Scouting Princeton

The Columbia and Princeton game notes are both now available online.

I don’t see any real changes in the CU two deep other than the accurate posting of Kendall Pace as the starting LT. Pace started last week over posted starter Keith Ramljak, who was actually injured. Ramljak is still listed as the backup, but I’m not sure if that’s true.

The Princeton starting lineup looks the same as well.

Quinn Epperly

Offense

Well, it all starts with the offensive line. And Princeton has the most experienced, and most likely the best O-Line in the league. Junior LT Spencer Huston is the most talented in this crew and it’s because of him and his play that the Tigers have been able to do so many different things at the QB position. Princeton has just one sack allowed.

While the front five does the hard work, “Mr. Excitement” is junior QB Quinn Epperly. Epperly is a dual threat to run and throw and while he doesn’t have eye-popping stats, (with the exception of his five TD’s), he’s the big weapon for Princeton.

His fellow QB Connor Michelsen is not spectacular, but he gets the job done and also makes it impossible to key only on Epperly. When Michelsen is under center, Epperly often lines up as a WR or even as a running back. He really reminds me of the Yale great Brian Dowling, (although he's a lot smaller). 

UPDATE: in the earlier edition of this post, I forgot to talk about the Tiger RB's, and that was a mistake. Princeton is all about deception, and RB DiAndre Atwater's story is the best example of that. Head Coach Bob Surace basically pretended Atwater, (son of former Bronco great Steve Atwater), didn't exist. He barely mentioned him, and only did so when he was forced to do so.

I can only assume that was a ruse, as Atwater is having a good season and hasn't even been used all that much considering what he can do. Columbia needs to be ready for Surace to change things up and give Atwater the ball 20 times or so to see what he can do. 

But when the Tigers do throw, senior WR Roman Wilson is the main target. Wilson has scored only one TD this year, but he’s averaging 114 receiving yards and eight catches a game. The secondary target is Matt Costello who has 10 grabs and 122 yards so far this season.

Defense

Most of us expected the Tiger D to be a bit weaker this season with the loss of Andrew Starks and Mike Catapano. But with DL Caraun Reid back for a 5^th year, no one expected the Princeton defense to go completely soft.

And in general, the Tigers have been solid defensively… if you take out the furious comeback by Lehigh that erased a 19-point PU lead in week one.

That comeback skews the stats a bit and makes the Princeton pass defense look a little weaker than it really is.  Lehigh’s amazing QB Brian Bialkowski just sliced up the Tiger pass defense throughout the second half in the season opener, while Georgetown netted fewer than 200 yards through the air and couldn’t even complete 50% of their passes in week 2.

The secondary has the other big star besides Reid in sophomore Anthony Gaffney, (more about him later), who is a spectacular athlete. The other key players in the secondary are Philip Bhaya and freshman Dorian Williams who had a breakout game vs. the Hoyas, (but is not listed on the two deep for this game. I still bet he plays).

But I do think the Tiger run defense is a real weakness. Lehigh didn’t run the ball that much, but Georgetown did and everyone who ran had good success. Here’s where the Starks and Catapano loss is being felt the most. LB Mike Zeuli is doing a pretty good job defending the edges, but the issue is that Reid is getting double teamed every play and Princeton hasn’t been able to figure out how to take 100% advantage of that… yet.

Special Teams

Columbia fans remember how Anthony Gaffney torched the Lions on the opening kickoff of the game last season for a 94-yard TD. He hasn’t broken a big one yet this season, but he’s always on the verge. Max Lescano is not a spectacular punt returner, but he’s solid.

Placekicker Nolan Bieck is basically a liability. Princeton often goes for two on PAT’s because he’s just not reliable. They did try two FG’s in week one, both in the 35-yard range, and they were both no good. Punter Tyler Roth is just okay.

Overall

Princeton is all about deception. They use deceptive formations, fake plays, and they try to move as fast as possible to make sure you don’t have a chance to catch your breath. For the most part it’s working, but it’s hard to tell how good the Tigers are overall after playing one very good team and one very bad team.

My take is that Princeton is very good, and much better than I thought they were coming into the season. The biggest reason is that Epperly has blossomed even more and the PU coaches have figured out the best ways to use him.

Throw in the facts that this is a home game and the Princeton faithful are expecting a big win, and there should be an excited atmosphere on the Tiger sideline Saturday. 

It’s All About the O-Line

I can still remember this moment as if it happened yesterday.

I was watching a NY Giants game on CBS TV during the end of the 1983 season. The Giants were awful that year, going 3-12-1. As the “Jints” were about to finish another bad loss, Pat Summerall asked John Madden where he would start to rebuild a team from scratch.

Madden didn’t wait a second with his answer: “offensive line.”

