BISON STAMPEDE: Rutgers Powers to 329 Rush Yds; Kaliakmanis 3 TD's Passing: The Good, Bad & Ugly

okay recers stampedes the Howard bison with a 447 victory at SHI stadium in Piscataway and actually through three touchdowns let's get to it [Music] [Music] [Music] okay so Ruckus takes care of business in Piscataway beating the Howard bison 447 as we Stampede over them in the running game 32 29 yards rushing 165 yards by Kyle we actually throw for three touchdown passes aan C Manis looking the part uh this is this is good news this is a good sign yes it's how one of the things we were looking about uh looking at is competency at the quarterback uh position who can manage a game not make the big mistakes and yet still make the throws and aan passed with fly colors and a 44 to7 Victory kind of close to my prediction a 4510 I'm sure there were some guys in the betting world at the end with that last uh 11 yard uh touchdown run by Antoine Raymond we not real happy uh nonetheless this uh we had a slow start you know after a slow start a little bit disconcerning there's always those guys in front of you with in my section they're like what are you doing what kind of players that uh he kind of felt that you know the momentum would pick up and we would start to wear them down as the game went on it just took a little longer then we would have liked The Good the Bad and the Ugly there was a lot of good little bit of bad little bit of ugly let's get to the good and that starts with the quarterback position Athan cik Manis did what he had to do he did his job he uh was 15 for 24 uh 147 yards three touchdowns and it was four drops that I that I got it so if he goes 19 for 24 and he has near 200 yards on three touchdowns that's a resounding success but it's not just about the production the stats the final score and all that just watching him in the pocket he looked like a quarterback he looked like a quarterback that we haven't had since I don't I can't even say Mike teal because teal wasn't exactly fluid and Polished back there uh he wasn't a terribly accurate passer uh nonetheless really good job by aan he was comfortable in the pocket he was fluid he uh made good decisions he he just looked like a real quarterback just the Poise every time he stepped back in a pocket wearing the P we were a little bit worried okay what was going to happen you just knew that he was going to throw the ball uh with good ball placement in a tight window and what stunned me was how accurate he was now I've watched some tape of him uh coach said he was by far the most accurate quarterback in Camp and we were kind of like I don't know about that but I have to tell you uh he didn't miss much he he missed uh one a Crossing pattern early on in the game and he had a couple throwaways and maybe one other uh pass that wasn't as accurate as it could have been but I I was just dumbfounded how even with Corners all over the wide receiver he stuck that ball in there and I was just pleasantly surprised by that uh remember that pass uh dropped by Ian Strong which kind of hurt our momentum early we were having our way on offense with Howard and Ian Strong drops one right across the middle hits him like right in the shoulder pads I think he had another one diir Miller had one one and so that kind of hurt our momentum early on uh nonetheless another thing that I liked about athan's game wasn't afraid to go across the middle this is something that we're not used to you know when Gavin did that the ball would be behind them over them in front of them would bounce up and tip up in the air you never knew you always had to hold your breath but Athan did a really good job throwing across the middle and I love that we were using more Crossing patterns you know i' I've been complaining forever about Crossing patterns and Screen passes in both those things tonight and I'll get to the screen passes in a little bit we utilize as part of our toolkit uh and that's a good job by coach Shaka Athan calikim Manis uh and the receivers they they were getting opening uh whoever you know there was some Talking Heads out there that were questioning athan's uh athleticism this is absolutely absurd his smoothness and his fluidity when leaving the pocket uh was a beautiful thing to watch he uh there there were times when he got flushed out and took off and there were times where it was kind of designed but unlike gavit where you just knew where he was going and he was running with it the thing I liked about Athan is he disguises it uh pretty well he uh I think he had what was it six rushers or seven rushers for 43 yards and there was a couple tush pushes in there so he did a really good job getting first downs so we don't have to worry about losing Gavin's uh productivity of 497 yards rushing um his decision making stupendous like I said when he dropped back in the pocket I wasn't worried if the ball was going to go in some crazy place like what the heck was that did a really good job with uh ball placement one of the things coach said in the postgame press conference he did not predetermine where he was going with the ball what does that mean he didn't lock on