The offense did what they needed to do on all the short field opportunities the defense gave them. So, credit Estime and Hartman, the OL. They sputtered when given a long field, except for the TD pass to Tyree, which was great to see for both Hartman and Tyree.
Hartman was 13-20, with two perfect throws that were drops, with our slot and TE and RB’s accounting for nearly 100% of the passing game, and our wide receivers damn near non existent.
Given the relatively short time of possession due to the play of our defense, and the multiple short field opportunities, it’s really hard to judge the play of our offense. The one stat that jumps out to me is our OL only allowed one sack, against a USC team that averages nearly four a game. Visually, I felt our OL dominated their DL and both Coogan and Rocco were aggressive with run blocking, and both showed huge improvement in pass blocking.
I would have preferred a bye week for this team earlier than this upcoming week, but its a critical opportunity to rest and get healed, while working on changes necessary to get this offense playing at a much higher level. I continue to believe that Love needs to get double digit touches; Faison needs to be a favorite target; and we need to add James to the mix of Faison and Tyree on shots down the field, etc…. We have limited elite speed and we need to use it more effectively to open up our running game, and to take advantage of Hartman’s skill set. Great win over USC last night, but it Was not a breakout night for our offense, which we need going forward to win out.