Yes, he's not a great playcaller and the QB sweeps were stupid today.
However, I'm seeing lots of "fire Cornelsen" posts online, which I find silly. These were, in my opinion, the biggest mistakes today:
1. Not calling timeout at the right moment on the last drive. We should have called timeout after they converted the 4th and short to (a) get a review for the apparent fumble and (b) set the defense. The clock already stopped temporarily for the first down and the refs were delaying the snap for some reason, so calling timeout would not have given Kentucky more than an extra second or two. Instead we were out of sorts and allowed a big play for another first down. Then we called timeout.
2. Not going for it on 4th and short and settling for a field goal. I'd like to see some aggression. Even if we didn't convert, they would have had bad field position and a touchdown would still beat us either way.
3. Not trying to score with a minute left in the first half and saving 2 timeouts for some reason. We blew 30 seconds on a McClease run. If we had just called timeout, we might have been able to get a huge field goal.
4. Poor execution on a couple big plays. (namely the drop by Turner and bad throw that Hazelton couldn't haul in).
The first 3 are on Fuente and the last one is just execution. I find it odd that so many people have said "fire Cornelsen," when Fuente's mistakes killed us again.
Comments
We had 3 times to Ice the game and couldn't. Fuente did make some bad calls
But he's the HMFIC. Everything in this program is ultimately his responsibility.
Not being able to put teams away when the opportunity was there, has been a trademark of this team the last couple years
Any upvote anymore so I will use !!!!!!!!!!!
That's been the trademark of VT for decades
I 100% agree with this. Cornelsen has had some poor games, but head coaching mistakes and players not executing at critical points down the stretch lost us this game.
Corn is the QB coach who thought with what we had this year Willis was the guy ... For 4 weeks! He hasn't done anything to prove he can move our program forward. Explain how you get a month to plan against a team and you look as slow as early in the season?
The player that looked the slowest was the one you are mad about not starting the year
Had a knee tweak 2 days ago so I can see where he had his issues.
Preseason injury too
Ultimately, that falls on our coach. Go on...
Disagree with first 3 points. We didn't play smart. Dropped balls and a couple of poor throws. Missed opportunities throughout game.
Opposing coaches making good calls or opposing team making plays can't be controlled either. Plenty of missed tackles, dropped balls and other mistakes. Shouldn't expect coaches to be perfect either. With 11 guys on each side and referees all on the field every play is subject to analysis and second guessing.
Only team to put up 30 on UK. Offense made some mistakes, sure but it should have been enough against a high school offense.
This...I'm no guru but why not stack 10 in the box and make Bowden beat us with his arm? Again, no guru but if he has to throw 20 times I just can't see us losing today
I mean... are you suggesting we should have left one WR completely uncovered? Because I don't think that would be a winning strategy at all.
They made the winning score that way.
That's not true. They ran a 3 WR set and we had 7 in the box with Deablo 7 yards off the LOS. UK sent out the TE and each WR was left in 1 on 1 coverage. Chatman let his guy beat him to the inside. Pitch and catch- game over.
My point is that Chatman's guy wasn't covered adequately, and they were able to score on it.
I'm agreeing with you that it wasn't a winning strategy.
When you throw 6 times a game, an ugly floating skinny post to win the game is like a trick play-they happen. Oh well. Get in the weight room and get better I guess.
Wasn't a trick play. We had to have expected it, just didn't know when.
He sorta did beat us with his arm.....
Not at all. He beat us by converting 3rd and 4th down after down by running simple delays and QB powers. Just like GT 2018. We could do nothing to stop them. If the field was 300 yards long, Kentucky would have scored on their last possession. 8 yards a rush = a lot of first downs. If we held him to just 6 ypc- which still sucks- we would have won because he- like Tobias Oliver- sucks at passing. But that doesn't matter when you get mauled at will in the running game.
I think he was making a punch joke.
I see what you did there...
I don't have tremendous issue with the game Cornelson called today, but he didn't really have his players ready to go. Hooker didn't throw the ball particularly well, and the WR drops really killed us. We weren't particularly aggressive pushing the ball downfield, and really only challenge their corners 1 on 1 for the early TD to Hazleton. We've got tremendously talented receivers, we need to be giving them 1 on 1 matchups as much as we can. Given the talent of our skill players, we should be doing better as an offense.
I agree that the blame needs to lie with Fuente on this one. Still, Cornelson was inconsistent throughout the season. Our offense was a major liability in all of our losses this year. The defense certainly deserves its share of the blame, but changes are happening on that side of the ball.
The team only punted twice and ended the first half after Hooker took a sack he shouldn't.
This loss is on dropped passes and not being able to get off the field on D due to poor tackling
Also poor pass protection at critical moments cost us against both UK and the hoos.
Did the OP pay any attention to which blocking schemes worked best at all?
Thank goodness the defense had nothing to do with the loss. I love bud but the blame cornelson for every error that VT makes is getting old and as the post states is just a scapegoat. We put up the most points that have been put up on them but people want Corn fired. Defense didn't have anything to do with it? Same with UVA, if I told you we put up 30 pts and 500 yds would you think we would have lost? But was that game on corn or bud?
On TKP Bud always gets a pass. Always. We'll find another reason we lost the game but it damn sure wasn't the defenses fault.
Why does it have to be Corn OR Bud? Why can't it be Corn AND Bud? I won't post my X and O analysis on Corn's bone-head calls again since I've just made a ton of posts about it but he does not get the most out of his talent.