to his number one receiver he went through his progressions and he hit a wide variety of receivers in the postgame press conference uh one of the reporters asked him about what does it mean if he can complete passes to eight different guys I can tell you that's a good thing because he's managing the game he's seeing the game in front of him he can spread the ball around and can make the throws make good decisions good ball placement really happy about that so that is one of uh one of the good things one of the really good things that happened last night we needed to get good play out of the quarterback the running game you know that's going to be our bread and butter no matter uh what we think about how much more we have to use the passing game and Kyle was Kyle he had 165 yards with you know Midway through the third quarter I'm thinking you know let's let's get him 200 but rightfully so uh they started to work in Sam and this is the second thing that I'm really good really happy about Sam Brown had himself a game last night early on he looked like he looked like a different Runner he was comfortable wasn't tentative was hitting the whole he wasn't hitting the whole tentatively he was decisive getting through there unlike last year you can see he was a little bit tentative and now now he was still maybe getting three four yards of pop but as we got into the second half he was uh exploding through those holds quickly wearing down the defense and uh wound up with 14 carries 68 yards so it's just under five yards of clip so if we could get production like that out of Sam first of all I'm really happy for him good dude and wish him well for the rest of the year and I hope he gets more productivity like that and it helps give us rotation I kind of feel that we have a deep running back room we should get more guys in there uh prevent some in injuries uh arrest some guys keep the defense on its heels never know who's coming where uh so that was a really good thing and you know Kyle was Kyle 19 rushes 165 yards and a touchdown early on though one of the reasons for our slow start start on offense you know we had some Dro passes but we got it wasn't about the offense's inability to build Rhythm and a momentum they looked to be in Rhythm but it was just situational football and play calling in those circumstances early on that maybe they got too predictable with Kyle on you know third and one and fourth and one and Howard was ready for it he got stopped on fourth and one didn't really uh gain anything and uh that prevented us from extending the the drive in Howard territory uh but you know so as a matter of you know play calling situationally what was going on but there were times that Kyle just got chunks and he uh he did his thing several times he had U big runs a really big one before the end of the second half then had a personal foul uh penalty called against him that enabled us to get a field goal to close out the half 177 a running again now and Juan Raymond gets that touchdown 11 yard touchdown with you know whatever it was eight seconds left on the clock last play the game you know the media is going to run with that to me it wasn't a big deal it's not like he threw the ball if coach threw the ball the pet out that's one thing but you're on the 11 yard line man and you uh you're handing the ball off to like a fourth string running back just stop them you know teams do that now they they run the ball they don't always kneel uh they're going to hand it off they and uh I'm not so upset with that although there are some guys on the betting line that probably were nonetheless that's uh you know just stop them you're on the 11 yard line uh show some pride they didn't uh those were all good things defensively uh so on offense it kind of give him an A minus I think that's a fair score you know they could have not dropped as many pens es uh scored a little more a little bit more early that would have been a solid a grade because we would have seen what we needed uh to see you know the the wide receiv here's another good thing before we get to the wide receivers we actually got production out of the tight end position I mean if we can get get production out of the tight end and there was some uh interesting play calls in there that this vess well for us in the future to pull something out of the toolkit which we haven't had in the past uh fleeter had four catches 31 yards and a touchdown he almost had a second touchdown he was stopped at like the the one or two yard line uh Victor kopka had a uh one reception for 12 yards and when things aren't opening up down field and you have the ability to get your uh the ball to your tight end uh you know either underneath or out in the flat as a safety valve I mean that's real I was really happy to see that and I'm almost positive that we used a tight end screen to Fletcher on one of those plays and this is the other thing that I was ecstatic about we actually my count completed four screen passes one to Sam for a 34 yard touchdown that was on the heels of a really bad call an ensuing un sportsmanlike 15 yard a penalty against coach shano for being pissed off