PN-G at BH Recap

[1989NDN]

I made the drive from Houston to Barbers Hill (FM 3180) to watch the Indians ... observations from Week 0 ... special teams have some work to do; offense has some work to do; need more versatility with play calling; PN-G is still vanilla on offense with the dive play, pitch right, pitch left, and the 3 step drop passing game (slant or quick out); Indians OL played very well with 8+ Barbers Hill defenders within 5 yards of the line of scrimmage; #9 runs tough and bounces off would be defenders; overall, the PN-G defense played well 99% of the time; PN-G DE #80 played really well batting down passes, pressuring the QB, stuffing the run; Barbers Hill never drove the field on the Indians and scored points ... Barbers Hill scored off of Indian miscues (fumbles and muffed punt return), which is something the Indians can correct ... Indian defense is not as big or fast as in years past, but they played hard, battled, scrapped, and clawed to make Barbers Hill move the chains; Indian DBs kept things in front of them, and they will continue to get better with time and experience; good job MB and Indian defensive coaches; the Indian defense was bending a little here and there, but they found a way to make some stops. Good first game. Any W is good. The kids played hard, played with spirit, and did good things. Texas City will be tough ... we must play error free football and continue getting better. I believe the Indians will be a team that peaks in district play ... they may have some ups and downs in the pre-district schedule, but with reps and experience, and barring injuries, they will get better each week. I left after PN-G punched it in to make it 19-14 ... why, the indecision on the late 2-pt try ... coaching staff takes the hit for that delay penalty.

Non-football: The Indian band is the smallest (number wise) I've ever seen. I get a sense that the PN-G community is shrinking. Is enrollment dropping? I can remember when we had 1,600+ kids in grades 9-12. I heard a few local fans saying we've dropped to 1,400 and that participation in some activities, such as the PN-G Indian band is continuing to drop. What is the deal? Also, our traveling fan base does not bring the numbers it once did. I can remember filling up Tully Stadium vs. Houston Stratford, the stadium in Pasadena vs. Dobie, the stadium in Goose Creek vs. Baytown Lee and Sterling, etc. Now, we did not even fill-up the 1,000 seats at Barbers Hill. Perhaps Gustav swirling around in the Gulf of Mexico had an impact? Anyway, it was nice to see the Indians play hard and get a W. Nice to see the purple and white fans and some old friends.

Go Indians. Peace.

 

[IBLEEDPURPLE]

I also made the trip to BH.

PN-G was lucky to get out of there with a win. It certainly was not pretty, but hopefully the offense can get the click, change some play calling around and hopefully Burnett will focus on the special teams (esp punt returns). I think playing two more tough teams in pre-season will hopefully build the confidence up before district play.

Other observations---

Was the Indian spirit not feeling well??? He basically stood on the track with his back to the Indian fans watching the game for the most part. I'm hoping he will interact with the cheerleaders & crowd more as the season progresses.

Although we did fill up the visitor stands... that isn't saying much if you haven't seen the BH stadium. I was looking for a much bigger crowd (although, we probably had almost as many fans as BH).

The placement of the band was horrible. Were those "new stands" that were just thrown up to hold the band & drill team? You could not hear them play if you sat anywhere from midfield to the right. I was shocked at the band size as well. I hope they can learn to speed up Cherokee. It sounded much slower than years past.

All in all, still proud of PN-G. Those boys never gave up and their tenacity enabled them to come home with a win!

Great to see all the purple....

SCALP EM!

 

[PNG NDN Fan]

Thanks for the update. I think storm-watching might have had some effect on the numbers, but over the past few years I don't recall the any of the non-district away games being packed. Frankly I wish they would schedule quality local opponents for non-district (WB, WO-S etc.) to minimize the travel, but that is another subject.

As far as band participation I am not sure, nowdays it seem as though there are more things that can occupy a student's time, not these these "things" are better alternatives to participation in school activities.

 

[pngfan93]

I'll tell you, my main reason for not going to see West Brook was that I wanted to leave max fuel in my tank. If I'm not driving to Bmt, I'm dang sure not driving to BH.

 

[badndn]

My thoughts (as if you guys were on pins and needles waiting ;D )
The passing game is much improved. Three or four wide receivers caught passes, a couple of really good catches, Tatum was on target most of the evening and looked good in the pocket, his line kept the pressure off. They did not throw over the middle, nothing to the TE's and not sure why, with all of the running they do, their was no real play action. Maybe not wanting to show anything predistrict???