It can be Corn and Bud, but today it was more Bud than Corn. It seems unlikely but that's what happened.
How many 4* players are on offense? How many are on defense? Statistically, which group plays better?
All that matters is that the D didn't get it done and for the most part the O did. There are reasons for that (the stars you mentioned and bad recruiting etc...) but that's just all about figuring out how to get better.
I think it's the following according to the 247 composite:
Offense - Hooker, Turner, Nester, Hudson
Defense - Hollifield, Garbutt, Conner
If it was like 8 to 2 in favor of the offense I'd be on board, but 4-3 seems essentially meaningless to me.
It can. And i'm not trying to say that Corn calls perfect games and doesn't make errors. But people make it seem like he calls horrible games and the offense can't put up any points when that's clearly not the case.
People have pointed out that we scored a season high points on Kentucky. But I haven't seen anything about WHO did what to them. For reference, Kentucky played two top 10 teams, Florida and Georgia. Florida put up 29 on them, the high until us. The other team, Georgia, is ranked number freaking 5 in the country and only put up 21 on them. Georgia won because their defense held them to zero points. The trick is to score MORE points than your opponent. Our offense, having scored more than anybody else they played, including two top 10 teams, I would very much argue, did their part. One guy gutted us for 306 yards. And 233 (75%) of those yards were on the ground. Two words: mobile quarterback. With an assist by the other two words: bad officiating. Because even if you call a play dead, but then discover that the guy who you thought had the ball, didn't, you should check to see when he lost the ball.
Arkansas, ranked 110 or 124 in defense this year, depending on the source, gave up 274 yards to Bowden, but held Kentucky to 24 points. Tech is ranked 41 or 46 in defense, depending on the source, should have done better. Lots better. But again, mobile quarterback. I love Bud, but maybe this is why they want to rebuild the D-line.
And if people don't like conservative play calling, maybe it's more conservative than it otherwise would be until we have a QB that has started more than a season and doesn't turn the ball over and make mistakes - in other words, maybe the playcalling gets more aggressive the more trust the coaches have in the QB. Oh, and we scored 30 on them.
I keep seeing this points scored stat thrown around and it's so misleading to say this game was an offensive success because of it. Florida played Kentucky with Franks for 3 quarters (and then proceeded to score 3 TDS when Trask came in), and the Georgia game was played in a monsoon. That's why their point totals were so low. Now today was Cornelson decent? Sure he was. But one decent bowl game performance doesn't make up for the years of questionable play calling
Georgia held Kentucky scoreless. Florida held them scoreless in the first and forth quarters. The Kentucky scores were low in those games because those teams have excellent run defenses.
In our game, you could see plays that would have worked if a receiver had caught a catchable ball, or if Hooker had thrown one to someone who was open.
Honestly I blame our WR's ...at least 6 drops I counted, and as I've mentioned in other posts the drops by Turner and Hazelton were big time keys. The play calls in those circumstances were good enough for us to win.
As soon as the game was over, my first words were I can't wait to see how the message boards blame this on Cornelson.
Not His Fucking Fault. Multiple players not named McClease let the team down today
Yup, had the same thought. Now, did I agree with *every* play he called? No - I think that those pure QB runs to the outside were never going to work, and they got stopped literally every time for a loss. That being said (and I hate to bring up this word), a lot of this comes down to execution errors. A sure TD pass gets underthrown, a few first downs get dropped, all of that piles up. Cornelson actually called a pretty decent game overall imo.
Game management was more disappointing in places, especially not pushing it at the end of the half and just letting 30+ seconds go while we walked off...would've been nice to have the possible field goal/TD that could've resulted if we played that same hurry-up attack that got us the first TD of the game. Gotta think that the call on that comes down to Fuente.
I would argue that the reason we lost is because we didn't put the hammer down in key moments, namely our last drive of the first half and the drive after the interception. We've got to come away with at least one first down there, if not points. We knew Bowden was in the middle of a huge game, and we should have been terrified to give him the ball back with 4:00ish minutes to run around. Do we blame Fuente or Cornelsen for that? I have no idea, but they need to take a long look at their play calling in those high impact situations. We blew leads against UVA as well...
But the play call on the 3rd and 4 on that exact drive was perfect. It was a simple pitch and catch and Hooker/Hazleton didn't execute. I know people hate for anything to be blamed on execution but that's the undeniable truth on that play.
McClease was a beast today.
I get physically ill every time we run a quarterback sweep with Hooker. That's not his game. Corn regularly has a few questionable playcalls every game that kill drives. When you are average or slightly above average, those plays make the difference between winning and losing. The sweep on 2nd and 8 lost four yards. On 3rd and 12, we gain nine. If we simply run a playcall we know will work, we get the first and maybe keep the drive alive.
I'm not sure who is responsible for the conservative playcalling when we take the lead. I would like to think that's Fuente because game management falls on the head coach. When you have a team on the ropes, you step on their throats. I don't know if it's a talent issue, Fuente's philosophy, or a mix of both, but I have only seen him do that twice against noteworthy opponents that I can remember in his tenure: once against Boston College in 2016 and again in 2017 against UNC. Today, we get the ball back at 17-7, three out and out. We go up 24-7 on those guys with their offensive gameplan? It's game.
