by Patrick Zier | May 11, 2025 |
They were not, frankly, a very good team. Alabama-Birmingham (UAB) would finish the season 3-9, but here they were leading South Florida, 9-7, as the third quarter began.
USF kicked off, and UAB started at its own 35. Three plays, 1:15 later the score was UAB 16, USF 7 as a dazed Bulls defense left the field after giving up a 12-yard run, a 38-yard pass and a 15-yard pass for the touchdown.
Explosive plays. They have become the name of the game in college football. Some think they may be the most important statistic of all as far as determining who wins and who loses. There are various definitions of what constitutes an explosive play, but generally, any pass of 15 or more yards and any run of 10 yards or more qualifies.
For the moment, we will forget about the runs and concentrate solely on chunk yardage passes, because they absolutely killed USF.
Eventually, USF won the game against UAB, but the Blazers stayed in it right to the end because they had 15 passes of 15 or more yards and another 10 of 10 yards or more.
And this was not an outlier, it happened a lot. If USF wants to move up and gain elite status in the Group of Five or even the American Athletic Conference (AAC) specifically, this has to stop.
There are a number of teams USF has to beat to reach the top tier, and two of them are Tulane, a rising conference power, and Memphis, which has been consistently good for many years. In 2024, Memphis was 11-2 overall and 6-2 in the AAC while Tulane was 7-1 in the conference and 9-5 overall.
In USF’s 21-3 loss to Memphis, quarterback Seth Henigan only threw for 208 yards, but he was 11 of 13 for 130 yards with two tosses of 15 or more yards and one of 10 on Memphis’ two touchdown drives in the first quarter. Overall, four of his completions went for 15 yards or more and he had two of 10 or better.
Tulane simply embarrassed the Bulls, winning 45-10. Quarterback Darian Mensah was 18-of-22 for 326 yards and in the first half, when Tulane built a 31-7 lead, he had nine throws of 15 yards or more and three that went for 10 or better.
Auburndale’s Jaelen Stokes has been around a while and was part of all this. In his final season at USF, he has played in all 26 games the last two years and started 11. He is part of an experienced secondary that knows it has to play better.
“I feel like defensively, we have to work on the back end,” he commented. “Like we have to work on not getting picked and rubbed (getting beat physically). That’s why we gave up a lot of big plays in the passing game last year.
“We need to get that off our plate and eliminate that from our game,” Stokes continued. “We’re really trying to make it (playing physically) a strength, not a weakness.
“Like just playing as a whole defense and knowing where you’ve got to be so you don’t hit one of your own players and basically knock them off the route,” Stokes remarked.
“On the back end (in the secondary) we’ve harped on staying of top of everybody (the receivers) and trying not to give anything up,” Stokes said.
“Honestly, we’re trying to make it easier for our D-line to eat. If the D-line eats we all eat, know what I’m saying?” Stokes went on.
“So, just trying to make it easier for those guys to have more time to force the quarterback to make a bad decision that helps us.”
Stokes is trying to help instill that philosophy in the younger players, mentoring them, emphasizing the importance of keeping explosive plays in check. While he may not project as a starter, he is still an important piece of the back end defense and has something to contribute.
And if he can help the secondary do a better job of smothering opposing receivers, preventing the chunk play, then USF will have a better chance to take a step up.
“I just want to play my role,” Stokes said. “Just do anything I can to help the defense.” And Lord knows, the defense definitely heeds help
by Patrick Zier | May 7, 2025 |
Chase Elliott is the poster boy for what’s wrong with NASCAR’s current point system. Despite the fact that he has not won a race, has led only 45 laps, 42 of which came at Martinsville and three of which are on super speedways where you can’t pass by yourself; and has only three top five finishes, Elliott is fourth in the current standings.
From a competitive standpoint, Elliott is way off the mark. But he doesn’t get into wrecks, his pit crew keeps the car running if something goes wrong, and he finishes races. All 11 of them so far. And that’s what you have to do to rack up points.
