This is a blanket statement that applies to 3 of our games this year - Oregon State, Oregon, and Utah. In all 3 games, the opposing offense just wasn't quite making connections in the first half. Go back and look at the games - there were openings, they just weren't finding them. We were getting some pressure, forcing mistakes, and their offense was missing the open man. After the half, they managed to contain our pressure better and starting finding running lanes and open receivers. Simultaneously, their defensive adjustments shut down our offense.
Some of that could be a freshman QB and a lack of practice, but in all 3 of those games, I can't really say that we changed anything for the second half. We didn't anticipate defensive adjustments, we didn't fix what wasn't working. That's on coaching, and 3 games makes a trend....and one that concerns me. Even when you're ahead 28-7 at the half, you have some adjustments you can make...and you always have to try to adjust to what you expect the other team to do. If you give a "keep doing what you're doing" speech at halftime, you just gave your team license to slack off.
Even in our 1 win this season, the Beavers put things together in the 4th quarter. In the first 2.5 quarters, they got 1 TD on 7 possessions (not counting the one that ended the half). In the late 3rd & 4th, they had 3 TDs in 4 possessions. They went from 3/11 on 3rd down in the 3 quarters to 5/5 in the fourth. Their defensive changes weren't as effective - we got 3 TDs in 5 possessions in the 2nd half (although 2 of those were short fields), but we went from 50% on 3rd down in the 1st half (3/6) to 25% in the second (1/4) and 0/2 in the 4th. Gebbia completed 58% for 90 yards in the first half, and was sacked twice in 19 dropbacks. In the second half, he completed 77% for 239 and was sacked twice in 33 dropbacks. 10 OSU first downs in the first half, 19 in the second. I really think that in this game, the Beavers just ran out of time. We were getting less effective against them, and they were getting more effective against us. Every other team we played either copied their blueprint or had enough additional talent to make effective corrections earlier in the game. If the Beavers did it one exchange sooner, I think maybe we're 0-4 instead of 1-3.