His game management in several other situations were questionable as well. For example, the clock management at the end of the half. I'm sure everyone is well aware of what happened there, so I'm not going to go into detail. However, there was another instance of game management in the second half that really pissed me off. We have 2nd and 3 in Kentucky territory in the second half. I am a huge proponent of saving all of your timeouts in the second half for the end of the game if it's close. That way, if you need to stop the clock, you can on three straight downs. Well, Fuente uses a timeout here. It wasn't so much the calling of the timeout as much as it was what happened after it. Don't get me wrong; the use of the timeout in that situation was weird. We could have just run the ball or threw a high percentage pass and gotten a first down. Anyway, we lose four yards on some weird running play to McClease. Now it's 3rd and 7, and we have one less timeout.
I have a lot more I want to bitch about, but my hands are still cold, and honestly, someone else will say whatever else I want to say. I am just unimpressed with several aspects of game management from this coaching staff. With Fuente's experience, it's either something you have at this point or don't and never will have. The latter seems to be prevailing.
I agree. There is a lot to be desired with Fuente and his in-game coaching. However, a fire Fuente post would get everyone up in arms, dismissive, and sassy, so it is worth looking down the list at whom else is underachieving and has a significant impact on the success of the team, and Cornelsen is clearly that guy. He needs to go. If Fuente wants to hitch his wagon and career to corn, I'm warming up to him going too.
Also 'just execution' is something we've heard all 4 years so far. At some point, the team and program needs to execute.
How many dropped passes today? How many bad passes today?
Do we not have a QB coach? Are we out of line to expect better passes out of a QB who has been in the system for 3 years? Who's responsibility is that?
Apparently that falls on Fud Boster
No, the 233 yards given up to a WR running the ball falls on him.
331 total rushing yards today!
Edit... Wrong thread
I just have one question, what color is Fu-Corn Kool-aid?
It's a mix of maroon and orange colors.
Result is the color if a sh*tshow.
That QB power to the short side of the field that they ran a million times vs UVA and again today is going to haunt my dreams for a while.
Yeah, I'm sorry but watching this game the last thing I thought was that our playcalling was bad. I mean it wasn't ideal I'd like to see more downfield attacking but every time we tried, the pass seemed to be dropped. Turner and Hazelton could have iced the game with catches and they flat out dropped it. Playcalling isn't going to solve that.
My biggest issue today was another poor tackling effort by our defense. After all the shit our defense talked before the game youd think they could do better, but nope. 35 points allowed to a team that literally cannot throw the ball. So unbelievably poor on their part that the criticism stops there. Far far too many times they were caught out of position and unable to stop literally the only guy who was going to have the ball. It was just a bad performance today and very fitting to how we've performed against mobile QBs over the past decade.
I also felt like I saw a number of times where the defensive player took a poor path to the ball, not realizing how fast that offensive player was, and getting beat because of it.
I hate to rag on Floyd because he has been a good vocal leader on a team where youth was plentiful, but I am not too upset to see him go. He was good in 2017 when he was surrounded by a lot of talent but fell off a cliff in 2018 and didn't get much better this year. I am ready to see what Devon Hunter can do. He had some decent tackles in space today and is one of the better athletes on the team.
I saw Hunter out there on the last two drives and it didn't change things for the better.
He wasn't making any glaring errors though. Floyd has done that for a couple seasons now, and he missed an open field tackle on that long touchdown by Bowden.
Fair enough, and every D player on the field whiffed on that play. It was as if Bowden had the power to simply make any D player near him dive to the ground and hug air.
I was thinking the same thing but what makes me nervous is Hunter hasn't been able to overtake a player who hasn't played particularly well.
Tayvion Robinson didn't begin returning punts over Hezekiah Grimsley till the end of the season. Hendon Hooker didn't start at quarterback until the fifth game of the season. Alan Tisdale didn't begin taking more reps from Dax Hollifield until later in the year.
The coaching staff seems to be hesitant on shaking things up. If there isn't much of a drop off in talent, I somewhat understand because continuity is important. I don't think Hunter will be any worse than what Floyd has been at times though.
Good post. I think the 'scared coaching' crosses into player management at times.
This was by far the most disappointing thing to me today. We looked like a G-5 defense out there with our lack of physicality.
Agreed. However, I don't want to take away from that QB - he was a very good runner and he ran hard.
Agreed
Chamarri Conner. 3 crucial plays.
Agree completely. Our defensive strategy against run-strong teams, particularly running QBs, has to change. We've been getting eaten alive more than most teams with "average" defenses. We all loved Bud's defenses, but that was always his biggest weakness, and it became even more prominent as our talent on defense has dipped.
I never understood why against mobile QBs like Perkins and Bowden, our pass rush penetrates way deeper than the QB drop, leaving him a wide open lane to run once things break down. I did see towards the end of the game yesterday where we ran a "contain" pass rush, leaving Bowden little room to run. We should have employed that strategy a little earlier in the season, and we could have won the UVA game and yesterday's game.
It's a team sport. Both the D and O didn't play well enough today. The difference is there are changes being made on defense for next year but Fu will never touch his Cornboy unless there is a Synder/Allen type slow debacle. I love Fu but it is what it is.
The offensive coaching was good today. More points against Kentucky than any other team.
The only reason changes are being made on the Defense is because Foster decided to retire. If he wasn't retiring I doubt we'd see too much of a shake up on defense.
Agreed. The big boy calls were Fuente's.
Speaking of changes being made on the defense. Does anybody know what Hamilton brings to the defensive identity of this team. It's his defense now and I haven't seen an interview telling me this. Is our line going to be bigger? I know people are saying this, but has JH confirmed this? Our defense has to stop getting throttled by running Quarter backs. I am hoping we will get some answers to this as they announce all of the defensive staff hires.