I was just 13 at the time, and his answer was confusing to kid who always thought football was about QB’s, RB’s and maybe a sack master D-liner or two.

But Madden went on to explain that without a decent O-line, everything else breaks down on a football team.

When the offensive line isn’t working, everything else on the team starts to break down.

The QB gets harassed and he starts to look terrible. The running game can’t get the job done. The defense ends up back on the field way too long. You lose games.

Madden made the simple point that there is no one unit on a team that’s more important than the offensive line. And he was right.

Columbia’s troubled teams of the recent past have all been plagued with weak offensive line play.

When Norries Wilson took over in 2006, the lack of experience on the O-line was shocking. By 2009, the Lion O-line was a lot better but even though Wilson had been a star O-lineman in college and even though he had successfully coached the front five at other schools, Columbia was never able to field a consistently strong O-line for more than a season or two.

Pete Mangurian did not inherit a great offensive line either, BUT the cupboard was much less bare for him than it was for Wilson six years before. His first order of business was to mysteriously marginalize and bench Scott Ward, CU’s lone returning All Ivy O-lineman in favor of much younger and less experienced players. And all of that was BEFORE the “grand experiment” of using lighter and supposedly stronger lineman began.

Like Wilson, Mangurian comes in with specific experience coaching offensive linemen… in his case in the NFL. But this experience has yielded much worse results. I feel for CU O-line coach Ed Argast, who I believe is probably being micromanaged by Mangurian and rendered almost useless.

I realize Fordham was a beast of a team to block. Monmouth was a formidable opponent too. And I know Princeton is no slouch… but if we don’t see real improvement this week on the O-line, (and by “improvement,” I mean giving the Lions a chance to win), then we’re officially in a crisis mode in the specific area where we all knew Columbia needed to improve the most coming into this season.

And if we don’t see different play calling to ease the O-line pass protection weakness, we may be witnessing a dangerous insanity in action on the sidelines. Putting our players in harm’s way like this simply because the coach can’t or won’t make a change to his system is criminally negligent because the safety of his players is at stake.

I know the Columbia football fan base isn’t huge, but this blog has always been solid proof that it is not dead. So I ask you: how much failure are you willing to accept in the one area where the Head Coach promised he was working the hardest? Will you sit by and still prescribe more waiting if our QB is sacked 5-6 times against Princeton on Saturday? Or will you demand that something be done?

This current scenario is EXACTLY what I was worried would result from the secretive, defensive, yes men-surrounded coach search process that yielded the Mangurian hire. Am I calling for his firing already? Of course not… BUT the parameters and the specific problems need to be publicly identified for anyone who isn’t listening.

Dianne Murphy needs to be put on notice by someone other than just me. The hiring process for Mangurian was not acceptable by any reasonable standard. Her only saving grace would have been if Mangurian could turn the team around. He isn’t doing that yet, and worse… we’re seeing a regression in the most key part of the team.

Notice that I am not even demanding wins anymore; I’m demanding SANITY. It’s insane not to change the offensive strategies to protect our players and avoid 30+-point losses.

The number for Bellevue Hospital in NYC is (212) 562-4141. If we don't see a lot more running plays Saturday at Princeton, it's time to call that number and get the guys with the white coats and the nets to take the coach away.

This is getting ugly fast, and it has nothing to do with the fans and little to do with the players. This is about the coaching, the administrators and the few, but sadly all too influential alumni apologists for them.

If you're a parent or a fan who thinks this is all too harsh, let me be the first to ask you to call Trevor McDonagh's dad and explain why you think he should keep getting the snot kicked out of him every week. Call Sean Brackett's dad and explain why it was okay for him to get batted around last season. Call Brett Nottingham's parents and explain why it was okay for him to run for his life right off the bat and end up with a broken wrist, (and frankly, he's lucky that's all it was. On another play or two, it looked like he was going to lose his head... literally).

We all get that we still have a young O-line that could get better in time. But what none of us should get or accept is a system that doesn't properly account for that weakness. The emotional pain every fan in the stands felt when McDonagh was strip sacked on Saturday wasn't just because of the result of the play, but it also because of the play call itself. 

So let’s just be clear about what any sane person wants to see for Columbia football in the next 2-3 games:

-O-line play needs to improve

-Play-calling needs to change to adjust to the O-line situation

Simple as that.

If we don’t see this, then something is very, very wrong here and it needs to be fixed.

There is no “W” in “system,” (unless you turn the “M” upside down).

You can all decide what the “M” stands for.

Ivy Power Rankings

Yale stunned everyone by using the pass primarily to beat Cornell 38-23 at Yale Bowl. Henry Furman was 29 of 36 for 353 yards, three TD’s and no picks. RB Tyler Varga hardly had to do much by his usual workhorse standards, rushing for 105 yards on just 21 carries. Cornell’s Jeff Mathews had a decent game, but his two interceptions hurt. RB Luke Hagy has been a non-factor so far this season for the Big Red.

