SicEm365’s Jack Mackenzie answers the questions posed by Grayson Grundhoefer in the “Keys to the Game” for Baylor’s matchup against Samford.
1. Who will shine at the quarterback position?
When the starting quarterback doesn’t shine against the weakest opponent on your schedule — whether he was pressing to make up for his teammates’ lack of effort and or focus or not — the amount of snaps available to the backups is going to shrink. With Sawyer Robertson throwing a pair of interceptions during his 37-attempt, 75-snap outing, there were only 15 snaps left for his backups when he was pulled in the fourth quarter. The man to take those snaps was redshirt freshman Nate Bennett.
Head coach Dave Aranda spoke on his thought process for playing Bennett ahead of Walker White and Edward Griffin after the game, saying: “We kind of wanted to go with guys from just how long you know their experience level here, and so we're thinking of kind of going in order of how long the guys have been here.” To me, this shows that the battle for QB2 is still going.
As Grayson said when posing this question before the game, Bennett’s strengths are different from White’s: accuracy and knowledge of the offense versus arm strength and power running ability. Different situations could call for one or the other, so time at Baylor being the tiebreaker here doesn’t garner a huge reaction from me. However, it is not very good that Bennett only got 15 snaps and seven pass attempts (five completions, 34 yards) while White got none. This game should have been solid experience for both despite the weak opponent. Instead, the team didn’t take care of business, and those of us outside of the building are left in the dark.
2. How many yards will Baylor rush for?
234 yards. Next question!
More seriously, the Bears averaged 5.2 yards per carry and seemed to switch between taking what they wanted and leaving serious questions about the level of the offensive line. Take out Bryson Washington’s 23-yard and 31-yard runs on the Bears’ second drive of the game, and you’re looking at 2.75 yards per carry in the first half and 4.39 yards per carry for the game. Yes, breaking off long runs is part of the game, and it is cheap to cherry-pick stats. But 2.75 yards per carry against Samford?
Once again, I fall back on what Aranda said about his team’s focus after the game: “I think we're kind of pulling teeth to kind of get a focus and an energy. And I thought we're able to break some plays early, and then we weren't able to break those plays late, and we kind of had to move people, to get out of the way, to find space, and we weren't doing that.” If the offensive line unit was not guilty of this, then it’s a skill issue, and that's worse.
3. Can the defense dominate and hold Samford to seven points or less?
Baylor’s defense, as Grayson said, was allowing 41.5 points per game through the first two weeks. After allowing just seven points to Samford, the Bears now give up an average of 30 points per game. Baylor gave up 195 total yards on Saturday, with 100 of them coming through the air. The Bulldogs converted just four of their 15 third-down attempts and did not go for it on a fourth down, so the Bears held Samford below their season average of 34.7% conversion on such downs. The green and gold forced four turnovers (three interceptions and one fumble) but only generated two sacks. For reference, Samford had allowed eight sacks through their first two games.
When looking at the running game specifically, Baylor could have been a bit better. Samford had only run for 114 yards with 1.9 yards per attempt through two weeks, but can add 95 rushing yards at a 2.9 yards per carry clip to that total. Against the pass, which is Samford’s preferred method of moving the ball, the Bears held the Bulldog quarterbacks to a 13/25 for 100 yards performance, including the three interceptions. Overall, the defense was not necessarily dominant, but between the turnovers and the scoreboard, they did what they had to do. Hopefully, that builds confidence.
4. What kind of production will we see from the freshman?
Grayson named five freshmen as players who are unlikely to use a redshirt this season. Those five were Caden Knighten, Kamauryn Morgan, Kaleb Burns, Rhett Armstrong and Bo Onu.
- Caden Knighten: 10 carries, 34 yards, 1 TD, long of 9 yards
- Kamauryn Morgan: 16 snaps (9 run defense, 7 pass rush), 1 tackle, 1 assist
- Kaleb Burns: 9 snaps (4 run defense, 5 coverage), 1 assist
- Bo Onu: 11 snaps (5 run defense, 6 coverage), 2 tackles
- Rhett Armstrong: 7 kickoffs, 7 touchbacks
Other names mentioned by Grayson to look out for were:
- Taz Williams: 15 snaps, 2 targets, 1 reception, 11 yards
- Jacorey Watson: 13 snaps, 2 targets, 2 receptions, 6 yards
- Harrison Cluff: 15 snaps (7 pass, 8 run)
- Matthew Parker: 15 snaps (7 pass, 8 run)
- Jackson Blackwell: DNP
- KB Winston: DNP
- Leo Almanza: DNP
So, not a whole lot of production from the freshmen in the game they were most likely to produce in. Once again, how much did the lack of focus of the team as a whole affect the snap counts of the younger guys?