The Old Guy Sport competition index gives a more realistic picture of Elliott’s problems. The OGS competition index has Denny Hamlin first with 218 points, Kyle Larson second with 212, Christopher Bell third with 187 and William Byron fourth with 141. They’re the clear leaders. Elliott is way behind them in 12th place with just 45 points.
Elliott is currently in the throes of a 38 race winless streak, having last won at Texas in 2024. Prior to that win, he had gone 42 races without a victory. That means Elliott has now won only one race in his last 81 starts.
He has a contract with Hendrick Motorsports that goes through 2027. And he won’t be 30 until this November despite the fact he already has 10 full years of cup competition and won the NASCAR championship in 2020. He should be in his prime, but…
His performance of late is making a lot of people nervous. Elliott is, generally speaking, an easy going guy. Some wonder if he can still be competitive in the new cut throat era that was ushered in with the NextGen car in 2022.
There was a lot of buzz around Elliott’s return to Texas, where he got his last win last year, but Elliott, who is a realist if nothing else, pointed out that winning at Texas a year ago and racing at Texas in 2025 had little in common.
“It was 12 months ago,” Elliott said as reported by NASCAR’s website and Fox sports among others. “A lot changes in a year, and things that we are working on behind the scenes, whether its setups or race strategy of what ever it is, that is going to outweigh something that went on 12 months ago.
“It’s hard to reflect that far back and think that ‘Oh, we’ll just do what we did last year’ and that’s going to be perfect because most of the time that’s not the case,” Elliott said.
Elliott ended up 16th at Texas, continuing a familiar pattern of finishing races but essentially not being competitive. Once again, he failed to lead a lap.
Of the 12 drivers on the three elite teams, Gibbs, Hendrick and Penske (We’re counting Josh Berry as a Penske car even though he drives for the Wood brothers because the team is closely aligned with Penske) Elliott ranks 10th in laps led.
He’s well behind teammates Larson, who has led 596 laps, and Byron, with 386. Even Alex Bowman, who has struggled more than Elliott, has led 108. While it’s not a perfect indicator, leading laps means you’re putting yourself in position to win, giving yourself a chance, and the way he’s running now, Elliott has no chance at all.
“All you can do when you’re in this fight is just keep showing up, make sure you’re prepared to just show up on any given weekend and put together a solid day,” Elliott continued.
“But its all got to come together at the right time,” he stressed. “I have to do my job. We’ve got to call good races in the box. We have to have good pit stops.
“I’m no different than anybody else on our team,” Elliott said. “We want more, I think we’re capable of more. We have high expectations. We are proud of the good runs we’ve had, but we know there’s more in the tank.
“The season’s still very early, and we’ve seen enough high spots to kind of give us hope,” he added. Hoping you can win, though, is one thing. Going out and doing it is something else. Elliott’s last 81 races have proven that.
NASCAR NOTES: Three most likely winners at Kansas – 1-Kyle Larson, 2-William Byron, 3-Ryan Blaney. Last year’s winners at Kansas – First race, Larson. Second race, Ross Chastain. Top five in first race last year – 1-Larson, 2-Chris Buescher, 3-Chase Elliott, 4-Martin Truex, 5-Denny Hamlin.
Last week’s OGS Texas picks – 1-Byron, 2-Larson, 3-Hamlin. Texas winner – Joey Logano. OGS season record – 4-4.
Top 10 in OGS competition index after eight races – 1-Hamlin 218 points; 2-Larson 212, 3-Christopher Bell 187, 4-Byron 141, 5-Josh Berry 83, 6-Blaney 77, 7-Bubba Wallace 73, 8-Logano 70, 9-Tyler Reddick 67, 10-Alex Bowman 52.
