This offense can’t win on 3rd and long

Other than scoring only 13 on the road (and in the rain) against the best defense in the country (a team that hasn't been beaten in three years), we scored no fewer than 31 points in any game (no fewer than 38 in SEC play).

If we're looking to close a gap, our 3rd-and-long conversion rate just isn't where it's at.
BruinVol tries so hard to be negative, but the thing about it, is if he wanted to be critical of our defense for our opponent's 3rd down conversion success .... I would agree with the guy. That is a legitimate area of concern. We used to talk about 3rd and Chavis. 3rd and Banks makes me long for those days.
 
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I think everyone struggles on 3rd and long. You only have one play to get 6+ yards, pressure increases and your odds of converting go down astronomically. I don’t think it’s a problem in the design of the offense. Statistically, this year may have been better than last year, but I would guess based on what I saw this season that UT was worse on 1st and 2nd down this year than last.

Lots of “well everyone struggles with 3rd and long” yes that’s true BUT to what degree?? That’s the point of this topic.


I’m not going to have time to go back and look at all the SEC teams but I have chosen Mizzu to look at. Last year they went 6-7…


I’ll get this years stats shortly when they went 10-2 but it’s alarming to me how much better at 3rd and long they are than us even in the 6-7 year


Here’s the stat :

They converted 36%of their 3rd and longs


That’s way ahead of our offense…. So yea it’s clearly a weakness that needs to be improved on
 
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This thread is dedicated to @Vol8188 who ask for proof that this offense wasn’t suited for 3rd and long.


Well I went back and looked at every single game from 2022 and compared it to our 13 opponents… I really woud really have thought the #1 offense in the country would have been better than it’s opponents… well it wasn’t..


Last year(2012 the great banner year) facing 3rd and 6 or longer the Vols were 28.9% and our Opponents were 30.4%



It’s clear to me (and yea the numbers show it) that this offense wasn’t built to convert 3rd and longs.


And yea I used all 13 opponents with those stats
Did that include 3 and 4 down conversions? CJH set up 3rd for a lot of successful 4th downs. Data is just numbers and letters without some analysis and broader look at what is going on.
 
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How many points you score is the real Stat
Nope…whether you end the game with more points than your opponent. That is why our basketball teams, baseball, and football teams in 2032 have not brought home in championships. Team college sports are simple…most points win. Not a beauty contest.
 
Lots of “well everyone struggles with 3rd and long” yes that’s true BUT to what degree?? That’s the point of this topic.

And what your interlocutors are telling you is that you can't evaluate "to what degree" without a careful examination of the circumstances surrounding each of these 3rd-and-longs and what the coaches were attempting to accomplish in each instance.

I’m not going to have time to go back and look at all the SEC teams but I have chosen Mizzu to look at. Last year they went 6-7…


I’ll get this years stats shortly when they went 10-2 but it’s alarming to me how much better at 3rd and long they are than us even in the 6-7 year


Here’s the stat :

They converted 36% of their 3rd and longs


That’s way ahead of our offense…. So yea it’s clearly a weakness that needs to be improved on

That's 1 additional 3rd-and-long conversion every 12 attempts against a weaker schedule and (arguably) less-motivated opponents. I think it safe to assume, moreover, that a lower percentage of their 3rd-and-long scenarios involved being backed up near their own end zone, throwing for their opponents' end zone, setting up a 4th-down attempt, or running clock.

You're going to have to do a much more refined analysis to make a persuasive case that this area of our performance constitutes a meaningful weakness (particularly relative to lack of roster depth, insufficient blue-chip talent, problems with pass protection, and the like). Only once last year did we fail to score enough points to win. and it wasn't primarily, secondarily, or tertiarily due to our 3rd-and-long conversion rate.
 
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Did that include 3 and 4 down conversions? CJH set up 3rd for a lot of successful 4th downs. Data is just numbers and letters without some analysis and broader look at what is going on.


