It was impressive that our Leos won the second game of our back to back contests with the Riders and that we were able win that second game in the Riders back yard. Its not an easy thing to do.
In our first win of the season over the Riders Travis Lulay had his best outing passing the football over the past 3 seasons and that included all the games he played in his 2011 MOP season. Against the Riders on Friday night, Lulay ran for over 100 yards on 6 carries - his best game running the football in his career as a B.C. Lion. It was also the best game running the football for a B.C. Lion quarterback since Casey Printers in the 2005 season.
One has to be impressed with Tedford's reign so far as ourB.C. Lion Head Coach. His major impact has been offensively so far and he has made key decisions and created key changes in order to achieve the success we've made so far. Those deciions have included
~demoting Khari Jones, hiring George Cortez and even more importantly, hiring Malone to coach our offensive line
-changing our offensive structure by incorporating a tight end into our offence
-having a very wise plan to deal with Lulay's off-season shoulder injury and history of shoulder problems to have Lulay ready to begin this season as our starting quarterback
-prepareing Lulay mentally to take a different approach to playing his position to best avoid potential future injury
-focusing on fundamentals with all his quarterbacks including Lulay and simulating ng game situations in practices
-excellent coaching of Lulay to work on quicker progressions for second and third reads.
-recognizing that we needed a change in personell at the center position and therefore the decision to go with an import center
-moving Valli to the back up guard position and inserting Player at right guard (Norman could contest there when he returns from injury and with Draheim playing so well its also possible that Steward could be moved to guard in the future
-getting rid of Poblah, even though Wally seemed in love with him and signed him again in the off-serason
-being able to recruit Austin Collie, who could step into the slot position - he is as good as a import at that spot with a National status - the move allowed us to move Shawn Gore outside to wide side outside receiver and Iannauzzi as a backup.
-moving Arseanault outside, where he is a much better option as a vertical receiver
Lulay has more time to throw, is a more confident quarterback passing the football after his first read, and looks comfortable and poised in the pocket and when throwing the football. A new offensive system from the Khari Jones model of last season was necessary for Lulay to have this kind of early success as was better line protection and better coaching for the quarterback position. Lulay looks enthused, much more relaxed, and our offence continues to make progress. Our defense is another story. Here are some post-game thoughts.
OFFENCE
On a previous KEYS TO THE GAME, in posting the following
Right now it seems like our offence is structured to protect Lulay. But unfortunately that is also restrictive. Lulay is at his best when he is mobile, throwing off the sprint out or misdirection play action and finding his open receiver that way or dumping to Harris or taking off downfield. Against Ottawa we had him in the pocket while using an extra blocker in pass protection.
Lulay's skill set favors the read option, misdirection play action semi-boots, quick sprint out pass plays, and getting outside the box using 'chip' blocking, so he can have a split field while having options for layered routes, including throwing to Harris underneath, or taking off upfield. Those concepts were what made Lulay so effective and dangourous when he won the MOP award in 2011.
I hoped that we would not try to protect Lulay by just keeping him in the pocket but I didn't believe that we would give him the read option play or at least not at this time in the season. What a pleasant surprise to see it happen. Keeping Lulay in the pocket was not the answer. Making sure that when he ran the football he protected himself was the far better strategy. Quarterbacks usually get hurt in the pocket more often than the open field anyway.
But I wasn't the only one who was surprised that we would turn Lulay loose. So were the Riders. They never expected Lulay to pull the football and take off on the read option. Hall was crashing down on Harris. Our Leos ran the misdirection option very well and Lulay is such a good runner. The ability to execute it so well and with surprise was such an asset. Once the Riders tried to play it more honesty, it opened up the inside run for Harris, who is at his best running north/south inside the tackles with the ability to shift in the second layer.
Secondly, our offence targeted our tight end as a primary target in the red zone and short yardage passing situatons. I understood why Tedord chose Morrah as our starting tight end early in the season due to his experience. But A.C. Leonard is a bigger, faster, more athletic target. We showed confidence in Leonard early by primarily targeting him and Lulay also showed confidence in Leonard by throwing the football to him on those situations.
Arsenault, now back outside at short side wide receiver, continues to be a deep threat, which opens up the underneath game. We also used Harris the way he is best used, as a double threat as a runner and receiver out of the backfield.
Our offence also drove the football for a touchdown on our first series and we had the lead all game, which was important to take the Regina crowd out of the game and force the Riders to play uphill.
We went more spread this game. That was by design to both incorporate Leonard, without asking him to do too much and to open up the read option for Lulay but we did use Lumbala in some tight end sets.
All in all, it was another good offensive performance that builds confidence. With a new offensive system, with new coaches (Tedford, Cortez, Malone impacting the offence), new starting offensive at their positions (Foster, Draheim, Player), new receivers or receivers playing new positions from last season (Collie, Leonard in his first game as a pro), Taylor at the ranger position, Arsenault back outside, Gore playing a new position) and a starting quarterback who hardly played last season, we are ahead of schedule and the progress we have made so far is excellent.
Our offence is averaging 381 yards per game, second in the CFL to the Riders 504 yards per game, at this point.
