Yesterday I linked to Josh Walfish's article on
the possible fallout of the cancellation of Spring football for the rebuilding UMass program.
Some of the difficulty is/was the state of the UMass roster. It's sobering to view the
247Sports scholarship distribution page for the Minutemen. UMass has 1 (count 'em 1) scholarship senior and 9 juniors on the Spring roster.
Last year the fans hated the UMass hurry-up (because it wasn't working). A run-based grind it out offense would have been better, but the Minutemen only had one recruited RB on the roster. Bilal Ally won UMass' only victory with nine straight carries in the fourth quarter against Akron.
Ally left the Minutemen via the transfer portal. This, I don't understand. He was the feature back last year and surely would have been the feature back again this year.
Probably the biggest glich in the 2019 offense was QB. We did not have one. Randall West gave UMass fans 20 minutes of ecstasy against Rutgers then got flushed out of the pocket and came up limping and had to leave the game. I thought he never looked the same.
Bad QB play screws up the whole offense. We did recruit JUCO pro-style QB
Kyle Lindquist. He's probably the starter unless he arrives injured. UMass also added three-star true freshman
Will Koch.
The running back situation in Amherst is still not good.The Minutemen added three-star RB
Earl Merriweather, who will likely be the feature back. UMass also added three-star
Jared Cole. The problem is depth. Two recruited RB's is not deep even for Group-of-five teams.
Temple, for example, has four three-stars.
Offensive line was another problem last year. When I visited a practice UMass had about seven or eight OL on the field. They struggled keep five healthy offensive lineman. The current roster has zero senior linemen and only one junior (!). The staff has done a good job in recruiting and things should improve. I would speculate a OL of
Dalton Tomlison and
Larnel Coleman at OT,
Max Sullivan and
Xavier Graham at guard;
Jaylen Larry at center.
Another problem is TE. The Minutemen recruited
Jacob Orlando and
Jackson Manning. UMass did not have a pass catching TE on the roster last year.
What does all this add up to? However we slice it, the UMass offense will be really young and not have a lot of experience playing together. Pro-style offenses usually feature a stud WR like Andy Isabella. Wide receiver is probably the deepest position of the squad and the coaches will want use them.
The
spread offense probably best fits the available players. There are a number of
"power" spread offense schemes to utilize the running game. UMass could ditch the no-huddle-hurry-up, which would please the fans. The main goals for 2020 could be:
- A QB who is not an offensive liability
- Better run blocking and a more effective run game.
- A lot more production from the WR's.
Hopefully, the NCAA will allow some kind of extended Spring practice to allow UMass to work on all this.