You cannot put this on play calling. We put up 30 points. We rushed against a d-line that was suppose to smother us. Were there questionable calls, yes (mostly the QB keep to the short side) but that happens with any OC. We HAD to run the ball and it worked. Why? Because we had to keep our defense off the field. Some people aren't going to like this take, but our legendary DC just got taken to school by a WR. You want to pin this one someone pin it on not being able to stop a QB with legs. I hope to god the next regime that comes in doesn't curl up in a ball when we face a running QB.
I agree with this. A very sad but fitting final game for Bud. The greater part of this decade he has not been able to come up with the big stop and let mobile QBs run all over us.
But, Bud has carried VT for a long, long time. Fuente told Bud he wouldn't have to win all the games anymore when he got here, but that's exactly what we still expect him to do. This offense had multiple chances to ice the game when we knew Kentucky was gashing our D and couldn't effectively stop it. But we couldn't score when it mattered most. I'm glad we have changes coming on D, but the game management and offense still leave a ton to be desired. They can't carry this team through a massive defensive overhaul. We will need Hamilton to hit the ground running.
8-5 here we come again next season! The new VT norm more likely than not
Add to:
1) why didn't Fuente throw a fucking fit when Bowden taunted going into the EZ? That was textbook and should have been enforced.
1a) Why didn't Fuente or someone from the AD's office get Bowden in trouble for punching someone before the game. I don't care about that stupid rule about an hour before the game or if that's not in the officials domain. Someone should have been policing. (Stoops should have sat him for the game)
2) why didn't Fuente get in the refs face about the blatant holding by their WRs on their first drives?
Both of those things set the tone for the game and we just accepted that we would roll over and not put up a fight for poor officiating.
I wish Fuente said something passive-aggressive in the postgame like "if my player punched someone in the face, I would have held him out of the game because Virginia Tech is an upstanding institution with standards"
This sounds very UVAish......so no thanks
Fuente is soft. Period.
Well I'm not normally in the fire corny camp, but today got me warmed up to the idea.
Corny wasn't the reason we lost today.
new Years, eh?
itll get after you
The only person I trust to evaluate whether that is true is Jerry Kill. Hopefully he is listened to.
why? people treat Kill as if he's Lincoln Riley offensive genius or something.
He's definitely not Lincoln Riley which is exactly what we need. When he started I pretty rapidly saw improvement in calling plays that the OL can execute to their strengths. Does that answer your "why"
tbh, no. I don't know of any evidence that he was the sole factor in the offensive turnaround. My guess, he was involved in a collective effort with the other offensive coaches in the room (Fuente and Cornelesen primarily). It's also worth noting that the turnaround occurred with HH (or QP) as quarterback, which is probably the most influential factor in offensive turnaround. And I highly doubt Kill was the sole factor in making the decision to bench RW in favor of HH.
With that said, the timing of his hire and the offensive turnaround suggest that Kill's presence was a positive factor.
Eaxctly. Kill is not an offensive genius by any stretch. But what is sad is that nobody on the staff prior to his arrival- including our "offensive minded" Head Coach could break down why the running game sucked.
Correlation does not always mean causation. We have zero proof as to who was the leading figure to cause the offensive improvement. It could have been collective or it could have been the old coaches finally getting their "coaching" to sink in. The Kill worship and Corny hate is perplexing.
It was reported (rumored) in multiple places Kill was pretty disappointed with both Zohn and Vice's ability to break down film and gameplan - the RB coach and the OL coach. Kill getting here and suddently those two units immediately getting better seems like way too much of a coincidence. I'm not sure how we can look at the situation and just think after 3.5 years of very below average RB and OL play, the light bulb for everyone finally went on.
Kill probably has more years studying game film at the P5 level than Vice and Burden combined. I can easily imagine Kill being the running game guru in the room, especially with all his years in the run heavy B1G. He had to study Wisky's elite running game every year he was at Minnesota, that will teach you some things about the ground game. Glad to hear that Kill is able to transfer his knowledge by "training the trainers."
I've seen Burden's name mentioned, but never the other coach's name. I think people are assuming it's Vice because running game involves the OL, and Kill ended up helping out on the running game. But the "surprisingly bad coaching/film study habits" rumor was separate from the public comments about Kill working on the running game. If I were betting it would be on someone on the D side who wasn't retained.
Anyway, I think Kill's biggest influence on the running game was getting Fuente to focus on his core principles (stressing the D with a running threat @ QB) and as a result, Hendon Hooker taking over at QB. Plus Kill basically took over as the sideline RB coach. (I think Burden was in the booth for games).
Finally don't forget we had some instability on the OL to start the season due to injuries and eligibility. It took a few games for the OL group to settle into a new lineup and gel.
I get it, there were plenty of dropped passes and I'm sure missed assignments that film review will reveal and don't get me started on the defensive lapses.
It just seems like we squander opportunities every game, especially after being gifted turnovers.
Corny getting blame is ridiculous. We put up 30pts on a team that hasn't allowed that many pts all year. #5 ranked Georgia that barely missed the CFP only scored 21 against them. Of course there were some bad play calls, no one disputes that. Send me a single college football game all year where there weren't a few bad play calls....just one. You won't find one. I'm no Corny apologist, but even attempting to blame him for this loss is asinine.
