first few weeks teaches nothing. Now if the team is making the same mistakes at Clemson and not improved that is a different story.

 

[PhatOrange]

my concern is OL, LB and Safety.

Our OL looked absolutely lost on pass blocking assignments.

LB was non existent. Stopping the run or creating pressure. Disappointed that Sparrow hasn’t earned a starting spot, he was so promising.

Safeties were awol on deep balls which id imagine is on ERob. If there’s going to be no safety deep inside over the middle, then why the hell do we play just two LB’s?

Samuels nearly recovered nicely on that deep ball but we had literally no one covering the inside pass.

Wonder if it’s because in practice our OLine just blocks defensive linemen rushing straight ahead, then they get to Tennessee who’s throwing stunts and blitzing gaps. Did Tennessee ever rush straight ahead ever yesterday?

 

[richmondcuse03]

People are complaining that we played Tenn and got exposed on D. I’d rather play a good team in week one and get exposed than a cupcake that tells us nothing. At least now we know areas we need to work on from week 1 to 2. This should help us when we play Clemson, ND, Miami etc. playing cupcakes the first few weeks teaches nothing. Now if the team is making the same mistakes at Clemson and not improved that is a different story.

Very very true. You only find out so much in camp practicing against yourself. It's why I love the idea of a spring game against an opposing team or even joint practices in the summer like the NFL.

We find out a LOT about the team next week and then again against Clemson. We hopefully will take big steps forward. We have a lot of film now on what we need to fix. With a young team, that's either a really good thing we leverage or ya know...the opposite.

 

[FrancoPizza]

my concern is OL

Our OL looked absolutely lost on pass blocking assignments.

You do realize our OL practices against an ERob defense right? They probably thought the stunts were illegal.

 

[RedtheGOB]

Exactly, we lost the UT game in the 1st quarter by some costly mistakes. Look at the scores per quarter;
1st: 0-17 (down 17 points)
2nd: 14-14
3rd: 6-7 (should have kicked the PAT)
4th: 6-7 (see above).

We were down 12 (should have been 10) points with 12 minutes to go.

I said before the game, which team could jell the fastest, limit mistakes, and turnovers would win the game. We lost on all of those.

Defense concerns me much more than Offense right now.

Oh and some of the UT fans were pretty obnoxious. The number of UT fans behind us talking about how they wanted to push us in front of the subway train before and after the game was crazy. They have some mental health issues.

Take a look at the last 2 mins of the 1st half and the 1st 3 mins of the 2nd half. it's even more disastrous. That was our bread and butter last year, need to be better in the those windows. It's shocking the team hung around.

 

[Acesn8s]

A. We have no clue how good that Tennessee defense is, one game is a tough sample size, if it turns out to be one of the top 2 or 3 defenses in SEC then we have to be thrilled, our OLine wasn’t great, but when they gave Steve any time he usually delivered. Willis is a monster, he maybe our next great back, our WR group did about as well as could be expected. This years schedule is brutal but IF this just turns out to be Tennessee is that good and basically had a home game, 2026 could be a sky’s the limit offense with all the talent we COULD have back,

B. Our defense is dumpster juice, and other than retention of current offensive players, we should spend every extra penny on defense in the transfer portal. I understand it’s next an exact science because rumor is Alabama has a 10 million dollar defense and they got absolutely bullied yesterday, but missed tackles is infuriating. Let’s hope Tennessee is a playoff team and we played a mistake filled game and still didn’t get run over.

I think we will know a lot more by end of next week, UConn isn’t going to be a pushover.

 

[Lukeyloo]

After getting some time this morning to watch the game after only seeing snippets while traveling yesterday I cannot understand how some people are taking issue with Angeli/the offense.

This offense moved the ball well and scored 4 touchdowns on a likely top defense. That should give you a good chance to win most games. Yes, there were turnovers that either handed Tenn points or put the defense in a bad position, but I believe those will be able to be cleaned up.

The issue here solely lies with the defense. We don’t do anything particularly well. We don’t have a pash rush, we don’t have lockdown DBs, and don’t do any scheming to make up for, or cover up, our deficiencies. We allowed a team to put up 45 on us. That’s beyond unacceptable.

This offense could be good enough to get us 8 wins this year, but the defense could be bad enough to lose us 8 games this year.

 

[DoctahLexus]

Angeli was good except for the two disastrous turnovers.

Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you enjoy the play?

No defending the fumble, but an INT where the throw initially gets tipped up in the air close to the line of scrimmage is not as concerning as some are. It’s not like he threw it right to a guy in their secondary. There was some bad luck on that play. The main issue was a guy getting to him so quickly with zero blocking (which happened several times).

 

[RedtheGOB]

People are complaining that we played Tenn and got exposed on D. I’d rather play a good team in week one and get exposed than a cupcake that tells us nothing. At least now we know areas we need to work on from week 1 to 2. This should help us when we play Clemson, ND, Miami etc. playing cupcakes the first few weeks teaches nothing. Now if the team is making the same mistakes at Clemson and not improved that is a different story.

For real, Same here. I could give a crap about going 5 or 6-0 through Sept like in those Dino years before looking like fools the rest of the year. People pretending like we should play Wagner or Holy Cross in the opener like this will do anything.

 

[JoeSU]

I'm not sure which conference the officiating crew was from, but overall, I thought they did a fair & balanced job. For the record, SU was flagged 4 times for 30 yds, while Tenn. was 7/65.

Just a couple of general observations:

Unlike many games last season, it was good to see Syracuse manage to avoid shooting itself in the foot with a myriad of unforced penalties and dumb personal foul-type infractions. This is particularly noteworthy, considering we had so many new players on the field together for the first time.

