[NU Sports] At the end

[Tom Maycock]

My 2 cents:

For the second week in a row, if a couple of plays had turned out differently, we'd be talking about one of the great QB performances in NU history. Unfortunately, the plays Kafka didn't make overshadowed those he did again this week. Same for the receivers--huge games from Fields, Markshausen, Dunsmore, etc. But a couple of drops really hurt.

But those few misconnections shouldn't have been the difference. Kafka and the gang didn't play championship football, but what they did should have been enough. 

The big problem was our inability to stop the run up the middle, poor tackling, and a lack of...something (energy? focus? enthusiasm?) on a couple of key drives. 

Ultimately, I suspect we miss Mims and Gill way more than I thought we would. I really think that if you plugged those two back into this defense, we'd be in a very different situation.

The reality is that we are now talented enough to hang with most teams, but we have a very small margin for error. Last year was no different in that respect, but the 2008 Cats made just enough plays to put Ws on the board.

I'm certainly not jumping off the bowl bandwagon yet, but a bunch of things need to improve. The Cats really need to shore up that interior defense, work on both ends of the kickoff game, and start making those one or two extra plays on offense.

Oh, and play Arby Fields more. Wow, he's got a huge upside.

Tom