If this loss is on anyone it has to be Bud. People keep saying Corny had a month to prepare and was lackluster (despite 30pts against a top 20 defense), yet I haven't seen a word of Bud had a month to prepare for an offense that he knew wasn't going to throw the ball and got torched by it. And this was a month to prepare while not recruiting, whereas Corny was traveling around all over trying to land some players.......who had more time to get it right?
I love Bud, but a running QB was always his kryptonite and it showed up again today. I'm fully confident over conversations I've had that JHam will be better at limiting the damage against these QBs.
The we put up 30 points argument I keep seeing is such a fallacy. Doesn't matter what happened in other KY games, VT OL completely countered their DL weakeness and every off tackle counter scheme or down gap scheme went for significant yards. Anyone OC with half a brain would have put up more than 30 with the way the OL performed
The fallacy? Seriously. It's not a fallacy. They played 13 games, including two top 10 teams, and we were the only ones to put up 30pts. I'm not saying it was a perfect game by Corny, but we easily could have put up 40 if hooker makes a decent throw to hazelton and just two of the six dropped passes are caught......and Fuente grows some balls and goes for it on 4th down and one inside the five
Edit: the point was Corny is not to blame. If our offense puts up 30pts I expect to win the game unless we are playing bama, LSU, Clemson......30pts against an I ranked team you should expect to win 95% of the time in my book....especially when the other team completes only 6 passes
I've never understood the Corny hate and I think today he is lowest on the list of who's fault it was. But I do find it incredibly annoying when he called plays where we dick around in the backfield for several seconds and the result is a run for a loss or no gain. It's totally the opposite of what we did in 2016 with Jerod where the emphasis was getting the ball as quickly as possible to playmakers in space
Cornhole sucks. He believes we should stop playing offense when we are up anywhere from 1 to infinity points. Pathetic.
That's why he told Hooker to not throw to Haze on the inside slant where he was wide open for a walk in touchdown right?
Why are are there people blaming Bud for not being able to stop Bowden? The kid put up just above his season average against us...I see no issue. He's an athlete, and teams have had trouble stopping him. The blame doesn't fall on any one person. It's a team loss. A stop here, a conversion there, we win. That's football.
It's a team loss but it's strange to see someone essentially point out Bud was average against Bowden and that wasn't the problem when the other side of the argument is Corn outscored every other team they played yet the conclusion many have arrived at is... Corn has to be fired after this.
I don't think Corn needs to be fired. I think Fuente and Corn need to grow a pair and quit calling so conservative all the time. So I'm not drawing that conclusion at this point.
Weren't the first like 5 plays passes and not one connected?
I'm not referring to the first drive aggression. I thought the play calls were good on that first drive, just terribly sloppy. I'm referring to kicking a FG on the 5. Nut up and get a TD.
The teams that beat Kentucky found a way to keep their score at 21 or less.
The kid played his nuts off. The defense left some out on the field, so did the offense. Team loss.
The kid did what he did all season.
Which is what I said above...
"We put up 30 on Kentucky" means nothing. UVA put up 28 on Florida. Are they somehow an offensive juggernaut?? You score more when you have a ducking month to prepare.
You should stop. Have a Happy New Year. I hope the hangover tomorrow doesn't kick your ass too bad.
I agree, but that was a good post tho
I do think Cornelson and Bud were both at fault for that loss, I would like to see a change at OC but realistically it's probably not going to happen
Forgetting the past from a results standpoint, given the New Year. We do seem to feel more comfortable playing from behind than ahead. I don't know what causes that for us, maybe it creates the underdog drive. However, if we want more wins it seems like we have to get better on stepping on throats when we are up. Maybe the consensus of the fanbase is different, but whenever we are up less than 7 inside of 7.5 minutes, my gut is always a loss. A bit more so than just paranoid fan. I appreciate us being up, and games are going to flip on time to time, but it seems to happen more than it should. Maybe I'm just reading into it more than I should.
After the slow start I remarked to my friend that I believed the offense would find its groove and put a decent amount of points on the board. That is not a statement I would have made prior to Fuente and Cornelson, where in many games the offense never found a rhythm and struggled to score 2 TDs. Play calling isn't perfect, but its a far stretch better than it was towards the end of the Beamer era, and I actually have confidence in games now that we will score some points. Can they improve, definitely, but the fact is if we had had the same caliber of defense as we have had in the past, this would be a 10 to 11 win team. We would all be singing praises of this staff top to bottom.
The absolute truth is that if anybody other than Bud Foster was on the sideline, the fanbase would clearly be going nuts about the defensive coaching. But, since it is our legendary coach, we assume he is getting the best out of his guys. Why can't we provide the offensive coaches the same benefit of doubt? It is embarrassing at times at how insecure the hokie fanbase is regarding offense. Corny never gets applauded for manufacturing respectable offense with below average Josh Jackson or Willis or even a relatively raw Hooker who still has quite a ways to go in the traditional passing game.
...because Foster has 33 years of "trust". He made chicken salad out of chicken shot for years. Consistently reinventing his D, in-game adjustments, coaching up underrated players, and literally carrying an entire fan base (see: Stiney O years).
Corny (and Fu) haven't shown as much. Maybe they'll get there. But so far it has been "Players not executing" and good games/plays followed by WTF stretches.
It doesn't matter how quickly or how often your dline gets in the backfield if they can't tackle the ball carrier and stop the play when they do it.