Top 10 in OGS competition index on intermediate tracks after four races – 1-Larson 97, 2-Byron 88, 3-Hamlin 63, 4-Blaney 62, 5-Berry 59, 6-Logano 58, 7-Chastain 51, 8-Bowman 48, 9-Wallace, Daniel Suarez 41.
by Patrick Zier | May 4, 2025 |
It has not gone well for Team Penske this year. We are only 10 races into the season, and there is still time to turn it around, but it has not gone well. There have been wrecks. And blown engines. And sloppy pit stops. It just isn’t working.
“It’s obviously frustrating to be in a situation where we have really good cars that are capable of winning every week and we just haven’t been able to get it done,” Travis Geisler, Penske’s director of competition, commented earlier this year on NASCAR’s website.
Geisler’s comments were made in late March, and we are now into May, but they are as applicable now as they were then, despite the fact that Austin Cindric won at Talladega last Sunday
“I think the key is the process is working as far as what we’re bringing to the race,” Geisler commented, trying to find a bit of light in a sea of darkness.
“The hardest part of this game is finding speed, and right now, I think all the teams are doing that,” Geisler said. “We’ve just got to execute on all the other facets of the game.”
Well, ummm, actually, no.
There are two kinds of speed in NASCAR, there’s super speedway speed and then there’s real speed. Super speedway speed, of which the Penske cars seem to have plenty, is not real because you don’t generate it by yourself.
To go fast on a super speedway, you need to have a group of cars running nose-to-tail. That’s because of the draft. When two cars close in on each other, the lead car pushes the air out of the way for the trailing car, allowing it to get to the bumper of the lead car. In effect, the lead car is pulling the trailing car and the trailing car is pushing the lead car so both can go faster.
The more cars you have in line, the more this effect is magnified and it doesn’t matter whether your car is fast or slow, all the cars will go the same speed because of the draft.
If you pull out of line and run by yourself, you have to break through the air flowing over and around the car which hits the rear spoiler and slows you down. So, you can be second in a line of 20 cars, pull out, the whole line will go by you and suddenly you’re 21st.
“I keep saying there are positives,” Defending NASCAR champion Joey Logano commented. “We’ve led the most laps this year. We’ve done a lot of really good things. We are in way better shape right now than we were this time last year – like way better.
“And we’re much better on points than we were this time last year. That being said,” Logano continued, “it sucks to not convert fast cars into victories of top fives.”
That’s because the Penske cars aren’t fast away from the super speedways, where the real racing takes place.
By NASCAR’s count, Ryan Blaney, Logano, Cindric and Josh Berry have led a total of 775 laps this year. We are including Berry as part of the Penske team because the Wood brothers car he drives has a very close affiliation with Penske.
By contrast Joe Gibbs Racing, the strongest of the elite teams according to the Old Guy Sport competition index with drivers Denny Hamlin, Christopher Bell, Chase Briscoe and Ty Gibbs, has led 515 laps, a sizable difference.
But if you subtract the three super speedways, Daytona, Talladega and Atlanta, Penske’s four cars have a total of just 420 points compared with 440 for Gibbs
This again shows how fickle super speedway racing can be. For example Cindric has only won three races in his career, and two are on super speedways including the Daytona 500.
Hamlin, meanwhile, has won three Daytona 500s including back-to-back wins in 2019 and 2020 and has led 315 laps this year but only 12 of those are on super speed ways.
On regular tracks, the Gibbs cars have four wins and 12 top fives led by Hamlin, who has two wins and five top fives in the seven races so far. The four Penske cars have one win and four top fives.
So in regular racing, Penske is being clobbered by Gibbs – and by the four Hendrick cars as well.
“You’ve just got to go back and review, was there anything we can do to avoid this (the mistakes)?” Geisler said. “What are the things in our normal process we can adjust to try and get ourselves to where we finish where we belong?
“That’s really the key right now,” Geisler remarked. “I think we’d be in really good shape if we just finished where we belong.”
The problem is, they are.