No 4th down wasn’t counted and yea CJH was really good on 4th down last year

This year he’s been awful and made some head scratching decisions
 
For the all teams struggle on 3rd and long crowd


I looked at Mizz in the last two years. The destroyed us in this stat as they were 34.5% successful this year and 36% successful a year ago. We were below 30% both years


There is no doubt stats can be misleading at times but in this case it’s clear to me that CJH needs to evolve his offense to being more in the 35% success area than below 30 if we ever want to compete for a SEC title
 
For the all teams struggle on 3rd and long crowd


I looked at Mizz in the last two years. The destroyed us in this stat as they were 34.5% successful this year and 36% successful a year ago. We were below 30% both years


There is no doubt stats can be misleading at times but in this case it’s clear to me that CJH needs to evolve his offense to being more in the 35% success area than below 30 if we ever want to compete for a SEC title
LOL. Again, you can't treat every 3rd and 10 as if they are the same play, with no consideration given to the score, field position, how much time is left in the game, and who was in the game at the time .... Starters or reserves in mop-up duty?

Tennessee averaged 46 points per game and 525 yards per game in 2022. Those are more meaningful numbers concerning the bottom line of wins and losses and they should do just fine in most years.
 
As I am sitting here in the game and watching two drops that would have resulted in a first down and a three and out that followed I wonder how much this stat really means.
It only means what the “statistician” wants it to mean. This whole thread is nonsense. If our offense sucked and we want to have a discussion about why it sucks, ok. But in 2022 we had the #1 scoring offense in NCAA and in 2023 we had the #1 rushing offense in the SEC. So to sit here and suggest that the coaches need to fix something is pretty stupid.
 
This thread is dedicated to @Vol8188 who ask for proof that this offense wasn’t suited for 3rd and long.


Well I went back and looked at every single game from 2022 and compared it to our 13 opponents… I really woud really have thought the #1 offense in the country would have been better than it’s opponents… well it wasn’t..


Last year(2012 the great banner year) facing 3rd and 6 or longer the Vols were 28.9% and our Opponents were 30.4%



It’s clear to me (and yea the numbers show it) that this offense wasn’t built to convert 3rd and longs.


And yea I used all 13 opponents with those stats

If you really did this, post your data.
 
Always appreciate data, especially when another fan initiates it. Thanks for your time and effort, BruinVol!

I'm sure this will generate follow up questions and challenges about which data are most pertinent. But like iron sharpens iron, hang in there with it and benefit from it.

He didn’t provide any data. It was just “trust me”. If he really did this, he should post the data
 
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Synopsis of problems with this “analysis”:

1. 6 yards is not “3rd and long”. 4-7 yards is traditionally called 3rd and medium. 1-3 is 3rd and short. 8 or > is 3rd and long. That’s very common for both offensive and defensive coordinators to categorize 3rd down that way. If I were putting together a call sheet I’d have a separate section for all 3 of those. So you’re not even analyzing the right thing.

2. You didn’t actually analyze how we were on 3rd and long relative to our opponents because you didn’t actually look at how they did in other games. What you did was analyzed how other teams did against our defense. It’s possible we were the best team in the country in that category and that our defense was the worst. For example you could have the best scoring offense and the worst scoring defense in the country. So all you really showed was that our 3rd and 6+ defense was worse than our 3rd and 6+ offense. Without knowing how well other teams performed, you can’t make heads or tails out of this

3. We don’t actually know you analyzed anything because you posted no data
 
This thread is dedicated to @Vol8188 who ask for proof that this offense wasn’t suited for 3rd and long.


Well I went back and looked at every single game from 2022 and compared it to our 13 opponents… I really woud really have thought the #1 offense in the country would have been better than it’s opponents… well it wasn’t..


Last year(2012 the great banner year) facing 3rd and 6 or longer the Vols were 28.9% and our Opponents were 30.4%



It’s clear to me (and yea the numbers show it) that this offense wasn’t built to convert 3rd and longs.


And yea I used all 13 opponents with those stats
No offense is suited for 3rd and long.
 

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