How many times were guys back there whiffing tackles or giving the O-lay like a spanish matador to the ball carrier?
If players execute on both sides of the ball (read catch balls that hit em in the hands and not miss tackles/be out of position on defense) then we win that game handily. The gameplan was fine. The execution was poor by quite a few people. It was frustrating to watch but is what it is at this point.
at what point does failure to execute begin to fall on the coaching and not the player? If we go back over a season and a half of threads, I believe I would see some of the names and situations of blowing up their assignments and dropping passes...etc.
Running the route correctly, making a good throw to the correct read are the things the coaches can teach. Them catching the ball when it all comes together isn't on the coaches. The defensive players missing gaps, getting out of position and blowing assignments are coachable things for the most part though. They just need to be disciplined in their play and not try to do more than what they are assigned on any given play. Sometimes the opposing player makes a great move/play, but being out of position when it happens is all on the defender.
I think people want him replaced because he's not a great play caller, regardless of what happened against Kentucky.
Cornelson calls up some beautiful plays. There are mind numbing issues at times... like not running a deep crossing pattern to the middle of the field (ever) when we are down 1 with 30 sec to go and 1 timeout. They were ceding the middle of the field. We could have gotten a big play to mid field. We Always seem afraid to throw to that part of the field.
But the run game is coming along with his play calling and a QB who can execute it. WR are open. This is a good offense, usually. But, as others have pointed out, our coaches seem to be a little deaf as to momentum or the moment. Stiney wasn't half as creative as Corn, but he could seize momentum when it presented itself. When we beat Miami for our first ACC championship, Randall to Royal came right after a pick. Now, our first play after a turnover is almost always an inside handoff.
Watching the Fuente/Corny offense is like listening to a CD that's scratched and skips. I know the youths may understand this analogy, but it's quite frustrating.
I keep seeing posts complaining about us settling for a FG on our last possession. I never understood this reasoning. There were 8+ mins left in the game. At that point, it was much more likely their QB would break a TD run than it was for them to milk the entire clock on a game winning drive. It seemed much more likely that we'd get the ball back with 2-3 mins if they'd scored and instead of being down by 4, all we would need to do is a FG to win. But, unfortunately, our D couldn't piece together the plays to get off the field.
Now, not being aggressive to get into field goal range at the end the first half, that's just inexcusable.
I was on the Fire Cornelson bandwagon early in the season, but have cooled down quite a bit on him. Our offensive playcalling is not as bad as it appeared early in the season. I think Fuente's conservative approach ( not pushing the tempo to try and score before the half, and settling for the FG in the 4th Qtr to go up 6 ) were more to blame than BC's playcalling, IMO. No, I'm not on the Fire Fuente bandwagon yet, but I would definitely like to see some more aggressiveness from him going forward.
And the dropped passes...my goodness, the dropped passes. Can't really blame those on the OC. Sometimes your players just have to step up and make the plays. In several key instances, our players did not. I'm not looking to throw them under the bus, but it needs to be acknowledged that these guys (young, amateur players who do not deserve to be dragged through the mud, to be sure) made some unfortunate and costly mistakes.
I think Corn did fine. Putting up 30 against UK was a really good showing for the offense. I had the biggest issues with Fuetne playing it safe before half, playing to protect a lead when we were up only 6, and not taking the timeout after that clear fumble (although in his presser he said the refs told them that they already reviewed it and told him to save his timeout. I find that incredibly dumb but if it's true then it makes sense why he didnt).
We had a young team this year and lost some games that a senior team wouldnt (ND, UK, UVa, and BC were all filled with mistakes that a seasoned team doesnt make). I think not having depth this year was the biggest killer in some of our games. If Waller and Farley play against UK, we win. If Farley plays against UVa, we win. Instead, to replace them we have inexperienced guys and in both games it cost us a W. The flip side of that is that the inexperienced guys behind Waller and Farley got some good practice time and game experience. That should help resolve that depth issue going forward.
Breaking in a new DCoord next year is going to be interesting. Our offense will need to be lights out explosive because our defense is definitely going to spend the first few weeks adjusting to JHam running things. I'm excited though.
I think 10 wins and the Coastal are the bar for next year. Anything less than that will be a huge disappointment.
The biggest problem with Corny's Offensive strategy is there seems to be way too much reliance on "fooling" the other team and setting them up for the big, explosive play. When that play doesn't happen or isn't executed well; everything breaks down.
In some series there seem to be pre-determined playcalls regardless of effectiveness or what the D has been showing (see the repeated and completely ineffective QB power and QB sweeps in the Belk Bowl). The overall goal (I assume) is to lull the D into bad positioning, then run a different play-type from a similar set and break an explosive play.
That's great---when it works. But this is College Football--protection sometimes breaks down, guys drop balls, and QBs under or overthrow WR. Its the nature of the game.
So in essence, we seem to be running multiple "dummy" plays for every "real" play. It seems like a much more effective offensive strategy would be to study the defense an call plays that would be expected to work or have worked based on what they are showing.
In the second half of the Belk Bowl, the best offensive player on the field for us was McClease. He had 2 solid runs on the 2nd to last Drive, then was taken out of the game and only got the ball once more. We went away from what was working. The net result was we got a FG where we needed a TD and went 3-and-Out when we had a chance to put in the dagger.
The film showed that Hooker was not particularly accurate or consistent throughout the day and our WR had already had multiple drops, so why choose to go away from what was working to try and win the game with a passing game that hadn't looked sharp all day?