NASCAR NOTES – Three most likely winners at Texas: 1-William Byron, 2-Kyle Larson, 3-Denny Hamlin. Last year’s winner at Texas: Chase Elliott. Top five at Texas: 1-Elliott, 2-Brad Keselowski, 3-Byron, 4-Tyler Reddick, 5-Dennis Suarez.
Last week’s OGS picks: No picks, super speedway race. Last week’s winner: Austin Cindric. OGS season record:4-3.
OGS competition index top 10 after seven races: 1-Hamlin 218 points, 2-Christopher Bell 187, 3-Larson 179, 4-Byron 139, 5-Josh Berry 77, 6-Bubba Wallace 73, 7-Reddick 67, 8-Alex Bowman 52, 9-Ryan Blaney 47, 10-Elliott 45.
OGS competition index on intermediate tracks: 1-Byron 86, 2-Larson 64, 3-Hamlin 63, 4-Berry 53, 5-Bowman 48, 6-Wallace, Suarez 41, 8-Reddick, Blaney 32, 10-Bell, Ryan Preece 30.
by Patrick Zier | Apr 29, 2025 |
All’s well that ends well and for USF, it ended well this spring.
“I was a solid day because our trainer wasn’t out on the field a lot,” South Florida Coach Alex Golesh said after his Bulls finished up practice with their annual spring game Saturday.
“I know it sounds really crazy to evaluate a day like that, but you really just want to get out of it healthy,” he added.
For USF, it was a chance to give their young players some exposure under game conditions. The Bulls have gone through the spring kind of banged up with a number of key players, including both potential starting cornerbacks and a couple veteran offensive linemen, sitting out.
And while Saturday’s game was about the here and now, from a program standpoint Golesh remains firmly focused on USF’s future and instilling that in his players.
He wants them to understand that the things they are doing now will not only make them better when they come back in the fall but are also necessary steps to make the program competitive at a higher level down the road.
After the game, Golesh said “I told our guys really the same thing I told them at the beginning of spring practice. There’s this gap that we’ve got to close and we have to keep working on that as we go into the summer.
“You know back-to-back bowl wins; I think it’s easy to forget what we walked into when we got here,” Golesh continued.
“I’m not justifying any part of what we’ve done but walking in and starting from scratch in every imaginable way and winning back-to-back bowl games, there’s this next step we have to take and the gap is not huge. but it’s the hardest gap to close,” Golesh said.
“And in my time, I’ve been part of four, five other programs trying to close that gap, that’s the hardest part,” Golesh remarked. “It’s going from winning bowl games and being competitive to winning championships and playing meaningful games into January.”
And Golesh believes he and his players are on the right track. “We’ll get there when we get there, but I think this is as close as we’ve ever been,” Golesh said.
While Golesh has a lot of confidence, it will be difficult for USF to get where he wants to take it and even more difficult to stay there because he’s not talking about being competitive in the AAC, or even the Group of 5.
He’s talking about building a program that can compete with the big boys, the Alabamas and Georgias and Ohio States of the world.
And USF has already tasted that kind of success, albeit very briefly, under its very first coach, Jim Leavitt, but couldn’t maintain it. In 2007, the Bulls came out of nowhere to soar to No.2 in the AP poll.
It was, to this point, the most exciting season in South Florida football history. Suddenly, the Bulls were relevant. Not just in Tampa, not just in Florida, but nationally,
With Lakeland native and Lake Gibson grad Matt Grothe leading the way at quarterback, the Bulls went on a six-game run to start the season that they have never come close to matching.
First they beat Elon. Then they beat 13th ranked Auburn in overtime at Auburn, their first win ever over an SEC team. Then they beat North Carolina. Then they beat fifth-ranked West Virginia. Then they beat Florida Atlantic. And then they capped off the six-game run by slaughtering Central Florida, 64-12. That shot them from fifth to second in the AP poll. And then it was over.
Grothe would say later that USF didn’t have the depth to stand up to the pounding it took playing some of the country’s best teams and simply got beat down physically.