After two games, Dartmouth looks like a super offense but weak defense kind of team. Holy Cross freshman QB Peter Pujals really torched the Big Green in every way for a 31-28 win at Memorial Field Saturday night. But you know what? The Penn game this coming Saturday is really the key game and I wouldn’t get too down about Dartmouth’s defense until we see what happens there.

Speaking of Penn, the Quakers got whacked by Villanova 35-6, and unless Head Coach Al Bagnoli is holding something back I’d say they have a real problem with their running game. Of course, the thing Bagnoli may have been holding back is QB Billy Ragone’s running plays. It makes little sense to risk having him re-injure himself against a non-league opponent.

Finally, Princeton’s offense looks sharp but the defense seems iffy after two games. Slamming Georgetown by 50-22 isn’t that impressive considering how poor a team the Hoyas are these days, but the sheer execution of the Tiger offense has me impressed. Quinn Epperly is a major weapon as a runner with a pass or two mixed in.

So here are the rankings right now:

1)      Harvard

2)      Brown

3)      Princeton

4)      Yale

5)      Dartmouth

6)      Penn

7)      Cornell

8)      Columbia

Adjust Away!

After the 0-2 start and the obvious emergency situation on the offensive line, Head Coach Pete Mangurian now says he's going to make adjustments.

I’m not sure that statement is going to be enough to placate fans who are currently locked in a debate over whether he can’t or won’t make the changes necessary to win.

I’m not ready to say Mangurian won’t make the necessary changes just because he’s married to a certain type of system. I need to see how he responds to this upcoming first Ivy League game against Princeton to be more sure of that.

Mangurian has basically two choices: he can keep the playbook intact and push ahead with trying to get improved pass protection from his existing players, OR he can adjust the playbook radically to rely less on solid pass protection and emphasize more runs and QB mobility.

What’s great about our schedule is that it does allow the Lions two out of conference games every year to learn and adjust before the games that really count begin. The bad news is that Princeton is better than I thought they’d be this season and the challenge at Princeton Stadium will be tough. But… that’s why we play the games.

Grounded

Monmouth 37 Columbia 14


Why Monmouth Won

The Hawks picked up where Fordham left off and harassed the Lion passing game. Monmouth sacked CU starter Trevor McDonagh six times and stripped of the ball twice with hits from the blind side. The Hawk offense was never spectacular, but it was efficient, controlling the ball for an amazing 39:51 of the game.


Why Columbia Lost

The Lion pass protection was abysmal, erasing the amazing efforts of RB Marcorus Garrett and a generally solid effort by the defense that eventually ran out of gas. Despite the lack of decent protection, the CU coaches continued to call for passing plays throughout the game.


Key Turning Points

-With Monmouth leading 10-7 late in the 2nd quarter, the Hawks missed a 39 yard FG and set the Lions up with the ball at their own 22 with 3:08 left in the half. After two quick 1st downs, Columbia now had the ball on their own 48. But on the ensuing play, McDonagh was hit by an untouched Hawk lineman who forced a fumble that officially was scored as an INT, (the ball never hit the ground). Monmouth scored a field goal on the resulting drive for a 13-7 lead.

-Columbia got the ball back after that FG with 1:23 left, but an exciting chance to take the lead at halftime was lost when Cameron Molina's well-thrown option pass to Denzel Hill fell incomplete when Hill slowed up on his route and the ball sailed over his head.

-The Lions got a jolt of momentum late in the 3rd quarter after Garrett delivered his second TD of the game, narrowing the Monmouth lead to 20-14. Then the Columbia defense kept it going by forcing a three-and-out thanks to a pass deflection by Chad Washington on 3rd down and five. But on the Lions first play from scrimmage after the Hawk punt, the coaches called for a play action pass. McDonagh was promptly stripped of the ball from his blind side. Monmouth recovered, scored a FG a few plays later and the Lions never really were in the running again.


Columbia Positives

-Garrett had a stunning game, netting 151 yards and two TD's on just 15 carries. His first TD was an especially electric 41 yard dash that briefly gave the Lions a 7-3 lead. He now has 240 yards on the season.

-The Columbia defense played very well, until the Lion lack of offensive possession time and killer turnovers finally forced them to run out of gas. LB Vinny Pugliese and DL Chad Washington has very strong performances.

Columbia Negatives

-The offensive line still seems clueless on pass protection. This remains the first, second, and last problem Columbia needs to fix before it can win.

-While mostly the result of his poor protection, McDonagh's overall performance was spotty. More time to hone the passing game in practice is definitely needed along with more time in the pocket.


Columbia MVP

-Marcorus Garrett was spectacular Saturday. One can only hope he'll get a chance to win some games in his senior year.