I wasn’t expecting a one-goal game like last year’s contest, but I also wasn’t expecting the Buckeyes to nearly double up what should be an improved Titans squad.
Although UDM kept the game close in the third quarter, Ohio State eventually took control and cruised to the win.
Tempo Free
From the official box score, a look at the tempo-free stats:
| Ohio State 2012 | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Detroit | Ohio State | ||
| Faceoff Wins | 6 | Faceoff Wins | 14 |
| Clearing | 20-26 | Clearing | 20-24 |
| Possessions | 36 | Possessions | 44 |
| Goals | 6 | Goals | 11 |
| Offensive Efficiency | .167 | Offensive Efficiency | .250 |
The Titans’ performance on faceoffs was significantly worse than last year’s outing against the Buckeyes (admittedly, on two pretty small sample sizes). You could say that was the story of the game, but UDM was juuust behind the Buckeyes in enough areas to make their overall performance much worse. At the end of the day, if you can’t possess the ball, you can’t win, and especially not mount a meaningful comeback.
They were god-awful on offense, for starters. The Buckeyes are a good defensive squad, to be fair, but the expectation going into this season was for a strong performance thanks to added firepower in the form of Joel Matthews. So far this season, we’ve seen sloppy play in spades, and not valuing the ball. It’s possible to blame early-season jitters, but the Titans had better snap out of it quickly.
On defense, they performed pretty well, although pretty much anything was an improvement over last weekend’s shellacking at the hands of Delaware (mitigating factors applied there, of course).
I haven’t included penalties in the tempo-free section, because the numbers don’t really take penalties into account. However, it seems – early in the year – that penalties will be a theme for this team. I understand that the Titans’ identity is predicated on aggressive play, but the reward is not worth the risk if you’re man-down 10 times a game.
Notes
Speaking of the man-down, Detroit allowed Ohio State to convert 4/10 opportunities with the advantage. On the other side, the Titans went 2/8 on the extra-man offense. That certainly sounds like a sloppily-played game on both sides, so take any criticism of Detroit’s discipline with a grain of salt.
Scott Harris’s move to midfield has led to more offensive production from that area of the field – and he looks like a natural on the invert, which you’d expect from an athletic converted attackman. The move looks to be permanent.
Shayne Adams had his worst game (at least fully-healthy game) in recent memory, scoring only one goal. Fortunately, the scoring will not be a one-man show this year, and the team offense, if and when it clicks, will be improved for that. Right now, the struggles look like basic concentration issues, and that will go away with more game under the team’s belt.
As mentioned above, the Titans committed a looooot of penalties in this game. The tradeoff? Four caused turnovers. This was a poor defensive performance, despite a better efficiency number than the Delaware game. Against the Blue Hens, fastbreak after fastbreak thanks to incompetency on faceoffs left the defense out to dry. This time, the faceoffs were far from great, but most Ohio State goals came in the settled offense.
Faceoffs. They have not improved. I predicted this. I was hoping that UDM would be a statistical anomaly and radically improve between seasons without much turnover in personnel, but it’s not to be, at least from early returns.
A.J. Levell was bad against Delaware (not all of which was his fault) and got immediately yanked. He showed in this game why he was the starter for all of last season. Hopefully this game was more indicative of his season-long performance than the opener. He let in a soft goal or two, but more often he was making a big play when his defense left him out to dry.
Early in the year, Detroit opponents are looking like offensive stars. This time around, it was Logan Schuss (4A, 2A) and Jesse King (3G, 1A) taking their star turn.
Elsewhere
Official Detroit recap. Official Ohio State recap. Ohio State-produced video highlights. You, too, can hear the worst sports announcing since “boom goes the dynamite.”
Up Next
Fortunately for Detroit, they’re playing an upstart team on Sunday, and that always provides an opportunity to break a losing streak. If they can’t beat Michigan… I may have radically overestimated this team, to be honest.
I’ve been derelict in my duties of previewing Michigan’s 2012 team, but I’ll try to pile several posts into tomorrow in time for Sunday’s biggest game in the history of the state (not joking).
osu looked a lot better than last year.
It looks like Tully is a bad coach.
It also looked like not only are the face off guys bad, the wings are worse.
I don’t know that the offensive scheme is bad, but through two game, the team is absolutely not valuing possession in the 6v6. Unforced turnovers have killed them in two straight games.
As for the faceoffs, I didn’t see the Ohio State game (just some of the highlights), but in the Delaware game – especially during the epic third-quarter run – the wingmen didn’t have a chance because Cooney won everything cleanly and initiated the 6v5 offensive break.
Stop it. You’ve seen the box score against 2 top 20 teams and are saying “Tully is a bad coach”.
Tully is NOT a bad coach. I have a lot of comments to post about the first two games, but to blame it on “Tully is a bad coach” is bullshit. This team hated Karweck at the same point last year but turned the corner mid season to perform well on the offensive end. And they loved Karweck when he left. Give the guy a chance.
UDM is a 4th year MAAC team that has played against 2 top 20 teams. I would love to have seen them win, but they were big underdogs in both games. Outside of Harris and Lehto most of their top guys are underclassmen and just starting to learn the D1 game and offense. I’m worried about the MAAC, let’s judge him on that.
AJ played well against OSU, but had 2 bad goals (magic bullet kind of shots). That didn’t cost them the game. A few bad turnovers on offense is on the players for being careless with the ball, not on Tully for the plays he called. I’m not going to blame anything on the refs, but 20 flags in a D1 game is questionable. Neither team had a chance to settle into a 6 on 6 game and after the game they had last year this screwed UDM up bad.
After watching the UM practice today I’m sure it will be a great game and Michigan will be ready for the Titans on Sunday, but let’s give the guy a chance before you blast him.
I think it can be debated as to what extent the UDM players “hated” Karweck this far into the season, but I sure do hope you’re right about Tully.
Reg,
Agree on everything except the penalty part. I thought the refs could have, and probably should have, thrown a lot more flags in the OSU game. UDM plays a really aggressive style. But there’s a line they seem to be crossing a lot right now that is going to continue to hurt them if they can’t find a way to play with a little self-control. It’s a fine line. It’s apparent that their aggressive approach is one of their strengths. They have to find a way to maintain that without fouling so much. One of the dangers is that they can develop a reputation as a cheap team, and that can haunt them with refs throughout the season, even if it’s not true. I hope they figure it out soon enough that it won’t hurt them later in MAAC games.
Where did you see UM practice, and what did you see that makes you think they’ll be ready? I’m hopeful you’re right, but the same things you just said about UDM having young guys who are playing against top 20 D1 teams can be said about Michigan in the sense that they have even more young guys and none of their players have ever played in a D1 game at all!
I thought UDM had a lot of bright spots. They were playing against deeper, more talented teams in the first two games where there was very little margin for error. If they can figure out faceoffs, cut down on turnovers and make a few less mistakes that lead to flags, they’ll be fine.
Michigan practiced at Ultimate Soccer last night. One must assume that’s where Reg saw them.