The running game is fairly stout. two good backs and the line was pretty aggressive off of the ball. We need to scrap the option. And Tatum does not need to carry the football again all season unless he is falling forward behind the center for a TD or FD. Not sure why (after gaining nothing on it all night) they called for the option (to the left side at that) on second down with the game on the line and deep in BH territory???? Especially after cramming it down BH's throat to get down there. The big loss did two things. 1. Put them in an obvious passing situation on 3rd down 2. placed the ball on the left hash so that if the 3rd down pass was incomplete a go ahead FG attempt would have been from the left (kicker missed just left all night, had he been kicking from the right hash he would have made the earlier FG). You have to figure that in to your playcalling. Should have ran the sweep right or a dive right. Turns out Ceigelski balled the staff out with a great catch!

Special Teams (particullarly punt team) need alot of work. They either need to block for the punter better or get someone other than the starting QB back there, because he is going to get killed if this keeps up!!! I thought the return team did well with the exception of trying to field a punt over their head (never, ever do that :nono.

Defense put pressure on the QB after that first drive and did a good job against the run. I thought a couple of guys stepped up and really helped to get some of our two way guys alot of rest. Those two were #66 and #61 not sure the names yet, but I think their play was very encouraging. I was worried after the first two series about our OLinemen wearing out since 3 or 4 of them had really never left the field because they also started on the DLine, but 66 and 61 spelled them well.

Take away a couple of mistakes in critical areas of the field and this is a 28 or 35-7 game.

Hopefully Gustav afford the kids a full week of preperation so they can get after, what will probably be a Crosby team that is better than BH.

 

[NDN X]

66 is Dylan Girolamo (Sr.) and 61 is Easley

 

[PNG Proud]

Has anyone found the stats to the game yet?

 

[IndianFan]

Has anyone found the stats to the game yet?

Link to stats is on front page...
http://www.pngindians.com/football.php

 

[squaw]

I have one thing to say and I'll shut up the rest of this season.

My 10 yr old broke the play calling of our offensive cord. When he puts his finger up with #1 we are running a sweep to the left. #2 sweep to the right, #3 pass left, #4 pass right. I am sorry but there is NO creativity in any of our play calling the past 2 yrs. The middle was open all night and I saw no receivers run a crossing pattern but once and we gained 30 yrs. All our plays could fit on a half of 3"x5" index card.

I agree totally. I will say that I have seen them look a lot worse for a first game. The boys were hustling. Can't blame them for the playcalling. Personally, the game was hot, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. Never once thought about Gustav. Can't think of one thing better than watching the Indians. The other side was not very sportsmanlike. They put our band under the stands and everytime our band tried to play, their band drowned them out. Too bad it didn't help their game! lol

 

[Justafan]

I have one thing to say and I'll shut up the rest of this season.

My 10 yr old broke the play calling of our offensive cord. When he puts his finger up with #1 we are running a sweep to the left. #2 sweep to the right, #3 pass left, #4 pass right. I am sorry but there is NO creativity in any of our play calling the past 2 yrs. The middle was open all night and I saw no receivers run a crossing pattern but once and we gained 30 yrs. All our plays could fit on a half of 3"x5" index card.

I agree totally. I will say that I have seen them look a lot worse for a first game. The boys were hustling. Can't blame them for the playcalling. Personally, the game was hot, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. Never once thought about Gustav. Can't think of one thing better than watching the Indians. The other side was not very sportsmanlike. They put our band under the stands and everytime our band tried to play, their band drowned them out. Too bad it didn't help their game! lol

I agree with you squaw. The boys really hustled. BH band was really upsetting my wife also. they kept drowning out our band every time they tried to play. The game was great and kept our minds off of the storm. Hope everything stays to the east. We need to learn to be more creative on offense or there needs to be a change. The defense really suprised me with there play, they looked good.

 

[IndianFan]

There was a time when Barbers Hill would need the help of the PA system to drown out the Indian band. BH was 1A when PNG was beating the super 4A schools.

I recall a comment made a couple of seasons ago that there was a reason the band had such small numbers. And that in a few years the numbers would increase. Anyone remember that?