So while Corny put up 30 on a UK Defense, he didn't put up points when it mattered, so while the D (not completely unexpectedly) struggled to stop a running QB, I don't find it reasonable to completely absolve Corny simply because we scored 30 points.
Much in the same way, had the Offense not looked like a dog chasing its damn tail for essentially the entire 1st Half against UVa, we probably would have won the game comfortably in the 2nd Half. I have very little faith in Corny as a Playcaller going forward.
you realize we won 8 games with a bunch of freshmen on the OL because of those misdirection tactics right?
and what you refer to as "dummy" plays are called base/constraint plays. By running your base plays you force the defense to account for something that leaves them vulnerable to something else - a constraint, or counter, that keeps them from selling out too hard on your base plays. If you've got a well-tuned offense, you are pretty effective at your base plays, at least enough that the D gets concerned and starts favoring alignments that make it more effective against your base plays and more vulnerable to the constraint plays.
A simple example is the inside zone run and the slant pass route. As LB's and safeties start rolling downhill and crashing the LOS at the snap to stop your effective inside zone runs ... they leave the slant open. So a couple of runs up the gut on first down for 2 ypc may seem like "dummy" plays but that's only because the defense is selling out to stop the run (or their DL is just beating our OL). Once that becomes a pattern for the 2nd level defenders, you bust out the slant behind those crashing LB's for a big YAC opportunity. If the are LB's regularly sitting back in zone coverage hopefully your OL and RB are good enough to average 5+ YPC and make them pay the other way.
A common RPO play combines the IZR and Slant into one play to see what the LB is actually doing on any given play, instead of trying to predict it pre-snap.
Yes...we won 8 games...against the easiest P5 schedule in the country.
And for the first third of the season, the Offense appeared to be a discombobulated mess.
In multiple other games, they had streches of ineptitude at key moments that contributed to losses (ND, UVA, UK, and nearly Miami).
I'm not saying that Misdirection shouldn't be part of the playbook at all, but it can't be the sole cornerstone of your system.
In the losses you mentioned (ND, UVA, and UK), I seem to remember portions of the game as we watched helplessly as their offense marched down the field and scored.
While you refuse to give Corny any credit at all for winning with an offense filled with a bunch of freshmen, you're overlooking the reason we actually lost those games. We were unable to stop the opposing team when we had a lead that we needed to hang onto in the waning minutes of those games.
Yes, it's also the offense's fault because we didn't have an insurmountable lead.
I think next year's team will be better due to more experience on both offense and defense, and a better ability to execute the game plan.
Corny has nothing to do with the Defense, the Defenses' performance (or lack there-of) doesn't effect his situational play-calling, which has been poor.
And no one said anything about insurmountable leads ONE FG vs. UVa, ND, UK and we win the game. Hell, in the Belk Bowl, if they just got a first down or two on the last drive, UK may not have had enough time to plod downfield with QB powers. ONE FG and there is no sweating bullets at the end of the Miami game.
Corny has an established pattern of not coming through when it matters and it has cost us games, I'm not going to give anybody credit for that.
I didn't say he affected the defense. Only that shortcomings of the defense also contributed to those losses. I'm not pointing fingers - I'm only saying that if you're going to point them, point them all around.
Corny has an established pattern of winning seasons at VT. A pattern which I expect will continue next year.
And I don't think I implied that the Defense desrved no blame. They had more than their fair share of chances to stop UK.
I just don't think the blanket statement of Corny put up 30 points on UK, so the offense was great is valid. The O could have put the game away and didn't and playcalling played a significant role in that.
I have no doubt that we will have a winning season in 2020. If you look at the schedule, it would be embarrassing not to.
I guess the question is, what is the goal here? In the last three seasons we haven't ended up even in the top 25, and have had three straight Bowl losses. If that's the Apex of our expectations, then I think Corny's fine. I think if we have higher aspirations, some changes on the offensive side are needed as well.
The last three seasons aren't the apex of my expectations.
But if we're realistic, we realize that we weren't going to get an instant turnaround of the program in 2 or 3 years. Particularly after the mass exodus of the NFL-eligible players.
I have some pretty high expectations, but a bit longer timeframe from some of the people here. I've seen other programs pull the plug every two years, and thrash around aimlessly while their program lurches around unsuccessfully. (See: Nebraska, Tennessee, FSU). Fan expectations can kill a program that's going through a transition. UVa had a couple of good seasons because they hit the lotto with a scatback-type quarterback who could make lemonade out of lemons, but Mendenhall now has lots of goodwill from his fan base.
For me, the jury is still out on Fuente. And the Corny-bashing is sort of out of hand. There were a few of plays that seemed as if we called something that just wasn't going to work, but the lack of traction on offense was mostly poor execution of plays where we had the right call at the right time.
Again, with Apples-to-Oranges comparisons. Comparing us to Programs that "pulled the plug" after 2 years has no reasoning---we are already in year 4 of the Fuente Era.
My point is simply this...here we sit in year four, no Top 25 for 3 years, no Bowl wins or even "signature" victories, and a Recruiting class that is near-worst in the ACC. None of that is is ideal.
Here is the crux of the point---College Programs live and die on Momentum. Momentum brings in what really makes the Program work---$$$MONEY$$. Money buys nicer facilities, better coaches (and helps prevent your best coaches from being poached away), expansive Recruiting budgets, more staff to create Social Media presence, ect.
