There is a lot to unpack from the loss to Pitt by Georgia Tech on Saturday and sadly it was a bit predictable as the Jackets faced a hard-nosed Panthers team that is well-coached and plays a physical brand of football. Those teams have really been the bane of the current regime. GT got manhandled at the lines of scrimmage and it is hard to win any game like that.
A dose of reality is needed as well as the team is still pretty thin especially on the offensive line. You had your best mauler guard Kenny Cooper out not even dressed, his backup Austin Smith out and not dressed, and Paula Vaipulu playing his first career snaps on the offensive line out of the gate starting at left guard. So that is not a recipe for success. On the right side at guard you had an injured Ryan Johnson come off the bench after Nick Pendley tried to step in on a bum ankle and play a position he had rarely even practiced at. Pendley had spent camp learning left guard and right tackle and started at right tackle before his injury. Pendley like Vaipulu doesn’t have a wealth of experience either. Will Lay stepped in at left guard showing the lack of overall depth and sadly Lay and Johnson were the two best-graded OLs per PFF in the game both coming off the bench. Clearly, they have zero interest in playing Mike Maye for whatever reason as he knows both guard spots and has been with the team for several seasons now.
Here is the deal with the offensive line situation. Brent Key has developed some depth at offensive tackle and center, but the guard situation remains a big issue. They just have not developed any depth and the guys they have who are not normally starting Smith, Vaipulu and Pendley can’t stay healthy. KJ Kirby who they also thought might help at guard or who could at least play tackle and allow them to slide Jordan Williams in at left guard was in a boot on the sideline.
Key has had one cycle of kids who have been in the full S&C program plus the transfers they’ve added so that isn’t a lot of time considering those kids dealt with a COVID year so they did not have a normal summer offseason as freshmen with S&C nor a normal camp last year to learn.
So that is why it was odd to me that they tried to run inside and use play-action early that led to the two interceptions from Jeff Sims, Sims played a great game after the two turnovers, clearly his best game throwing the ball at GT and he graded out really high despite the two turnovers that were not totally his fault. I think there is a lot of misplaced anger toward Sims who played his ass off.
The red zone offense stuff is puzzling, I’m going to try to do a deep dive on that later this week, so I’ll just say it is bad when you get three times to the 21 or closer and get zero points. They converted two others, but you won’t win any games not punching it in. Maybe they need to go under center or something because it is not working and that was not Clemson on defense on Saturday.
Defensively I have a lot of questions. The big takeaway for me though was Tech’s two best defensive players struggled against Pitt’s size on Saturday, Charlie Thomas and Jordan Domineck and no one else stepped up to bail them out.
I love #2 on D, but he is not playing well and I don’t understand why they leave him out there to get exposed. I find it odd that in a very talented safety room those players are regressing and not progressing despite having guys with NFL body types and speed and yet they play slow and out of position so much. That has to be coaching because if they do that regularly they shouldn’t be on the field and they should find other options. I think it is clear there are major issues with the coaching on the back end of the defense right now and that got exposed by Pickett in a big way. Pitt receivers just found the soft spots in the D over and over and GT would have help over the top and under but none of the guys were anywhere close to their receivers and that is a scheme or a coaching issue. It is bad when Charlie Thomas had the best coverage grade according to PFF in the game at just 61.7.
I also don’t understand why they did not switch things up defensively at halftime. They seemed to make no adjustments whatsoever. We have seen them successful switch things up at times, but the 3-3-5 wasn’t working and they were getting pushed around and two of the LBs
For those banging on Coach Collins, it is not in his nature to own things like that. He isn’t wired like and he doesn’t throw his coordinators under the bus either. Most coaches do not do that even CPJ when he was really fed up with Al Groh or Wommack or Roof wouldn’t do that because it is unprofessional and has huge issues within your organization. They have seven games left maybe eight if they can rip off some wins against some mediocre foes the next few weeks and then after the season you make a change. I did not see anything that warranted an immediate change unless they get boat raced by Duke next week.
I do find it odd that Geoff Collins is 0-8 at Georgia Tech after a win. However there is a little more to it when you look at it, I was unsure before I checked deeper.
Here are the losses after Collins wins:
Beat USF lost to the Citadel
Beat Miami lost to Pitt
Beat NC State lost to #4 UGA (understandable)
Beat FSU lost to #14 UCF (understandable)
Beat Louisville lost to #1 Clemson (understandable)
Beat Duke lost to NC State
Beat KSU lost to #6 Clemson (understandable)
Beat #21 UNC lost to Pitt
Some of that is just the hard nature of the schedule although the Citadel game is still amazing to me.
One other area of concern is fan support. The crowd was lousy coming off a win over #21 UNC, there are a lot of factors that go into that, but that is not good and the tune-out factor from GT fans is increasing as they lay eggs like Pitt or the NIU game. Collins is viewed as someone who is overselling and under-delivering and a stable 25-year run of consistent play in the ACC and bowl games by the program. He needs to start winning and turning the tables and he needs to be better in his pressers and more detailed about the issues they have. I know how Collins is off the mic and he is very blunt and honest, but I think he is doing himself a disservice by pulling back so much to protect the program, it is not coming across well to GT fans who are used to GOL or PJ being beyond brutally honest. There is a line there he needs to work toward. His pressers at Temple were more honest and blunt and he probably needs to get back to that and that would go a long way toward easing the minds of people who are on the fence.
