The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

[Oldhen]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

Do you spuds use a different calendar out there in Dover-Dover land? Just an FYI, in most of the galaxy, it is now 2007!

The post I answered was about '03, which will remain '03 forevermore.

[Oldhen]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

Huh. We should just fine a 'common' opponent through 3 or 4 degrees of separation, compare the scores, and declare Saturday's winner that way.

I'm almost stunned that you think your stat is meaningful in any way.

If you saw the games, you'd see the meaning.

Just to review the bidding here, the '03 game has come up a number of times. Several UD fans have pointed out that, in '03, the UD team was tested severly in their regular schedule by A-10 teams (go look at the record) and outplayed by 3-4 of them (IMHO). When we got to the playoffs, we had no idea what to expect from the opposition, who all came in with glorious stats and excellent records.

We were pleasantly surprised to find that none of them lived up to their billing, and we won the games much more easily than our conference schedule.

You can look that up.

Does this have anything to do with Saturday? Who knows? My personal opinion is not much, but when UNI folks talked about '03, we talked about '03.

As I've said elsewhere, I expect a high-scoring game Saturday (over-under could be around 90) with about zero margin for error for either team. I think the game will probably come down to the O's avoiding stopping themselves and the D's chipping in a few stops.

[Newsbreaker]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

I could have been those teams and it wouldn't be meaningful. So much of the game of football is about matchups, that's why "ease of victory" in terms of score is as meaningless as it gets.

UNI fans inquired about how this team compares to 2003, because that team was very impressive. Instead of any sort of honest appraisal, we've been given reason after reason why the 2003 team makes a win for Delaware more likely on Saturday. Or something. I'll be honest, half of what the Delaware folks have said on here reads like Chinese.

[Twin Cities Panther]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

As I've said elsewhere, I expect a high-scoring game Saturday (over-under could be around 90) with about zero margin for error for either team. I think the game will probably come down to the O's avoiding stopping themselves and the D's chipping in a few stops.

Gee, Denny Green, you forgot to add; "when two teams really wanna win, only one of them can!"

[Oldhen]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

UNI fans inquired about how this team compares to 2003, because that team was very impressive. Instead of any sort of honest appraisal, we've been given reason after reason why the 2003 team makes a win for Delaware more likely on Saturday.

Well, I posted much of this before in response to that question, folks didn't like my response, but I'll post it again.

Thru the regular season, the '03 teams and '07 teams compared like this...

'03 averages just under 400/game on O, '07 averages 470+/game. On D, thru the regular season, they are pretty comparable... '03 gave up 330/game, '07 gives up 336/game.

(This is where the trouble starts... the '03 D's stats improved dramatically in the playoffs... down to 207/game.... and conventional wisdom for the UD fans that watched the games isn't that we suddenly started to channel Richard Seymour and Brian Urlacher on D... ).

Non statistical comparison? The '03 D was much more expereinced. The '07 DL is s cypher. When we have our '07 DE's healthy (and they're supposed to be OK for UNI) the '03 team still gets an edge, but not a big one. LB's favor '03, mostly because Davis was better than anything we have now. Secondary in '03 gets an edge because of the experience they had. I think the '07 secondary is actually more athletic, but is younger. Team speed on D about even.

On O, as much as I liked our players in '03, the '07team has a big edge. OL's are comparable, maybe '03 was very slightly better. In skill positions, the big edge goes to '07, everywhere you look, and it's really not close. Speed advanage to '07, and I think it's sizeable, pretty much everywhere but QB.

Special teams? '03 by a big margin, though our FG/PAT kicking is good. Depth favors '07, mostly because we've been *killed* by injuries last two seasons and lots of playing time got spread around. We still play an awful lot of folks. Only places we drop off much are DE and QB (I personally like our backup RB better than Cuff in a lot of ways).

Hope this helps.

[Oldhen]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

Gee, Denny Green, you forgot to add; "when two teams really wanna win, only one of them can!"

I can be more specific.

UD's big problem this year has been consistency, on both sides of the ball. Both O and D have played around 6-7 quarters of bad football, but have been very good otherwise. You can't throw those out, and we go into games knowing it will all depend on who shows up in the Michigan-style helmets.

On O, our best weapon has been a two-edged sword. When I say Flacco could throw the ball through a cinderblock wall, it's only slight hyperbole. He simply has one of the srongest arms I've ever seen in 50+ years of watching football. He's an unflappable sort, and looks like nothing bothers him... but when he's jacked up, he tends to throw TOO hard, and this can result in drops and getting a little wild high. FWIW, we've had games (Villanova) when Flacco was actually throwing pretty well, but our recievers couldn't catch a cold (we have two who can be erratic). Similarly, our OL has had stretches when they looked lethargic.

On D, lots depends on whether we have #11 and #99playing and reasonably healthy. When they're playing close to 100%, we can be a very good D. They've both missed stretches with injuries (#99 more than #11) and we're inconsistent without them, our LB's have a much harder time of it with blockers at the second level, and we get less pressure on the QB, which stretches the secondary.

