Okay, so this is a message board, so let's throw out some crazy, wild ass theories as to why Rouse outperformed Hilliman running the ball today. I know that the most popular theory is going to be that either Maine was gassed by that point in the game or it just so happened that our line blocked better for Rouse on those two runs than they did for Hilliman. But I'm not buying it. I'll throw out two theories of my own:
- Rouse did a better job of setting up his inexperienced blockers today. Especially on his second TD run, I thought Rouse did a brilliant job of waiting for his center to get in front of him, reading the direction the tackler was going and cutting off the block. I wonder if Hilliman (who is a very good runner and usually reads blocks well) was a little over anxious today and wasn't waiting for his blockers.
- Tendencies. I think that Maine was reading our tendencies today and attacking based on that. I think when Hilliman was in the ball game, they were expecting him to get the ball and keying off him. With Rouse in the backfield, they weren't keying on the run (in fact we usually throw with him back there) so they actually had to cover all options. I think the same thing happened with Thadd Smith versus Alston - when Alston is in the ballgame, they watch for that jet sweep (or whatever it is called) and they were able to shut it down. But they didn't expect it from Smith, so it was more successful. If I am right about this, then Daz and our OC need to learn to break their tendencies more often. I think we all feel this about Daz - just too predictable. We don't make a defense cover all options in most cases.