And as Golesh looks to the future now, that remains a huge hurdle. It’s what separates Group of 5 teams from the Power 4 conferences and what separates the Alabamas and Georgias and Ohio States and other elite teams from the rest of the Power 4.
But Golesh believes he can get there. First, with the best team in the Group of 5 now guaranteed a place in the College Football Playoff, Golesh doesn’t have to be as good as the country’s elite teams to get a shot at a national championship.
And second, if he can start putting together double digit win seasons, USF will become more attractive to portal players and high school recruits.
They say where there’s a will there’s a way, and Golesh certainly has the will. Now, all he has to do is find a way.
by Patrick Zier | Apr 25, 2025 |
TAMPA-It has been a good spring. There have been ups and downs, there always are, but overall, South Florida Coach Alex Golesh says, it has been a good spring.
“I’m really proud of how far we’ve come so far,” Golesh said after one of his team’s final practices before Saturday’s spring game at Corbett Field here. The game starts at 6 p.m. with a fan fest beginning at four o’clock.
“Our message to the guys after practice was man, we’ve got to go finish and every single day matters,” Golesh said. “Every single day that we get an opportunity to go we’ve got to compete, get better as a program and for us to take the next step its gotta come from within the locker room.
“I’m proud of what we’ve done so far up to this point and our program so far,” Golesh added.
“Our confidence level, you know, I continue to talk about earning confidence,” Golesh remarked. “I think you earn confidence as you continue to perfect the process, continue to improve day-to-day.
“It’s a really confident bunch,” Golesh said of his team. “I think as the leadership continues to grow and you continue to go through hard situations you build confidence. I think it’s really high.
“There’s a bunch of guys out there that are guys we know will contribute and have contributed so I think where we are, you’re seeing a lot of young guys start to gain confidence as they’re making plays,” Golesh went on.
“I think we do a really good job of not looking forward too much. We don’t focus on anything other than what we’re doing today and like I said, that was the message to the team,” Golesh concluded.
Two areas where younger players have had a chance to step up are the offensive line and the secondary. That’s because 12 players missed all of spring practice including some returning veterans in the line and defensive backfield.
“You know I think there have been bright spots at a lot of places,” Golesh said as he continued to assess his team. “I think the offensive line, there’s a handful of guys who are not going through spring practice that have played a ton of snaps for us.
“And seeing the depth and the young guys step up there and develop, that’s been really exciting,” Golesh said. “I think when offensive linemen are out you start to panic; man, can we operate? I think we’ve operated really well.”
The Bulls’ offensive line holds the key to how far this team will go in 2025. “This could be the deepest offensive line room I’ve ever been a part of,” veteran offensive line coach Tyler Hudanick commented on the USF football website.
USF has some solid starters returning including guard Zane Herring, who, along with veterans center Cole best, has missed all of spring practice; tackle Derek Bowman and center Mike Lofton. Cole Skinner and Deonte Bowie are seasoned reserves.
In college football, or football at any level, it’s what’s up front that counts. It doesn’t matter how good your quarterback is, he can’t throw on his back or if he’s constantly got hands in his face or if he’s forced to run for his life.
Running backs can’t explode through the hole and break tackles if there’s no hole to explode through.
So, for USF, having quarterback Byrum Brown back is great because he puts some pop in the offense, but having a veteran offensive line to protect him might be even better.
At any rate, this will all come to an end, or should we say be put on hold until the fall, with Saturday’s spring game.
“It’ll be good for our kids to come out and compete in front of a crowd,” Golesh said. “It’ll be offense versus defense. There are not enough players to split the squad into teams, but we’ll go offense versus defense for four quarters and make it as much like a game as we can.”
And just like this spring has been, it will be good preparation for the real thing. This team will have a lot of hurdles to jump if it is to reach its goals once September rolls around, but it will be ready. It’s prepared to take its best shot.
In the past, that hasn’t been good enough. This year, it might be.