The one exception that sticks in my craw was the illegal procedure call on our first drive, which was a real momentum swing. After the SU D stiffened and held the Vols to a FG on their opening possession, our offense was driving, and the illegal procedure penalty killed a first down completion well into Tenn. territory. The refs claimed we had 2 men moving, but other than one of the WRs shuffling his feet while standing in place, both players who had been in motion seemed set for 1-2 secs. Maybe this is the correct call, but the drive stalled, and instead of being 7-7 or 7-3, we soon found ourselves down 14-0.

The announcers made a bid deal when Samuel went down, calling it a "suspicious" injury stoppage. There were numerous similar situations the rest of the game (perhaps cramps playing indoors?), but the announcers never questioned the Vol players who went down under similar circumstances.

 

[PAcuse]

IMO we need to change our portal strategy on D. I feel like on O we can get trickle down talent from the bigger programs. So it is a net positive. On D I think the opposite is true in regards to the bigger programs/talent. I think we need to pull up talent from G5s and even FCS.

I also don't think we can go for kids in the portal with ideal measurables. We either need to A. find good undersized CFB players who aren't NFL guys or B. find guys who can change position like we used to with HS kids. For the latter find big Ss who aren't good enough to be a P4 S but could easily be moved to LB. LBs who can move to DE. DEs who can move to DT. I don't think we can find enough plug in types in the portal on D. On O yes, but not D.

You are seeing that with LB Bryant. LB Heard we got from WVU and has not made much of an impact.
I think CB/S we can pull from bigger schools, I agree with getting some edge rushes and LBs from G5s and FCS as they can be upgrades quickly.

 

[ECE '76]

thought stonehouse kicked well. jackson ross and his unique rugby style was equally effective.

I am super annoyed that SU never pressured their punter. He had all the time he wanted waiting there with the ball for UT's coverage to get down field before he punted it! It got really ridiculous when it was apparent about the only way SU could get back into the game would be a punt block to set SU up for a much needed short field to a TD.

There was no reason to not sell out and go for punt blocks since our returner was just fair catching everything anyway.

 

[wfschrec]

You are seeing that with LB Bryant. LB Heard we got from WVU and has not made much of an impact.
I think CB/S we can pull from bigger schools, I agree with getting some edge rushes and LBs from G5s and FCS as they can be upgrades quickly.

We also grabbed Thomas from Marshall, Grant from Buffalo as well

 

[tbonezone]

I am super annoyed that SU never pressured their punter. He had all the time he wanted waiting there with the ball for UT's coverage to get down field before he punted it! It got really ridiculous when it was apparent about the only way SU could get back into the game would be a punt block to set SU up for a much needed short field to a TD.

There was no reason to not sell out and go for punt blocks since our returner was just fair catching everything anyway.

dude tumbled 3 of his 4 punts inside the 20. zero return yardage. his unorthodox deliver also froze many defenders cuz he held it long enuf to make you think pass/run. he was very effective. kudos.

 

[ECE '76]

The one thing about Angeli that concerns me is his running ability. For some reason I had it in my head that he was maybe halfway between Garrett and McCord (aka serviceable, like a Nassib) in that regard but he appears to be much closer to Kyle on that spectrum.

I think between the Penn State game and yesterday, he ran more than McCord or Nassib ever did. I actually don't want to see him end up unable to play like what happened with Shrader.

 

[ECE '76]

Man I miss Tony White.

Seeing FSU defense tee off on Bama makes me sad.

Remember, he didn't want to be the DC at Syracuse long term.

 

[GoSU96]

A. We have no clue how good that Tennessee defense is, one game is a tough sample size, if it turns out to be one of the top 2 or 3 defenses in SEC then we have to be thrilled, our OLine wasn’t great, but when they gave Steve any time he usually delivered. Willis is a monster, he maybe our next great back, our WR group did about as well as could be expected. This years schedule is brutal but IF this just turns out to be Tennessee is that good and basically had a home game, 2026 could be a sky’s the limit offense with all the talent we COULD have back,

B. Our defense is dumpster juice, and other than retention of current offensive players, we should spend every extra penny on defense in the transfer portal. I understand it’s next an exact science because rumor is Alabama has a 10 million dollar defense and they got absolutely bullied yesterday, but missed tackles is infuriating. Let’s hope Tennessee is a playoff team and we played a mistake filled game and still didn’t get run over.

I think we will know a lot more by end of next week, UConn isn’t going to be a pushover.

I’ve been saying for months, Survive in 25. Compete and develop.

It’s game one. You had a 17yr old out at corner and started a true freshman LB against Tennessee.

It will get better.

 

[ECE '76]

Looking back, I'm still struggling to come to terms with how bad of a performance this was defensively. Right now its looking like out of all Power 5 teams this week, we are going to have the most points given up by a wide margin ( even if we don't count the fumble return). Just completely unacceptable especially after a full off-season to prepare

Remember, there were 2 defensive scores by UT. That's 14 points not on SU's defense, ie, 31 points given up.

 

[ECE '76]

Rewatching some of the clips of the game McDonald did not have a good game at all.
Need to find some kind of blitz package and not this bend and break defense we are playing.
Offense looked pretty good for playing a top 5-10 defense.
Some good things out of the game and some things to really clean up or even change completely.

I heard somewhere that McDonald is playing through an injury.

 

[ECE '76]

Also, the entire fourth quarter, we weren't tackling. We were--intentionally--trying to go for the ball. It's clear as day the last two TN drives.

Interesting point. It seemed like Samuel could have tackled the WR before the goal line on that long TD, but instead he tried to rip at the ball.