Minnesota State at Slippery Rock

[Purple Mav Man]

Mankato threw 2 int's in 16 pass attempts against a team geared to stop the RB.

They did. And both were terrible throws.

[jrshooter]

The schools that have been doing well in the PSAC in recent years aren't necessarily the ones with the most scholarships.

A very key point.

[Purple Mav Man]

Also,

Mankato had 213 yds rushing. 75 of was on one run that slipped thru a blitz with man coverage behind it. So the total up front domination by the OL had 138 rushing yds on 35 att other than the big run....vs a SRU run D that nobody would say is great. That's less than 4 yds a carry.

And 250 yards passing on 10 completions. Because, as mentioned, SR completely sold out on the run.

[Horror Child]

Rivers and Rock stymied by a visiting team wearing purple and gold again.

But hey, they dominated time of possession.

[Purple Mav Man]

Ya, Because that's what I meant by that.

It was based on the Mankato line being all the sudden Big Ten caliber by conversation throughout this thread. The big run broke through a blitz and like a 4 and 1 type run that goes all the way. But it does count. Good point.

Guess that O-Line picked up the blitz and opened a hole. Weird.

[PSACfan1]

It's pretty ironic that you are telling people to "pipe down."

[IUPbigINDIANS]

I did see that at Ship this year. There were some good individual skill players, but I didn't see the depth they had on coach Mac's better teams. The difference between the top few teams and rest of the league was really a chasm this year. A year after beating both Slippery Rock and Indiana, Ship wasn't even competitive with them this season. They did have some young guys playing and I'm hoping we'll see improvement next season. Discussion about the disparity in D2 scholarships is nothing new. I think there are only so many small schools with the desire and means to fund 30 or more scholarships. This probably wouldn't be a popular opinion, but I'm wondering if they shouldn't go to something like an NAIA model with a 24-schollie limit in football. I know the NCAA is generally sexier to most schools than the NAIA, but there are more than 160 schools playing D2, probably enough to add another NCAA division if there was a desire. Teams that wanted to go big could still go big. I'm just afraid you're going to see more schools drop out of D2 or drop football entirely if things go on as they are.

And I agree that you could fully fund some of our schools with the way it is now and probably still not be nationally competitive. The schools that have been doing well in the PSAC in recent years aren't necessarily the ones with the most scholarships.

SR1 was gaining minimal traction the past two years prior to SRU crapping the bed yesterday with an awful showing. The prior two years we at least had a respectable showing. Yesterday unfortunately set us back to the norm.


I just wonder if SR1 d-coordinators had played like MSM instead of crapping their pants, Tomlin style, against Rivers.

[Ship69]

SR1 was gaining minimal traction the past two years prior to SRU crapping the bed yesterday with an awful showing. The prior two years we at least had a respectable showing. Yesterday unfortunately set us back to the norm.


I just wonder if SR1 d-coordinators had played like MSM instead of crapping their pants, Tomlin style, against Rivers.

Well, "minimal traction" is a good description. The area hasn't done much on a national level in a long time. Need to start consistently getting to the final four and championship game (and not get our doors blown off when we do it) before our region can say much at all.

[laker]

I'm still in awe of Shane Zylstra making this catch. I'm thinking back to the best catch that I ever made on my fingertips in a game and it was no where near what this was. The coverage was even right there.

[EdinboroFB]

Guess that O-Line picked up the blitz and opened a hole. Weird.

Ya, I just watched the replay. I thought SRU just got schemed there in a bad defensive call....but the LT made a nice block on Rock's best LB #1 and the TE totally washed the DE. I think the DE was doing an inside stunt but I'm not sure. It looked like the DL was stunting inside with the LBs coming over top. Rock looked like they did that on the TD run before it by the big RB too and Mankato gashed it. Same thing the TE totally washed the DE down the line....LB's picked up....safety missed the one on one tackle. Rock is fascinated by that stunt. They got burnt vs. Edinboro running it over and over. Mankato was ready for it and gashed it up both of those times.

Also, I thought the jet sweep TD early was great coaching from Mankato. Rock was selling out to Gunn and the jet sweep went the other way. (I think...that's from watching it live)

[Tundra_Man]

The NSIC South is more highly ranked according to Massey. The North really brings the conference down.

This. The NSIC North is pretty bad. Really the only good team they have is Duluth, and frankly the Bulldogs weren't that great this year either. Bemidji is above average. The remaining six NSIC North teams have a long way to go to become competitive. Well, actually the remaining four because two of them dropped football last week.

[EdinboroFB]

I'm still in awe of Shane Zylstra making this catch. I'm thinking back to the best catch that I ever made on my fingertips in a game and it was no where near what this was. The coverage was even right there.

He's quicker than given credit also. It looked like he got of the line without even being touched by the corner on that slant for a td.

[msumavfan]

Also,

Mankato had 213 yds rushing. 75 of was on one run that slipped thru a blitz with man coverage behind it. So the total up front domination by the OL had 138 rushing yds on 35 att other than the big run....vs a SRU run D that nobody would say is great. That's less than 4 yds a carry.

[msumavfan]

No doubt everybody is correct. The PSAC can't match up with some of the other conferences and our best teams have had a lot of difficulty when they get deep into the NCAA tournament. But I don't give up hope. I don't necessarily think the difference is insurmountable.

It is definitely possible for a PSAC team to break through. IUP was pretty good 2 years ago but they blew it. And it's been discussed many times if Redfield didn't get hurt against Assumption we could have been competitive. We will never know.

NDC from SR1 was competitive last year. Slippery Rock wasn't the PSAC Team of the Decade like they were made out to be. After all, they beat 3 PSAC teams by a grand total of 8 points.

Everybody is fretting about the blowout yesterday but I think it's possible the Rock got a bad matchup. After watching the other semifinal I think it's possible SRU would match up better with either Ferris State or UWF.

It seems that there are always 3-4 teams in D2 that are clearly superior. But those teams change. Where is Pitt State? NWMSU? Grand Valley?

The history does reflect a weaker conference but things can change. Programs rise and fall. I think one of our teams can make a cinderella run at some point.

Unfortunately I think both of those teams would handle SRU pretty easily. They have great line play like Mankato and control the game that way. I think the result would be pretty similar to the Mankato game against both of them. Maybe SRU could keep it within 30.

[Twincitiesmav]

Massey has the conferences in this order this year:

1. GSC
2. GLIAC
3. MIAA
4. LSC
5. RMAC
6. SAC
7. GLVC
8. NSIC
9. PSAC
10. GMAC
11. GAC
12. MEC
13. SIAC
14. CIAA
15. NE10

Dang.. no GNAC hahaha!!