That should have been a win. All they had to do was continue to run the ball and convert any short situations that came up. Instead Smith and the OC got “Luton Happy” and began throwing when Hawaii never established they could stop the run (Beavs had like 200 yards by the 2nd quarter).

A list of some Smith errors:

1. Luton was not the best option to win the game. If the coach claims he wants to put his players in the best position to win, you can’t tell me that was Luton (at least not tonight, though I don’t think ever).

2. Kicking with Choker from 52. This guy can’t even make it from 32.

3. Fake punt when that was so obvious Hawaii was just standing there waiting for it. You should either punt or go for it with your actual QB.

4. Abandoning the run mid game and falling in love with Luton for no reason.

5. Not having Luton throw a hail mary instead and instead you call a trick play that never works. The guy’s strength is supposed to be his 60 yard bombs. Haven’t seen one.

6. Poor fundamentals. No discipline in the players — they punch one another in the face.

7. Abandoning Pierce when he had an 11.3 YPC and was the best player in the 1st half.

8. Not giving Gebbia a shot to win the game with Luton clearly was not the answer.

9. Etc. Has to be more.

What a disaster. Smith now has lost the Nevada and Hawaii games due to poor coaching. To state the obvious: we’re not a program that can afford that. Let me know what I missed on the list. There has to be more.

Go Beavs.

I’m going with a cautiously optimistic Beav victory.

34-31

Super busy, but this will act as a placeholder for now.

Hopefully I can write up something later. If any of the other mods want to write a preview of the game please do so.

Something I noticed during the game, and that I mentioned in the prior thread:

Beavs have a mental problem where they think hanging around in a game for a few quarters is good enough. They’ve had this forever. It’s something institutional and systemic. I could see the defenders lacking desire and instead looking around for someone else to make a play. It’s very disturbing because it’s ingrained and therefore harder to fix than talent problems.

This led me to conclude the Beav’s D is running on the “Bystander Effect.”

What Is the Bystander Effect?

The bystander effect occurs when the presence of others discourages an individual from intervening in an emergency situation. The greater the number of bystanders, the less likely it is for any one of them to provide help to a person in distress. People are more likely to take action in a crisis when there are few or no other witnesses present.Social psychologists Bibb Latané and John Darley popularized the concept of the bystander effect following the infamous 1964 Kitty Genovese murder in New York City. As 28-year-old Genovese was stabbed to death outside her apartment, neighbors failed to step in to assist or call the police. Latané and Darley attributed the bystander effect to the perceived diffusion of responsibility (onlookers are less likely to intervene if there are other witnesses who seem likely to do so) and social influence (individuals monitor the behavior of those around them to determine how to act). […] Some efforts have been made, including on college campuses, to encourage people to be “active bystanders” and fight the urge to step aside when someone is in trouble.Smith seems a bit obsessed with recruiting “intelligent” players, but that trait seems linked, at least in the Beav’s case, to passivity. Some of that could be regional recruiting, too. California and Oregon tend to produce “laid back” players. The Beavs best teams of late have come from dipping into Texas (Rodgers, et al) and other regions known for less passive players.