Offense and red zone
Appalachian State’s offensive production has been down a bit recently, which is a cause for concern for coach Jerry Moore.
Today’s 553 yards against Western Carolina looked nice, but red-zone struggles continued. Although the Mountaineers were 9 of 9 in red-zone chances, six of the nine trips inside the 20-yard line ended in field goals rather than touchdowns.
Moore said the offensive line is young, and perhaps not controlling the line of scrimmage consistently, but there are other possible factors as well, he said.
“We went through one period this year where blitzes hurt us, and I think we got some of that corrected,” Moore said.
“One thing is that people know a lot more about defending the Spread offense around the country, not just against us. Around the country defensive coaches are more adept at defending Spread offenses than was the case four or five years ago.
“You can look at a team like Florida, which was kind of premier team when Urban (Meyer) came from Utah to Florida, and the next thing you know people were learning how to defend it. We’re a little bit the same way.
“And some of it is our youth. We have some freshmen (up front). Our center (Alex Acey) at this time last year was playing center at Chalkville (Ala.) High School. He hasn’t even been redshirted. The left tackle (Kendall Lamm) is a kid that’s been on scout team all last year. So some of it is youth.
“But a lot of it is just executing and putting our offense in the right situation, making the right calls and things like that. We’re struggling with it a little bit and we’ve got to get it corrected. It’s not in our nature to make a bunch of excuses. We’ve got to bear down and get it fixed.”
The Mountaineers got tackle Kendall Lamm back from an ankle injury today, but lost guard Matt Ruff in the first half as result of a head injury. Ruff will be evaluated Monday.