We have to take into account that the Riders defense has been lousy all season so far but even still there are a lot of good things going on offensively with our Lions from Lulay to our offensive line to our play calling. We still need to get better in the red zone, we really need to use more motion, and we would be wise, over an 18 game schedule, to incorporate Lawrence and Lochard into our offence to keep Harris fresher over the longer haul.
DEFENSE
Its not easy to find a lot of positives regarding our defense, after giving up over 500 yards of net offence to the Riders. Yes, Chap's offence was excellent in the Riders first two games of the season before we played them and was rolling up the huge yards on the ground and in the air (Glenn is leading the league in passing and has an impressive 110.7 quarterback efficiency average) but our strategy in playing Chap's offence and Glenn was baffling.
The Riders are averaging over 500 yards of offence per game this season, in their first four games and they lead the CFL in most offensive statistics. But our Lions defense did not do anything to change the Riders success in their first two games and allowed them to carry on with their offensive success, even with seeing a lot of tape on them in their first three games, including last weeks game.
Yes, playing zone has become more necessary with the new pass interference rules but playing soft zone against a possession style passing game is not wise. We were fortunate that the Riders did not score touchdowns earlier and more often in this game because they moved the ball very well against us. Its really been individual plays, such as the tackle by Eliminian, who came from nowhere to tackle Messam, with a huge open field in front of him, that kept the score down. Its really individual talent, rather than scheme, that is allowing our defense to play as well as it is, at times.
Why we didn't play tighter zone, as well as more effectively blitz the middle on occasion to create penetration and get a player in Glenn's face is baffling. Most of the time we gave Glenn a vanilla look, dropped the linebackers very deep, and allowed the Regina offence to now exactly what we were doing. Roh had an early sack up the middle and his pressure also led to an interception by Lee but too often we didn't break down the pocket quickly enough on Glenn.
Secondly, when we did blitz, our blitzes were so obvious and so badly executed, it was almost embarrassing to watch. Our run defense, most of the time is atrocious, as it was last season.
Too many are blaming our defensive line. But our defensive line had Taylor and Mitchell or Taylor and Westerman at tackle last season and the result was the same.
Give us Stubler back at defensive coordinator, with this same line or last year's defensive line, and the result would be different. Stubler isn't coming back but something has to change. I would love us to hire Dave Ritchie as a defensive consultant, as we hired Hufnagel in that same role in 2007 with our offence. Likely won't happen. But Washington, as really a Buono deciscion to be our DC, is a Buono/Benevedes clone, in terms of defensive philosophy. But you just can`t play soft vanilla in today`s CFL and we really need the defensive brain power of a Ritchie or a Stubler or Washington has to change tracks and develop and quickly (if he can). If we didn`t have such a great linebacking corps in Sol E. and Bighill, along with Hoffman-Ellis and Lokombo rotating in and some talented defensive backs we would be in big trouble.
It`s also tough on a defensive line when they have to constantly pass rush vanilla, with the ends containing and the tackles coming straight up field. We rarely stunt, loop, off-set, or do anything to advantage them.
Our Lions have the lowest average time of possession in the CFL, because our defense is on the field too long, were giving up the most average yards per rush in the CFL, we`re eight in terms of average length per completion against, we`re giving up an average of 420 yards per game so far (eighth) and were 7th in average points per game against (that`s not bend but not break)
Tedford is going to need to focus more on our defense, in one way or the other, going forward.
SPECIAL TEAMS
Once again, Murray Lawrence had a big kickoff return, this time setting up a Leos touchdown. However, I wonder why we don`t try to incorporate him more into our punt return game. We`re still going with Tillman and Iannuzzi and Lawrence could add a different dimension.
I thought that Hoffman-Ellis, Lumbala, and Lokombo did a great job on our downfield coverage. Leone is having a very good start to his career as a pro. He punts the football deep and high and with his very little experience as a field goal kicker, one has to be very pleased at this point. Leone has the best punting average in the CFL with a 49 yard average.
I thought it was interesting to see McCallum be given the opportunity to kick a 50 yard field goal and he made it with yards to spare. Guess his leg was not as weak as Benevedes and Wally made it out to be over the last couple of years.
Iannuzzi fielded a punt on our one yard line instead of letting the football go into the end zone. Not sure if it was Iannuzzi`s fault or a communication breakdown between our special teams coach and himself but these are situations that have happened too often in the past and need to be cleaned up.
WRAP
We`re 2-1. A decent start to the season for a team that most prognosticators and numerous fans were predicting for fourth or last in the West. I was more optimistic. Our offense is a strength so far. Our defense is a liability that Is underperforming and disappointing. Our personnel is better than our results so far on defense. If we don`t get our defense fixed we are going to pay a price.
On the positive side, we have momentum. There are many more positives than last season. We won the second half of a back to back meeting with the Roughriders in Regina. Our Leos are exciting to watch on offence. Our new talent is performing. Looking very forward to our next Leos game.
"When I went to Catholic high school in Philadelphia, we just had one coach for football and basketball. He took all of us who turned out and had us run through a forest. The ones who ran into the trees were on the football team". (George Raveling)
