Week Two Review

I want to emphasize that these opinions, like everything else in this blog represent my opinions only and not those of the San Diego Surge organization or the Women’s Football Association, ok?

We had a game this past weekend, which we won 62-0. We ran 24 offensive plays (had a running clock from the 7:00 mark of the second quarter on), scoring 8 touchdowns. We also had one on a punt return. We averaged 20.8 yards per carry on the ground. Of our 24 plays, 14 were passes, and we completed only 50%. So yes, we threw in the second half (2 or 3 out of the 6 plays we had), but would the defense rather have a 50% chance of stopping the play, or give up an almost guaranteed 20 yards?

When we lined up for the opening kickoff, the receiving team lined up 20 yards off the ball. We declined to kick it onside. They fixed it, sort of, on the following kicks, moving up to 15 yards off. We never took advantage.

I mention all this to emphasize that we really weren’t trying to run up the score. I suppose we could have run up the middle, but I’m not a huge fan of running our backs straight into unblocked defenders, you know? Player safety does have a role in play calling, and when there are 8/9 defenders stacked inside against our spread formations, it just makes no sense.

Here’s the thing….short of giving the other team a 50-point head start, there’s not a rule change in the world that could have changed the result. When you are flat out faster than the other team at every position on the field, it is simply not going to end well.

Ken Massey said in advance of the NCAA women’s basketball championship something to the effect of, “there is a greater disparity in talent between the #1 women’s team and the #3 team than there is between the #1 men’s team and the #120 team”. I believe that to be true in the women’s game as well. It was graphically pointed out last year when the Chicago Force beat the Dallas Diamonds 81-34 in the WFA Championship game. Now, it’s not normally that bad – the spread in 2012 was 4 and in 2011 it was 15. But overall, I think you can draw a line after the top six teams in the league (in alphabetical order: Boston, Central Cal, Chicago, DC, Kansas City & San Diego) and there will be a wide margin of difference between #6 and #7 and certainly between #7 and #50-something.

I’m not quite sure of the reason for all this. This week, the main culprit was speed. We had it, our opponents did not. They have a good head coach, but he’s had trouble like so many other teams, in finding enough quality assistants. It’s tough to build a team of committed, quality assistants who volunteer.

The team we’re playing this week apparently went through another off-season coaching change, and that is tough as well. We’ve had coaches on our staff be with the core of this team since 2001 (not a typo). I’ve had a couple of offensive linemen be with me for 10 years now. The point is, when you have that type of continuity going, plus talent, rule changes are not going to even the playing field.

So right now, in all honesty, we find ourselves over the next couple of weeks facing the same “problem” Team USA did last year: playing teams that we will beat, by a lot. We have to continue to stress in practice that at this point it isn’t about the other team at all, but about how close to perfection we can get in our execution of technique and scheme. We will have tough games down the road! I also want to emphasize that I have the utmost respect for our upcoming opponents – it takes a lot to go out and fight until the end knowing what you’re up against. The team last week certainly did that, and the team we’re playing this week has a reputation for that as well. Plus, they have some of the most genuinely nice people we’ve ever played against. Maybe that’s not so good on a football field though……

Until next week!