Rez

!!3/0/1

Png fans outnumbering the Leander side about 10-1, if not more. It’s a shame - 2nd round playoff game, and Austin is pretty much an easy shot to Katy.

I watched LR’s first-round game on YouTube. Setting normal caveats for “anything can happen” and “we might not be as good as we think,” I’m predicting a fairly routine victory for PNG. LR has some serious speed on offense. They run a straightforward spread. They remind me of Nederland or Dayton, but better. But, not much better. They don’t do anything on offense we haven’t faced before (Brenham is better, among Texas City, West Orange, FBM, and, of course PAM). Their o-line is going to be asking for oxygen tanks by the third quarter. And, they simply don’t play defense. Their plan is to hope they score 50 while hoping you score 48. That’s a bad recipe for facing the PNG o-line and D.

I have no doubt whatsoever that Nederland could be just as good as PnG with an equal coaching staff. That’s what PNG’s experiment shows - Success at this level isn’t genetic. It’s not about just “having a good crop of boys this year.” It’s coached, created, engineered, taught. The encouraging thing is it doesn’t have to take a long time. Nederland seems to have replaced Neuman with a “rah rah” coaching staff hoping their boys will simply out-gumption the other team. This year especially, the lack of teaching is obvious. A new coaching staff could come in and say, “Every single thing you’re doing now, we’re going to do differently.” A year from now we could be talking about a completely transformed, terrifying Nederland team. Granted, PNG’s current staff inherited a solid, well-coached, enthusiastic Faircloth team and built from there. Nederland might need to get some kids back into the program, but once that happens there’s no reason a great coach can’t make it all work. There’s no difference between the PNG and Nederland players - Half of them were probably born in the same hospital. This is all the result of deliberate coaching choices.

I think it’s a shame there isn’t a Cajun/Mardi Gras themed team around here. If png ever changes mascots, I’d want us to be the Cajuns with Mardi Gras colors for the uniforms. It would be a party

Exactly - It wouldn’t automatically result in us being good. And the area of the district would be too big. Besides, Nederland kids would hate having to wear purple

I’m still pissed about it. And, it wasn’t “PNG” - it was a few try-hard losers who watched Friday Night Lights too much.

I hope those from other schools who come wear their own colors. I want them to let everyone know they’re there. It’s a tradition I’d love to see get going. When Nederland is in the playoffs and png isn’t, I’d love to see their whole side in black, gold, purple, and white. And I’d love a sea of black and gold sitting with us this week.

PNG’s D is actually slightly better in PPG. With yesterday’s win, we average 14.5 points per game.

I smell a tough game. Hope the team doesn’t look past Leander to Montgomery LC. Leander seems pretty good. Some size. No gauge on the comparative strength of their schedule, but that’s unreliable analysis most of the time anyway. We need to play our best game so far to get past them. We looked great against Brenham, but we can’t ignore how much Brenham’s mistakes helped us out (short punts, fumbles). We benefitted from short fields all night. This isn’t to take credit from the team for capitalizing on (and sometimes creating) those mistakes. Our defense got an anaconda grip on them from the beginning and never let go. Here’s hoping we do the same next week.

I hate the cowbells . Not as bad as those stupid drums Stephenville has

I got to talk to some Brenham fans after the game. They might be the nicest people in Texas. I wish we played them every year.

Well, I was wrong. I had Texas City making it to the third round.

[Hidden Content]

Brenham #17 RB is very good. Slippery in these wet conditions. Brenham D-line showing up, but png is probably averaging 5 yards a carry.

Agreed - I’m 50/50 on who wins between FBM and Randle (I think we’re looking at a 3-point game either way), but in the playoffs, defense is everything, and that’s advantage FBM. We see teams who average buckets of points all season lose to much more boring teams that just play good defense, every year in the playoffs. I’m a big Coach Faircloth fan (he gave a lot to the program, took us to the next level from where we had been, made us far more consistent, and won tons of games) but I don’t miss the “We’ll have to score 50 to win this game” days. All that to say, FBM looks “weaker” this year, but to paraphrase a quote Dave Campbell’s Matt Stepp yesterday, “Fort Bend Marshall has the best defense they’ve ever had.” That’s going to be a huge problem for Randle.

Didn’t they make the playoffs in 2021? I have trouble finding Nederland football history

They’ve GOT to start blocking for him. Or at least trying to.

Same year. Nederland was D1, PNg was D2

Ok - So, that goes to my point. West Orange was better than a lot of teams that made the playoffs across the state that year. Would they have made it to state? Who knows. But, it wouldn’t have hurt to have West Orange in, and they might have shaken things up.

Thanks - I thought it was West Orange that made it, not Nederland.

(1) UIL collects revenue from playoff games. More games = $$ (2) I like four teams in, and more teams solves a couple problems while not depriving the playoffs of what makes playoffs great. In the old days, teams were often punished for being in good districts. In 1999, state-ranked Nederland team sat at home because West Orange and PNG beat them. Both West Orange and PnG made good playoff runs, and it’s reasonable to expect Nederland would have as well. Far weaker teams than Nederland across the state made the playoffs because they were in weaker districts. I see the dilutive effect of adding more teams, but only if “making the playoffs” is the prize I’m protecting. But, our goal isn’t to see who can make the playoffs. Our goal is to arrive at the best team in the state via a single-elimination tournament. More teams doesn’t hurt that, and there have been four seeds who made it really far (I want to say some have made it to state because I remember hearing that from Dave Campbell’s, but I don’t know for certain).

Disregard, there’s already a thread on this below, I just missed it.

I don’t see a thread for this one yet. This is likely going to be the most competitive first round game between two really good teams in 5aD2, Region 3. Randle’s offense vs FBM’s speed, size, and defense. Randle has only lost to undefeated Lake Creek. FBM averaged just over 10 points a game on defense. I have a hunch FBM has a little more in this game. I’ll take FBM by three.

Right- I mean actually play.