At the end of the day, he has to win and figure it out. There will be an unbelievable amount of pressure going into next season if they can’t get across the 5-win barrier this season IMO.
Keep the faith, love your team and be nice to each other.
A dose of reality is needed as well as the team is still pretty thin especially on the offensive line. You had your best mauler guard Kenny Cooper out not even dressed, his backup Austin Smith out and not dressed, and Paula Vaipulu playing his first career snaps on the offensive line out of the gate starting at left guard. So that is not a recipe for success. On the right side at guard you had an injured Ryan Johnson come off the bench after Nick Pendley tried to step in on a bum ankle and play a position he had rarely even practiced at. Pendley had spent camp learning left guard and right tackle and started at right tackle before his injury. Pendley like Vaipulu doesn’t have a wealth of experience either. Will Lay stepped in at left guard showing the lack of overall depth and sadly Lay and Johnson were the two best-graded OLs per PFF in the game both coming off the bench. Clearly, they have zero interest in playing Mike Maye for whatever reason as he knows both guard spots and has been with the team for several seasons now.
Here is the deal with the offensive line situation. Brent Key has developed some depth at offensive tackle and center, but the guard situation remains a big issue. They just have not developed any depth and the guys they have who are not normally starting Smith, Vaipulu and Pendley can’t stay healthy. KJ Kirby who they also thought might help at guard or who could at least play tackle and allow them to slide Jordan Williams in at left guard was in a boot on the sideline.
Key has had one cycle of kids who have been in the full S&C program plus the transfers they’ve added so that isn’t a lot of time considering those kids dealt with a COVID year so they did not have a normal summer offseason as freshmen with S&C nor a normal camp last year to learn.
So that is why it was odd to me that they tried to run inside and use play-action early that led to the two interceptions from Jeff Sims, Sims played a great game after the two turnovers, clearly his best game throwing the ball at GT and he graded out really high despite the two turnovers that were not totally his fault. I think there is a lot of misplaced anger toward Sims who played his ass off.
The red zone offense stuff is puzzling, I’m going to try to do a deep dive on that later this week, so I’ll just say it is bad when you get three times to the 21 or closer and get zero points. They converted two others, but you won’t win any games not punching it in. Maybe they need to go under center or something because it is not working and that was not Clemson on defense on Saturday.
Defensively I have a lot of questions. The big takeaway for me though was Tech’s two best defensive players struggled against Pitt’s size on Saturday, Charlie Thomas and Jordan Domineck and no one else stepped up to bail them out.
I love #2 on D, but he is not playing well and I don’t understand why they leave him out there to get exposed. I find it odd that in a very talented safety room those players are regressing and not progressing despite having guys with NFL body types and speed and yet they play slow and out of position so much. That has to be coaching because if they do that regularly they shouldn’t be on the field and they should find other options. I think it is clear there are major issues with the coaching on the back end of the defense right now and that got exposed by Pickett in a big way. Pitt receivers just found the soft spots in the D over and over and GT would have help over the top and under but none of the guys were anywhere close to their receivers and that is a scheme or a coaching issue. It is bad when Charlie Thomas had the best coverage grade according to PFF in the game at just 61.7.
I also don’t understand why they did not switch things up defensively at halftime. They seemed to make no adjustments whatsoever. We have seen them successful switch things up at times, but the 3-3-5 wasn’t working and they were getting pushed around and two of the LBs
For those banging on Coach Collins, it is not in his nature to own things like that. He isn’t wired like and he doesn’t throw his coordinators under the bus either. Most coaches do not do that even CPJ when he was really fed up with Al Groh or Wommack or Roof wouldn’t do that because it is unprofessional and has huge issues within your organization. They have seven games left maybe eight if they can rip off some wins against some mediocre foes the next few weeks and then after the season you make a change. I did not see anything that warranted an immediate change unless they get boat raced by Duke next week.
I do find it odd that Geoff Collins is 0-8 at Georgia Tech after a win. However there is a little more to it when you look at it, I was unsure before I checked deeper.
Here are the losses after Collins wins:
Beat USF lost to the Citadel
Beat Miami lost to Pitt
Beat NC State lost to #4 UGA (understandable)
Beat FSU lost to #14 UCF (understandable)
Beat Louisville lost to #1 Clemson (understandable)
Beat Duke lost to NC State
Beat KSU lost to #6 Clemson (understandable)
Beat #21 UNC lost to Pitt
Some of that is just the hard nature of the schedule although the Citadel game is still amazing to me.
One other area of concern is fan support. The crowd was lousy coming off a win over #21 UNC, there are a lot of factors that go into that, but that is not good and the tune-out factor from GT fans is increasing as they lay eggs like Pitt or the NIU game. Collins is viewed as someone who is overselling and under-delivering and a stable 25-year run of consistent play in the ACC and bowl games by the program. He needs to start winning and turning the tables and he needs to be better in his pressers and more detailed about the issues they have. I know how Collins is off the mic and he is very blunt and honest, but I think he is doing himself a disservice by pulling back so much to protect the program, it is not coming across well to GT fans who are used to GOL or PJ being beyond brutally honest. There is a line there he needs to work toward. His pressers at Temple were more honest and blunt and he probably needs to get back to that and that would go a long way toward easing the minds of people who are on the fence.
At the end of the day, he has to win and figure it out. There will be an unbelievable amount of pressure going into next season if they can’t get across the 5-win barrier this season IMO.
Keep the faith, love your team and be nice to each other.
