I think it’s a whole combination of things, but at it’s foundation it seems to stem from Day wanting a certain style of bend-but-don’t-break defense that doesn’t give up quick big plays and allows the offense to do the heavy lifting for the team.
In the weather yesterday, on the road, with a first year QB in the biggest rivalry in the sport, play calling on offense was restricted, which was obviously a problem.
In a way, I don’t really even blame Day. He was screwed by circumstances that caused him to make bad decisions, it was Michigan, in the snow, with a young QB on the road, of course we needed to run the ball. But Michigan, like everyone else for the last decade, was selling out to stop the run and Day needed to shift to what the defense was giving him much sooner, which was throwing.
That first drive on the second half was an absolute killer, we needed to come out guns blazing and we ran a stretch play on third and short. Slow developing stretch runs against a defense going all out at the LOS just wasn’t going to cut it
If we take Michigan slightly out of their comfort zone by scoring on that first drive we might have been able to give the D more of a chance, but a quick three and out and we just got buried.
Going back to the defense, I think Coombs was an unmitigated disaster of a hire, and while Barnes was duct tape for the season, that fell off and a permanent repair is needed.
The fundamental issue to me, which I’ve been saying for two years, is too much thinking/reacting… not enough playing/attacking.
I think this is due to 1) changing things up mid season, resulting in players who aren’t comfortable/confident in the system.
And the Coombs failure resulting in a lack of overall leadership on the defense and a lack of confidence from the guys calling plays to attack within the bend-but-don’t-break scheme, much less make adjustments in-game to react to whatever the offense is doing.
The players lack confidence, the coaches lacked confidence, resulting in just trying to react rather than attack.
It was apparent all year to varying degrees, and getting punched in the mouth in the snow is particularly devastating for a defense that is fundamentally incapable of doing anything but reacting to what the offense is doing.
The defense needs an overall architect at the top that has the knowledge and confidence in whatever scheme they’re running to unleash the athletes at their disposal—to attack and impose their will instead of just sitting back and trying to respond.
That person is not on the coaching staff right now.