The other wildcard is our OC. He's like the little girl with the curl... when he's good he's very, very good, but when he's bad he's horrid. Lots of UD's fans think that overcoming his gameplans and game-day calls are sometimes harder than playing the opposing D's. If/when he screws up, it'll have your fans scratching their heads, thinking 'WTF are they doing?' Trust me.

I see the game playing out one of two ways. We show up with our 'A' game, it'll be a barnburner. We show up like we did in the first half at UNH, it'll be UNI comfortably.

[Big_Al]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

Excellent post about what to expect from UD.

One thing to remember about what to expect from UNI -- 38-35 vs. UNH doesn't tell the whole story. I think many Delaware fans are tempted to look at that score and conclude UNI is a paper tiger. I mean, hey, they barely beat 7-4 UNH!

Everyone likes to talk about The Catch (which was incredible), but the real story should be about The Fumble That Wasn't. UNI was threatening to score when the BSC officials made that bogus call. As it was, UNH was able to take that gift and put a bow on it, bringing them back into the game.

IMHO, UNI beat UNH by 10, UNH's offense by 17 and the BSC's terrible officials by 3. That's the best picture of the game.

[Oldhen]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

Just to be clear, the rest of the nation thought the 2003 edition of the Blue Hens was one of the best in 1-AA history, but their fans don't think they were that good. I've heard they didn't "turn it on" until the play-offs. Then, fast forward to now, the CAA was so tough that the play-offs will be easy by comparison so it will appear that the Blue Hens will again "turn it on" during their run to an evantual National Championship.

I wish I could say that's what's going to happen.

Don't get me wrong, we were happy to go into the playoffs 11-1 in '03, but folks who watched us all season knew we were outplayed 3-4-5 times and still found a way to win close games (and two with multiple OT's). The 'best team in 1-AA history' stuff came when folks outside our little corner of the East Coast tuned in to watch. It just wasn't the whole story of the whole season.

PS.... insofar as the A-10's quality at the time is getting called into question, remember that the following year, JMU won it all, without having any home games at all in the playoffs. Going 4-0 on the road against that playoff lineup was pretty impressive to me, maybe even moreso than our wins at home the previous year.

[shush21]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

This getting funny! As I have stated before, this is going to be a fantastic game to watch. I'm going to be in Chicago and debating to head west for the game and see what this dome is all about! I hear its loud but our guys have been thru their fair share of 22,000+ games in the Tub. We will see how they handle the noise. I posted this on the gohens board as I am about to do now again. We have something that you guys are looking for...good luck to both teams.

[clenz]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

Don't get me wrong, we were happy to go into the playoffs 11-1 in '03, but folks who watched us all season knew we were outplayed 3-4-5 times and still found a way to win close games (and two with multiple OT's).

Sounds like a couple of our games this season. We must not be as good as the 03 Hens. We both found ways to win when we probably shouldn't have in the regular season, but when people look back in 25 years they will go "That 03 team would destroy and FCS team EVER! And that 07 UNI team, vastly overrated, I mean hell they only beat two 7-4 teams by a combined 4 points!"

[joecooll6]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

So Delaware has won a national title? What year was that?

[clenz]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

So Delaware has won a national title? What year was that?

Not really sure, I'll do some research and get back to you on that one

[Twin Cities Panther]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

[QUOTE=shush21;102869]This getting funny! As I have stated before, this is going to be a fantastic game to watch. I'm going to be in Chicago and debating to head west for the game and see what this dome is all about! I hear its loud but our guys have been thru their fair share of 22,000+ games in the Tub. We will see how they handle the noise. I posted this on the gohens board as I am about to do now again. We have something that you guys are looking for...good luck to both teams.


QUOTE]

What is "The Tub?" KFC's weekly special; a "Tub" of fried Blue Hen and 4 lbs of mashed potatos for $7.99?

[Oldhen]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

Is "The Tub" your home field? It's great that is seats 22,000 plus and your guys have been through their fair share of games there...but are the fans screaming as loud as they can when your offense is on the field? If so, you're a pretty uneducated fan base. When UNI is on offense in the Dome...you won't hear crowd noise unless there is a good play on the field. When Delaware's offense is on the field...it will be loud!

This is the best pic I could find.... looking from the SEZ, backed by our sports athletic complex, toward the NEZ. "The Tub" refers to Tubby Raymond Field. He's the coach that preceeded KC Keeler, 300 wins, HOF.

You can see the stands are pretty much on top of the benches. It's pretty noisy there all the time. Doesn't matter all that much, our plays are signaled in from the sideline visually. Everybody looks. Unless your guys turn out the lights or something, we'll be OK.... maybe a couple of motion calls until we get acclimated.




Couple other shots to give you a better feel.







OK, the honey shot was gratituous.

[clenz]

Re: The OFFICIAL:... I am now scared of Delaware thread......

Thats the best you got at UD for girls? I feel bad for you. no wonder Cuff plays chess in his free time