about the non call so now it's third quarter it's third and 25 from the 34 yd line and we throw a screen to a wide open Sam out in the flat and he basically walks into the end zone so those two aspects of the passing game usage of the tight end different kind of play calls and using the screen pass is going to open things up for us uh with play calls and situational football that we weren't able to take advantage of in the past so I was extremely extremely happy uh about that the uh other thing that was uh really good zero sacks the offensive line gave up zero sacks and not only that there wasn't a lot of pressure I mean there were a couple times during that game where aan was just standing back there you know uh surveying the field looking for guys that were open um again it's Howard nonetheless when you give up no sacks and I don't know what the stats are on pressures but it didn't look like Howard got much pressure uh so that's a good job wide receivers um wasn't super productive want to see more production and a lot of you know had to do with the drops you know like I said we had four drops we only completed eight passes to wide receiver so dime here uh four catches 37 yards two yard touchdown on that two yard touchdown it looked like he was going to be stopped short he fought his way in so that's a good job by him he's not a big guy he's like 5'11 and uh so he got his first touchdown uh in strong wound up two catches 20 yards KJ Duff one for nine Chris long one for four we need to see got to pump up those numbers those are rookie numbers we need more production matter to wide receivers uh to give us at least the threat of being able to complete passes across the middle of the field and down field deep the uh you know when your tight ends and your wide receiver you have almost the same production I guess that could be a good good and a bad thing um so as we move on to the defense I don't want to say it's bad but uh needs some work we uh same old boogaboo we did not we got pressure no sacks until Jordan Walker with 48 seconds uh left in the game and once again we were vulnerable to those big athletic quarterbacks early on the only play it was like schoolyard football the only play that Howard was successful on was a quarterback run a quarterback draw whenever they needed a first down uh that's what they ran with saggin and he was successful a lot he went he's a lot like drones he's 63 205 drones is like 63 225 230 whatever it is he had 12 rushes for 67 yards but a lot of those were for first downs and when we got pressure on he was able to scramble out of the pocket we kind of held the running uh the traditional running game in check with Hunter and James Ed and James son they had a total of 20 carries for 73 yards for our team that's pretty good at running the ball so as far as that is concerned that was a good part of the defense we need to work on containing uh those versatile athletic quarterbacks and we also need to do a little better job you know off schedule so we're getting pressure on and it's third and 11 uh typical ruter series stop them on first down stop them on second down this is like late in the second quarter we flush him the quarterback out of the pocket and you're hoping he doesn't take off and we had him contained but he Wings the ball down field towards mid mid field uh receiver makes a leaping grab really good catch and I don't believe it was even intended for him but they completed the pass they were able to get near Midfield and ensuing roughing the quarterback call which was kind of borderline but I guess you have to call it these days uh put them in pretty good field position wind up scoring 14-7 game and that was a typical ruter kind of Series where you stop them on first and second down you give up uh a big Play to an athletic quarterback or something that's uh off schedule so you know we're GNA have to deal with that again against Virginia Tech with uh Kiron drones he had a similar game he had like 74 yards rushing last year had more yards passing uh but he had a lot of rushes I think it was like 20 something rushes he had so uh defense kaj Sanders got his first start you know I said you know throughout Camp don't be shocked if you see him uh getting significant playing time in a starting lineup and uh of course with with uh flip Dixon out he was going to get playing time but he started and coach shano is not one that look likes to start freshman he got the start he even said in a postgame press conference he deserved it he put in the work and uh so he got the start he felt good about it he felt he had a good game although he didn't you know hasn't watched uh the tape I think he had one pass deflexion uh maybe had three tackles so nothing uh coach said when you don't get beat deep that's always a good day for the safety so nothing deep completed against uh the safeties so that was pretty good uh when we look at where ruus was successful on defense when Howard ran traditional passing plays traditional running plays uh they didn't get very much you know it's those off schedule kind of athletic plays that hurts them um you know with our you know uh five two uh 