North Texas: Room For Improvement

Moving The Chains, Both Ways

North Texas’ whopping 41:52 to 18:08 advantage in time of possession was a result of Clemson’s failure on both sides of the third-down equation.

The Tigers converted just two of nine third-down chances, while allowing the Mean Green to extend possession on 11 of 22 opportunities. North Texas also converted its only fourth-down try.

North Texas also cashed in on third down for some of its biggest-yardage plays, including runs of 20 and 21 yards by Lance Dunbar and 23 yards by James Hamilton, as well as Nathan Tune’s passes of 45 yards to Jamaal Jackson, 18 yards to Darius Carey and 35 yards to Dunbar.

“The most disappointing thing was third down – they were 50 percent, and you’ve got to get off the field on third down,” said defensive coordinator Kevin Steele.

“We’ve got to work on stopping the run – we have to make more plays,” said Jarvis Jenkins. “Their running back (Dunbar) was good – everything they said about him was true. But it all comes back to stopping the run. If we stop the run, then the pass will come. I felt like we gave the quarterback too much time to throw. We had five sacks, but that wasn’t good enough. Too many times he had too long.”

Offensive coordinator Billy Napier said the offense did less than its part to keep the defense off the field.

“We weren’t very good on third down, especially in the first half,” Napier said. “It takes a toll on your defense when you can’t keep the ball and send them right back out there.”

Inefficient Tackling

Kevin Steele mentioned several factors in North Texas’ ability to run up its 462-yard offensive total. None of them would have made much difference, he said, had the Tigers done a better job of tackling.

“We’ve got to tackle better – that’s the bottom line,” Steele said. “If we tackle, then a lot of these things we’re not even talking about…We’re better tacklers than that, and we can be and will be.”

“Everybody’s got to do their job,” said DeAndre McDaniel. “We made some subtle mistakes that we have to get corrected. We’ve got a long road ahead of us. This was the first game of the season and we gave up more yards than expected. Now we have to come back and fix our mistakes and go from there.

“I didn’t expect them to get 460 yards – nobody did. But they came out and did it, though. We just have to come back next week and do what we’re supposed to do.”

“There are a lot of things we could have done better, but mainly it was just tackling,” said Corico Hawkins. “If we make the tackles we should make, then they’d have gotten a lot less yards.

“Overall, I’d give us a B-minus. Mainly because of all the tackles we missed. It’s just a matter of wrapping up. It’s our first real contest and we had some cobwebs to get out. You’re all jacked up and flying around out there. Everybody wants those knockout shots, but you just have to calm down and make those plays. There were a lot of times we were in near-leg, near-shoulder position, and we didn’t make the near-leg, near-shoulder tackles.”

“There are positives on the tape, but there are a lot of things to correct,” said Steele. “This will be good to have to sit ‘em down and show them that we need to get a whole lot better than this.”

Parker’s ‘Greedy’ Decision

Kyle Parker admits he got a bit greedy when he tried to force the ball into the end zone with the Tigers leading 21-7 and trying to take command midway through the third quarter.

Dabo Swinney saw Parker’s error more in terms of decision-making and game-management.

“I thought Kyle did fine except for the turnover,” Swinney said. “He’s smarter than that. The guy did a good job of baiting him and dropped back underneath the throw. But he’s got to manage the game. That’s his job – manage the game. We’ve got to come away with points right there.

“Hopefully that’s something you learn from, knock that rust off, and don’t let that happen again. That can cost you a ball game.”

First-Half First-Downs, Both Ways

The Tigers’ early-game performance on first down left something to be desired, on both sides of the line of scrimmage.

Offensively, prior to Kyle Parker’s 70-yard bomb to Brandon Clear, the Tigers had gained just nine yards on six first-down plays, putting the offense in challenging down-and-distance situations and contributing to an offensive funk that lasted most of two quarters.

Defensively, the Tigers gave up 118 yards on a dozen first-down plays in the first two periods – half of North Texas’ 234-yard total.

Clemson’s first-down productivity improved significantly as the game progressed. The Tigers had consecutive first-down plays of 24, 17 and 8 yards on their quick-strike touchdown drive at the end of the first half, and then had a 49-yard run by Jamie Harper, a 30-yard pass from Kyle Parker to Bryce McNeal and 18-yard reverse run by Jaron Brown early in the second half.