Vol secondary

[lclavolfan]

Although the Vol's defensive front line has been good in the past few years, it seems as though the secondary can never stop the pass when playing against a talented qb. Why not?

 

[Cajun Vol]

They never play tight, they are always 5-10 yards off the receivers. Any halfway efficient passing game could throw on a team like that all day long.

 

[OWB]

Originally posted by lclavolfan@Nov 22, 2005 8:29 AM
Although the Vol's defensive front line has been good in the past few years, it seems as though the secondary can never stop the pass when playing against a talented qb.  Why not?

[snapback]199527[/snapback]​

Our secondary obviously took a big step back after Allen was injured. I would say we went from good to a little below average. Vandy's Bennett almost had 200 yards receiving against us. Why was he running free most of the game? Your guess is as good as mine.

 

[allvol]

Didn't Vandy get alot of yards in the 1st quarter and then get shut down by the Vol defense until the go-ahead touchdown at the end? Chavis said he stuck with the man-to-man defense on that last drive because it had worked so well in the 2nd half... limiting the Vanderbilt offense to 67 yards in the 2nd half up to that point.

I see your point. When the games are on the line, the Vol defense has given up some huge plays. Alabama, South Carolina, Notre Dame and now Vanderbilt come to mind. All 4 games, the defense gave up the go-ahead points too easily in the 4th quarter.

 

[GenNeyland9]

UT's secondary has been the weak point of the defense almost every year since as long as I can remember.

I have read several quotes from other SEC coaches saying that "they just don't cover well," and "you can definitely hit the big play on them."

Hopefully some of this will be remedied by Larry Slade's replacement.

 

[Liper]

I thought our secondary played pretty well most of the year. It was those pesky 4th qtr plays that stick in my crawl. We just couldn't make the plays when it mattered.

At least this year, when our DBs are getting plays made on them it's not as if they are getting burned. They've typically had pretty good coverage. And they don't have that bewildered flailing look like they have at times.

 

[orangetd88]

Without Allen, they are mediocre at best, but they at least tackle better than they have in a long, long time.

 

[gonygonygo]

Originally posted by Cajun Vol@Nov 22, 2005 8:33 AM
They never play tight, they are always 5-10 yards off the receivers.  Any halfway efficient passing game could throw on a team like that all day long.

[snapback]199529[/snapback]​

True, but you can probably attribute that to John Chavis's defensive philosophy to not give up the big plays. I honestly feel that he's no different from Fulmer sometimes on defense. His defense is rather conservative, yet disciplined. That's probably the biggest difference. We blitz, but rarely all out.