425 uh defense I'm not sure if it's a problematic for being softed in the middle because we also those quick hitting runs uh up the middle in the middle of the field getting into space those things also hurt us uh hurt us last year that was a weak part of our defense was the running game in that middle part of the field in addition to uh struggling with athletic quarterbacks we got to work on some of those things it's not really too bad but if I were to give the defensive Grade B minus you did hold them to seven points and you had a fourth I want to say fourth and three in the 14 yd line when the game was you know not out of hand yet uh in the second half you came up big so that's what matters in the end a little bit of a b but don't break if you look at the stats Howard 116 yards passing uh that's pretty good 145 yards rushing but 67 of those yards from the quarterback position so only 73 yards under of the running back position and that's a two-headed monster that they have that they're going to have lots of uh double digit games uh Ruckers 147 yards passing 329 yards rushing 476 total yards you'll take that uh if we do something similar like that against Aaron we ABS uh akan we absolutely will uh take that that's how it's going to be you know when we talk about balance between rushing and passing it's not going to be just about the same amount of yards it's going to be the kind of productivity that we get and how we can use the passing game to take some of the pressure off the predictability of the running game and team stack in the line so overall a minus for the uh offense B minus uh for the defense now ugly coach shano in midseason form using three timeouts in the first half two on punt plays and once on on a first and 10 it's like what are you what are you doing it came back to hurt us because after Kyle had that long run uh late in the first half and then had the uh personal foul penalty tacked off we had no timeouts so we made some plays in the running game made some plays in the passing game we had a spike the ball but we couldn't go into the end zone uh because we had no timeouts if we at least had a shot I had confidence and athan's ability to throw a good pass into the end zone and if it wasn't there he' throw it away he had a couple throwaways uh which is also a sign of really good decision making he just wasn't going to make a crazy pass like we would have had in the past nonetheless we got a field goal out of it 36 yard by J Patel but um you know using up all and then in the second half early in the second half we used another time out so we need to work on our our uh our time clock uh strategy the other thing that uh you know coach was called for unsportsmanlike penalty in the first half I don't blame him I was pissed too we throw a pass into the end zone absolutely positively was a pass interference and uh the receiver's path to the ball which was catchable and inbounds was knocked off path wasn't C coach was pissed we get a 15 yard penalty from from the 19 now we're back uh at the 34 thankfully uh Ethan was able to find a wide open Sam out in the flat and we get a 34 yard touchdown and a big Fu after that but and uh coaches got to be uh you know a little more judicious about how he uh voices his displeasure you know he likes to have a disciplined team that doesn't get involved in those kinds of things we did have a late hit penalty almost blocked the punt two in the first half I was a little worried that we might have run uh hit the kicker but we didn't so just that overall uh in inattention uh to detail uh in those moments during the game that was I mean we were just like laughing in the stands you know using up all our time on pump plays at first downs nonetheless an overall uh good performance by Ruckers in their first game we got what we wanted to see out of the the quarterback position in the passing game we we got what we expected out of the running game um the defense uh was okay but as we get healthier and we uh you know move forward in the season and uh become more cohesive as a unit and have our guys in there we should uh and as we get more experience we had a bunch of young guys playing last night that should help us uh out fairly well and uh I'm not so worried about that although when you go up against the new Big 10 members who have run wide open offenses they just need to be uh you need to do stay home take care of your business and uh wide receiver room looking forward to a little more prod productivity happy I hope we continue to see more productivity out of the after the tight ends uh special teams last night uh you know not much going on Jay Patel with 36y field goal we did return a kick a little bit of surprise we got it out to the 28 yard line all right we got an extra three yards on that uh nonetheless good job only way to celebrate is with Rucker's favorite Sons Eric Grand Kentucky Straight Bourbon if you uh if this is not in your collection it should be proceeds go to the Christopher and Dana Reeves foundation for spinal research so cheers to Eric cheers to a Ruckers Victory on to Ain we'll see you the next time and have a great Labor Day weekend