'Everybody Playing as ONE': Cajuns' offensive line excelling despite playing better defenses

[Cajunsmike]

stAte played without James Blackman. That was huge.

I agree the Red Wolves not having their starting QB was a factor. However, he does not play defense. The OL did have their best game of the year as evidenced by the 200 yards rushing. Coach Dez said at the QB Club that the staff felt we had a chance to be able to run effectively on them. Part of the success running the ball was the improvement of the backs. At times they seemed to be late in picking the appropriate hole. They ran more aggressively and with better vision as the night went along. That improvement will need to continue against USM. Golden Eagles held Texas State to negative yards rushing yesterday. Some of that was due to sacks they put on the Bobcat QB. Two teams playing with more confidence will meet at USM on Thursday night.

[Bandwagon King]

Seriously though, Mr. King, if the Louisiana running game we know and love shows up Saturday, it is going to be a looooooong day for stAte.

You may have thought I was being facetious, but one thing I have learned about Mike is this was on the verge of trash talking for him. He isn't going to say something he doesn't absolutely believe. Personally I hate the zone read offense because of the laziness it creates for coaches who have no imagination. The blocking schemes seem simple, but technically are extremely hard for the offensive line to execute on an individual basis. And IMO the only way to properly run the thing to perfection is to have a true dual threat QB like a Lamar Jackson type. But it also requires patient running & a huge amount of cut backs to be made by the runners as well to have any chance to succeed.

We weren't getting much of either for the first five games of the season. Chris Smith started to show some success in the ASU game then went down with an injury. Last night for some strange reason, the light sure seemed to go on for our running backs as well as our offensive line being able to handle their D. line. There were a ton of cut backs made & before you knew it guys were running wild in their secondary. For people at the game, there was at least a dozen, or more times it felt like the running backs were going to break free & go for huge runs. And it looked like the backs were in shock when they got to the second level & almost didn't know what to do with all the space they had.

This could be a function of how bad ASU is on their D. line, or it could be that some really bad communication issues have been fixed between the O.line & the running back group. Either way, I had a feeling reading this article that Mike was able to see something solid in film that he felt like could be addressed at least for this game. I am hopeful this is just the beginning of the real Cajuns offense coming to life & not just a really bad football team that we just raked over the coals. We will see in just a few days.

[Hudsheen#Fired]

Speaking of running backs. Dre'lyn Washington really reminded me of emani bailey with his shiftiness. By next year he should be a really good back

[RaginDave]

I agree the Red Wolves not having their starting QB was a factor. However, he does not play defense. The OL did have their best game of the year as evidenced by the 200 yards rushing. Coach Dez said at the QB Club that the staff felt we had a chance to be able to run effectively on them. Part of the success running the ball was the improvement of the backs. At times they seemed to be late in picking the appropriate hole. They ran more aggressively and with better vision as the night went along. That improvement will need to continue against USM. Golden Eagles held Texas State to negative yards rushing yesterday. Some of that was due to sacks they put on the Bobcat QB. Two teams playing with more confidence will meet at USM on Thursday night.

I knew we would be able to move the ball on this bad defense. It made it worse the fact that asu couldn’t move the ball and their d was on the field almost all game

[CajunVic]

Wtf you talking bout?

The only King I saw on Saturday was in Jackson. Besides, we made a Great Snowing in Lafayette. Go Cajuns . . .

[CajunEXPRESS]

I agree the Red Wolves not having their starting QB was a factor. However, he does not play defense. The OL did have their best game of the year as evidenced by the 200 yards rushing. Coach Dez said at the QB Club that the staff felt we had a chance to be able to run effectively on them. Part of the success running the ball was the improvement of the backs. At times they seemed to be late in picking the appropriate hole. They ran more aggressively and with better vision as the night went along. That improvement will need to continue against USM. Golden Eagles held Texas State to negative yards rushing yesterday. Some of that was due to sacks they put on the Bobcat QB. Two teams playing with more confidence will meet at USM on Thursday night.

Yeah, but you do recall that A S has by far the worst ground defense in the conference. I’m glad we’ve played better for one and a half games, but I’m not sure how much better we really are. Hopefully we have similar success from here forward