Irish

They key part of that was "on Saturday". Rate his performance for that game. I agree that he has upped the program while dealing with crappy facilities. I like some of the talent we have coming up. However, his performance on Saturday was not good at all and has happened enough to be a pattern. He is not a good game day coach - especially for big games. The 4th down call cost us big time. We finally had a chance to shut up the Bison and blew it.

Just curious - what did you see from Bubba on Saturday that led you to believe he was smart? I'll wait.

Exactly

To be fair, most of us that came to those conclusions watched the game on Saturday - Bubba - stupid seems like a pretty logical conclusion.

And discipline and play calling - false start on the first play - come on. And we can't seem to keep any defense off balance or guessing. The word is out on our offense.

Agreed that we are a better team - however the Bison are not the Bison of old. Bubba has shown us time and time again what kind of coach he is (especially on game decisions). He had a big hand in blowing what was one of our most important games in recent history. If this is what people want going forward so be it. But don't be surprised if he Bubbas away other important games. This isn't the first time his game coaching has cost us. Time to demand excellence for this program.

Hell - let's make him work for it and manage all of the 4th downs too.

Sums up Bubba in a nutshell.

I admit to being frustrated with Bubba - and I think our horrible 4th down play affected the outcome - not only a poor idea but very poorly executed - we gave the Bison time to stack the line and then went ahead. We could have called time out when we saw how it developed. Yes, Bubba deserves the criticism. In looking at his body of work on 4th downs, it's almost he thinks what the logical thing to do is and then does the opposite. Coaches need to put the team in a position to win. The offense was not sharp and a lot had to do with poor discipline - we were offsides on our first play. This is part on the players but also part on the coaches. We had a golden opportunity to shut up the Bison and didn't cash in.

Imagine how good it would feel if we had won - and should have but for Bubba's poor decisions and the lack of discipline and poor play-calling by our OC.

I don't want the guy I saw yesterday any where near the head coaching job. He is becoming more Bubba like day by day.

Totally frustrated - we had a good chance of beating the Bison at home and wiping of the smug from their obnoxious fans - then nope, Bubbaed again.

It doesn't define the season but it does define Bubba.

What the actual hell was that - couldn't have executed that more poorly. Bubba must be going mental.

I thought Freund would be a big influence on Bubba - turns out he is more Bubba like every game

Could we be any more undisciplined?

Horrible tackling

And that's with playing 11 mini-Ditkas

I totally agree with your point - my comment about play calling was more directed to earlier posts . There is no doubt that Bubba's philosophy is infused into the staff and team. With good recruiting (which we have generally been doing) this is a recipe for good teams that never quite get over the hump. What's frustrating to me is this philosophy seems to be hard-baked into Bubba - if not we would have changed after the Richmond fiasco. We look like world beaters against weaker teams, but when good teams catch on to our philosophy they stack the box and we almost never make them pay. Rinse, Repeat. Playing not to lose is a real momentum breaker and drives me nuts.

I don't think Bubba directly interferes with play calling. And we have lots of plays - it's just how we use them sometimes that is problematic. Bubba is one of the original "play not to lose" guys and has definitely put his stamp on things. The 2nd and 2 play calls were examples of this philosophy. We have no killer instinct - our tendency is to get conservative with a lead against a good team. We can wheel and deal against weaker teams, but when faced with a strong opponent we revert. In addition, we have no downfield threat in our arsenal which often comes back to bite us. How many times over the last several years have we seen 8 in the box - and we will continue to see this until we address this. It's not like this is a new issue. A running game against a stacked defense and 5 yard passes are not going to get us to the next level.

That is true about the FCS vs FBS - Montana beat #20 Washington for example - however Utah State is a Mountain West team that was 1-5 last year and in my opinion we were behind in talent in almost every area. We could neither cover their receivers or run the ball on them. Once they adjusted on defense we couldn't do anything. If by "active" defense you mean continually out of position and running to cover then you are correct. And for the last 3 quarters I saw exactly zero imagination from our offense - which resulted in a whopping 3 points. I agree that altitude was a factor but so was playing not to lose. We have potential but a lot of areas to clean up and improve in order to be close to a top 4 team. I hope we get there but so far we are not close. If we learn from this game we could take big steps to get there.

My take-aways after a night's sleep. We are not as bad as we looked for 3 quarters. We were punching above our weight and got exposed. However, I think there are serious issues that need to be addressed if we are going to have the season we expected. The inability to throw down field is not a new issue, yet here we are again. When good teams stack the box we are going to have a bad time. I was not impressed with our mental toughness - when things started to go sideways we folded like a cheap lawn chair. We were certainly not assignment sharp - blown coverage, out of place players etc. (not to mention being tackled by our own player). Line strength is a concern. While we will likely handle weaker opponents when we meet the big boys we are still in danger of getting spanked. Finally, overall coaching philosophy. Bubba coaches like he wants to re-live Lennon's championship year. It ain't going to happen. Danny is certainly an upgrade, but the 2nd and 2 calls were painful to watch and came at a critical time. We need to stop playing not to lose. We still have time to right the ship. Prediction - a good but not great season with flashes of really good play but not quite enough to carry us. Overall still a step away from where we need to be. Rinse repeat.

And it's not like this issue just popped up - Bubba makes adjustments at glacial speed - if at all.

My prediction is that the only thing worse than our collapse will be Bubba's post game presser.

How about our 2nd and 2 calls?