8-5 Seasons don't build momentum. Saying "we scored 30 on UK" (but Lost) doesn't create momentum. We need to win and win big in 2020. Anyone who doesn't contribute to that needs to be "reassigned" I think there is plenty of evidence to put Cornelson in that category at this point.
Did you even read my post? I'll leave it at that.
It's pretty impossible to follow your posts, because you constantly manipulate the subject to fit your point of view.
You said you have high expectations but a longer time frame. I'm making the simple point that time is not often a commodity that college football programs have.
Once results start declining, momentum goes away, and money stops coming in, things head South quickly.
The point is, if we want to compete for the ACC we need to bring in better players, upgrade facilities, find strong coaches and staff (and retain them).
8 - 5 Seasons in a very weak conference, and lauding our offensive coordinator for scoring 30 points while losing a Mid-tier bowl game to a basketball school do nothing to advance our goals.
If this is our goal, I think Corny is perfect. If not, we need a better Playcaller in the booth.
Clear?
Your point is valid, but Key is claiming that 8-5 seasons aren't the apex of capability of Coach Corn. In fact, we saw that in '16 and '17. If you only expect consistent and constant increases, eventually you will be disappointed.
Also, if we don't win 9 games next year, I bet Key would agree with your opinion that improvements are required.
Exactly.
I very much feel that the Fuente experiment isn't over yet.
I think we'll have a pretty good idea in a year or two.
By the way, it's not so hard to follow my posts. I've been saying the same thing for about a year now.
I would generally agree that Fuente has 1-2 more years to show significant progress.
I simply think he would have a much better chance of success with someone other than Cornelson calling plays.
I'm not at all sure of that.
In the Belk Bowl, there were a few (like maybe 3) plays that people tended to disagree with. This was not why we lost the Belk Bowl.
You could see that there were lots of pretty good plays called, that were blown on execution.
Doesn't matter, though. Fuente can have whatever OC he wants. It's his call, and for now I trust his judgment.
The Belk Bowl was One Game!
Look at the film over the last three years. It has been filled with questionable play calls, poor scheme, and long streches of ineptitude. The same issues keep popping up with Cornelson time and time again.
We simply ignored them in 2016, because we won a lot of games and Jarod Evans willed many broken plays to work.
I believe that the program, today, is better than it was when Fuente arrived.
Let's re-hash this conversation next year about this time.
What's the endgame here? Let's say you successfully convince Key that Coach Corn has to go. Now both of you get to fruitlessly complain online while Fuente doesn't fire him.
Doesn't seem super worth it to me.
Offense does effect defense and vica-versa. If we can't get a first down, the defense has to play perfect. Likely wise if the offense gets a multiple score lead, the defense aggressiveness changes. The defense gets a stop, is gassed, offense goes quick 3-and-out and then puts the defense back on the field. You can't say one doesn't effec the other. As ST effects both. Part of being a successful OC and play-caller is understanding the whole game and adjusting to help strengthen the other side of the ball.
Watching our offense, I sometimes feel like Fuente gave Corn a book full of plays, and Corn just picks them with no regard for opponent. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't, but in every game, there are weird stretches where we look great, and others that look like we did zero gameplaning. I'm tending to lean toward Fuente's plays are genuinely pretty decent, but when you don't consider matchups or specific strategies based on the opponent, you get an offense that looks like it's about 70% there.
Yep, mostly what I was trying to say, but in a more succinct way.
It seems like we have a "program" of plays that are run against every opponent with little regard for how they do (or do not) attack the defense's scheme or weaknesses.
There appears to be equally little in-game scheming or adjustment (at least effective adjustment) made based on what the Defense is showing or what is effective.
As the playcaller, I would put most of this at Cornelson's feet, although its certainly possible that Fuente plays a significant role as well. Either way, at year Four, I am still waiting to see the Dynamic offense that was promised.
Spoiler alert- if the WRs/TEs/TBs had blocked worth a spitting cuss, the QB sweep would have been ok. However, he called it twice and neither time could the seal block on the edge get executed. Calling it a third time (when some other safe run plays had promise FILM REVIEW SPOILER ALERT) wasn't good play calling. His scheme was good- they ran well, and receivers were open when they tried to throw the ball. The execution wasn't always great, especially by the skill guys.
Defensively, the best OL in the SEC East and that VT played all year was going to win battles and open holes. It was the big plays that killed the Hokies, and those big plays resulted from a ton of brutal mental errors by the backers and safeties. Horrid game by Hollifield, Tisdale, Floyd, Deablo, and even Hunter and Rodgers when they got a series in the place of Floyd and Deablo. The fact is, the four star guys like Hollifield and Hunter don't look like big time players, and that is a killer. And, Mario Kendricks is a guy who needs a big time off season. His level of play went off a cliff the last couple of games.
Looking forward to the film review.
Sounds a lot like what we saw.
Love Dax's attitude, but he has been a liability all year. His natural position is taken up by Ashby, and he needs to be the backup there and not on the field otherwise. I think Bud promised Dax too much when recruiting him (his last real recruiting job) and tried to make it work despite the obvious pitfalls in his game (slow, bad angles, etc).
It will be very interesting next year to see who JHam rolls out there....especially against mobile qbs.......Ashby and Dax are probably/most likely two of the slowest linebackers in the ACC......having them on the field at the same time killed us a lot this year on big plays.
DIVINE DEABLO REFUSES TO RUN!
He is never in attack mode and jogs through his pursuit angles. It is hard to watch.