 

[PNG NDN Fan]

There was a time when Barbers Hill would need the help of the PA system to drown out the Indian band. BH was 1A when PNG was beating the super 4A schools.

I recall a comment made a couple of seasons ago that there was a reason the band had such small numbers. And that in a few years the numbers would increase. Anyone remember that?

I recall the same comment, but I think that was on the older messageboard.

 

[Justafan]

The reason was Grove Middle School did not have a band director. They got one towards the middle of last year.

 

[realndn]

I have one thing to say and I'll shut up the rest of this season.

My 10 yr old broke the play calling of our offensive cord. When he puts his finger up with #1 we are running a sweep to the left. #2 sweep to the right, #3 pass left, #4 pass right. I am sorry but there is NO creativity in any of our play calling the past 2 yrs. The middle was open all night and I saw no receivers run a crossing pattern but once and we gained 30 yrs. All our plays could fit on a half of 3"x5" index card.

I agree totally. I will say that I have seen them look a lot worse for a first game. The boys were hustling. Can't blame them for the playcalling. Personally, the game was hot, but I thoroughly enjoyed it. Never once thought about Gustav. Can't think of one thing better than watching the Indians. The other side was not very sportsmanlike. They put our band under the stands and everytime our band tried to play, their band drowned them out. Too bad it didn't help their game! lol

I agree with you squaw. The boys really hustled. BH band was really upsetting my wife also. they kept drowning out our band every time they tried to play. The game was great and kept our minds off of the storm. Hope everything stays to the east. We need to learn to be more creative on offense or there needs to be a change. The defense really suprised me with there play, they looked good.

I thought you [Justafan} were going to shut up for the rest of the season. Tell your 10yr old we don't run a no huddle offense. The play comes in from a player on the the sidelines. Also ask ned, Lulmberton,central,ozen,vidor,lcm, and babershill how predictable the offense is? We beat all of them. One thing is predictable ,we lead the district in total yds and we are winning.

 

[Justafan]

It was a joke about my son, sorry if I hit a sensitive spot with you. What I was stating is we are way to predictable in our offensive play calling. We need to pass across the middle more to open up the middle for the run. Line up in the I and give Wright a running start going North and South without always pitching the ball while going east or west. Run the slots across the middle and not always trying to throw the deep out.

 

[Indianman]

I totally agree realndn fan. Our offense has been predictable in that year after year we line up and know that we will run right at you and gain yards play after play. Another thing about no play action, if you really watched about 5 or so of Tatums completions were play action off our bread and butter. I say that we need to throw to the TE in our offense just about 1-3 times a game to make oppents respect him then run our receivers in the holes. But I have always looked at our OC and HC philosophy on running as a good strategy in that so many defenses work on this spread stuff that when they see our hard nose PNG power offense it really is intimidating in knowing that we will run 40 + times a game right at you. With PNG seemingly always having big OL we usually control line of scrimmage in many of our games. If its not persuading to you others, take a look at what Creduer in Lumberton brought to the games last year on his offensive scheme. He took our PNG power running offense, brought it to Lumberton,and delivered a hell of an offense and saw the playoffs just as PNG had last year. I know there is still criticism about it and its predictability and sometimes agreed, but year after year we bring in more play action, more reverses, and small changes when needed as the season matures. Just my thoughts. I also agree that a little work more work on special teams will have this team fine tuning in these pre district games and MB will have them ready when district arrives

 

[1989NDN]

It is good to see more traffic on this web site and message board ... and, it is good to read the various opinions of other fans/alums. Barring injuries, I think we will see the 2008 Indians get better and better.

Go Indians. Peace.

 

[Indian99]

I'm just happy that we won the game, regardless of the playcalling. A win is a win in my book.

 

[badndn]

We ran play action once last week and DeRon's guy bit on it and Tatum hit him in stride, but he dropped the pass.

Quote from a Crosby defender this week:
“Maybe they will throw something on third down trying to convert those but we just need to stop the run to stop him (Tatum).”

What do you think would happen if we ran playaction on the first play from scrimmage Saturday night?????

 

[lu cards]

if any coaches read this.i suggest installing some bootlegs for tatum.when you run those pitchouts the bootleg would be a good compliment.drag that tightend and i guarantee 20 yards.