The Postgame Meal - UAlbany

Postgame Drink: We beat the Danes, we get the Scooby Snacks. Coconut rum, creme de bananes, melon liqueur, pineapple juice in equal parts shaken over ice and topped with whipped cream.

Postgame Meal: We'll eat Albany's own doughboy, it is basically chicken and cheese wrapped inside pizza dough. Simple but effective like UB's approach against Albany. A doughboy is also a name for a US soldier, in WWI, which was a war based on trench warfare, kinda like the Albany game. In conclusion, the doughboy is a food of contrast. Thank you.

Postgame Song: As promised, this was always going to be Sarah

I feel for you Albany fans.

1) I am of the belief that SUNY football isn't a flagship situation, it's a weak link situation. If UB got really good, it's game over for Stony and Albany, but if Stony or Albany got much better, it would force the other to ramp up efforts in an attempt not to be the worst. If one of those schools exceeded UB, it would motivate UB to ramp up efforts etc...

2) We go to Penn State next week, we might go from winning by 37 and everything being right in the world, to losing by 37 and everything being wrong in the world.

3) You had no chance. I know the feeling of talking yourself into having a chance, then having the first two drives confirm your belief, only for the next 20 drives to rip out your soul (see: Baylor 2013).

4) Your jerseys say UALBANY. Whoever decided to add that U is not very good at their job. Glass houses shouldn't throw stones as we have "the paragraph", but after seeing UALBANY for a game, I now can confidently say, our jersey text is better than at least one other school.

Albany. It gets better. Maybe. I don't know what the CAA looks like, as I said earlier this week, I don't do research on CAA teams.

10 Takeaways

1) Take a load off Anthone:

I did a bunch of data mining from old Lance Leipold games and old Quinn games. I never got it down on a post, but one of the takeaways was that LL Cool Coach does a much better job at preserving his running backs:

Leipold almost always had a main back getting around half the team's carries, with a secondary back grabbing about 25% and in 2013 he had three other backs each pull about 12% of the team's carries. Outside of 2012, when BO was injured, The 2013-14 Bulls were dominated by one runner getting 80-90% of carries.

This week the Bulls running backs ran 38 times with Taylor getting 17 carries (45%), Johnson with 11 (29%), and Hawkins with 10 (26%).

Last year Taylor started four games where he had under 20 run attempts, each game a UB loss:

Army 2014: 16-79 4.94ypc

Baylor 2014: 13-47 3.62ypc

CMU 2014: 14-25 1.79ypc

Ohio 2014:  17-37 2.18ypc

Albany 2015: 17-104 6.12ypc

2) Run defense still unknown

The defense held Albany to 67 yards on 24 carries (2.79ypc) before Elijah Ibitokun-Hanks ran roughshod all over UB's reserves. With Penn State and local product Akeel Lynch next week, we'll find out more than we did against the undersized Danes.

3) Pass rush

UB ended the game with 2 sacks and Okezie Alozie was just crushing the QB on well timed outside blitzes. UB averaged 1.4 sacks per game last year, and manged 2 sacks against the FCS offensive line. Not sure how to feel about it, but  again we'll get a better look at what we can do against a PSU offensive line that gave up 10 sacks last week.

4) Big Plays

UB had 9 Big Plays, each either for a score or to set up a score:

1) Licata 26-yard Pass to Ron Willoughby (led to a FG)

2) Ron Willoughby 24-yard catch that led to..

3) Anthone Taylor 21-yard TD run

4) Jordan Johnson 27-yard run (led to a TD)

5) 18-yard Mason Schreck catch (led to a TD)

6) Collin Lisa 46-yard catch that led to

7) Jacob Martinez 20-yard TD catch.

8) Jordan Johnson 17-yard run (led to a TD)

9) Jacob Martinez 86-yard punt return for a TD.

Nine plays from six different play makers led to 44 of UB's 51 points. That is the offense we hoped to see when we saw we had 2 QBs, 3 RBs and 6 WRs who could start on any roster in the MAC.

5) Big Plays Allowed

UB allowed a 30-yard pass that led to a TD, and a 21 yard pass that allowed Albany to drive deep into UB territory (before being stopped by the Nick Gilbo interception). UB also allowed a 23-yard pass and a 20-yard run late in the third which fueled Albany's second TD.

That helped UB hold Albany to 4.48 yards per play, the third best defensive effort in the last 12 games of play.

1) 2014 Akron 3.52

2) 2014 Norfolk 3.71

3) 2015 Albany 4.48

4) 2014 CMU 4.67

PSU definitely has big play ability UB will need to hold those plays down and force PSU to sustain a long drive next week.

6) Field Goals

A solid 40-yard field goal was nice to see, blocked XP wasn't so good, but we should be able to shore up our blocking on special teams.

7) Turnovers

UB matched their INT total from last year already. UB also recovered a fumble. UB did not lose a fumble or throw an interception. UB is plus 3 in turnover margin, better than at any point of the 2014 season.

A list of UB seasons by Turnover margin:

+20

+15

-2

-3

-6

8) BRuWPeG Results