Tennessee Volunteers Vs. UAB Blazers: Game Preview & Stat Comparison

A weekly look at our upcoming opponent's recent history, with animated drive charts, links to SB Nation game pages, and statistical comparisons.

CAVEATS: You know the drill.

As always, this is a long post, so I've put the conclusions and predictions before and after the meat. You're not seeing double.

Sketchy Conclusions

• UAB has had some unfortunate oddities in their first three games, from losing on a last second field goal attempt to a certain red zone wonkiness that looks and smells like a curse. They have scored four TDs on their last four drives, though, so perhaps the curse is broken just in time for their trip to Knoxville. Yay!
• The Blazers lead C-USA in rushing yards, largely due to QB David Isabelle. Otherwise, their offense is pretty much as middle-of-the-road as you'd expect. The offense seems to be a three-man game, with Isabelle's running being the primary threat. Running back Pat Shed and receiver Frantrell Forrest are the other two main guys. [Note by Joel, 09/21/10 10:40 AM EDT ] Backup QB Bryan Ellis came in late last week and had enough success to come from way behind to win. (Hat tip to Incipient_Senescence for the discovery.)
  
• As funky as their offense has been, their defense appears to be consistently bad over three games. They're strongest in sacks and rushing defense, but mostly they're in the bottom fourth in defensive categories. Apart from defensive lineman Bryant Turner, who can apply pressure to the backfield, the Blazers' defense should be vulnerable.
• Trey Ragland is an excellent punter, ranks fourth in the nation with an average of 48.4 yards, and can knock one the length of the field and make it stop at the one if you let him. The Blazers are better at kickoff returns than punt returns, at least after three games.
• Like last week, the two teams may actually be relatively even on yards, but the numbers suggest that Tennessee should win on the scoreboard. Of course, that probably depends on continuation of the red zone curse for the Blazers or some other turnover advantage for the Vols, which is a sketchy thing on which to rely. But after three games, maybe it's who they are.

Predictions

• Tennessee 34, UAB 17.

Schedule and Animated Drive Charts

 

Florida Atlantic Owls	9/2/10	loss 31 - 32	coverage
@ SMU Mustangs	9/11/10	loss 7 - 28	coverage
Troy Trojans	9/18/10	win 34 - 33	coverage

 

FULL SCREEN VERSION

 

Yikes. Solid start, both offensively and defensively. A little back and forth for awhile, and then a pick six to change momentum. We have no idea how that feels. Look at that punt on FAU's second-to-last possession.What is that, some 65 yards and downed at the one? Force a punt, get the go-ahead touchdown? UAB misses a field goal that could have won the game? Like I said, that's a yikes game for UAB.

FULL SCREEN VERSION

 

Oh, my. All sorts of futility in gradient segmented lines. That 76 yard punt downed at the one was an absolute beaut, but it was followed up by the hapless FCS opponent Mustangs (HT: Incipient_Senescence again) with a 99-yard TD drive. UAB did put together a couple of decent drives, but one mysteriously ended at the five yard line when time expired in the first half without a field goal attempt, and the opening drive of the second half was fumbled at the goal line. Odd.

FULL SCREEN VERSION

 

Bless their hearts, every time the Blazers got close to the end zone in the first half, Something Really Bad happened. Do they not have a field goal kicker? Either they give it up on downs, fumble it away, or throw it to the other team. And look at that defense. Lots of solid red lines for the Troy Troys. But . . .

. . . but have the Blazers found themselves just in time for Tennessee? They scored four TDs on their last four drives coming into this game, one of them a 99-yarder to win the game by a single point. [Note by Joel, 09/21/10 10:38 AM EDT ] Credit backup QB Bryan Ellis for that. (HT: Incipient_Senescence) Clutch? Yes. Fluke? We hope so.

National Unit Rankings

Now on to the national rankings.

 

OFFENSIVE RANKINGS
Category	National Rank	Actual	National Leader	Actual	Conf Rank	Conference USA Leader	Actual
Rushing Offense	30	204.00	Air Force	399.00	1	UAB	204.00
Passing Offense	75	202.67	Oklahoma St.	391.67	9	Tulsa	328.00
Total Offense	51	406.67	Oregon	611.67	6	Tulsa	517.67
Scoring Offense	81	24.00	Oregon	63.00	8	Houston	45.00
Passing Efficiency	85	118.39	Auburn	191.48	9	Houston	159.90
Sacks Allowed	65	2.00	Penn St.	.00	8	Marshall	.33

 

Offensive observations. Hmm. Nothing special to see here. The Blazers' running game is quite respectable, and they lead C-USA with 204 yards per game. We're getting 181, just for comparison's sake, although we hope the UT Martin, Oregon, Florida slate is tougher than FAU, FCS, Troy Trojans of Troy (We're from Troy!).

DEFENSIVE RANKINGS
Category	National Rank	Actual	National Leader	Actual	Conf Rank	Conference USA Leader	Actual
Rushing Defense	73	162.33	Texas	44.00	9	Tulane	78.00
Pass Efficiency Defense	101	146.86	Oregon	61.20	8	UCF	87.79
Total Defense	103	444.67	Oregon	193.33	9	UCF	261.67
Scoring Defense	98	31.00	Oregon	4.33	7	UCF	15.00
Pass Defense	105	282.33	Stanford	90.00	8	UCF	133.00
Sacks	T-43	2.33	Fresno St.	5.00	5	Marshall	3.67
Tackles For Loss	80	5.00	Miami (FL)	12.50	10	Southern Miss.	8.00

 

Defensive observations. Well, here's some special stuff, albeit of the "bless your heart" variety. UAB ranks over the century mark nationally in every defensive category save sacks (43rd, respectable), rushing defense (bottom half), and scoring defense (bottom fourth).

SPECIAL TEAMS AND TURNOVERS RANKINGS
Category	National Rank	Actual	National Leader	Actual	Conf Rank	Conference USA Leader	Actual
Net Punting	4	44.53	Boston College	47.13	1	UAB	44.53
Punt Returns	98	3.89	Miami (FL)	27.75	10	Tulsa	13.80
Kickoff Returns	21	25.50	Indiana	40.40	3	SMU	28.56
Turnover Margin	T-89	-1.00	Ohio St.	3.33	8	East Carolina	1.00

 

Special teams and turnovers observations. Well, a 76 yard punt will certainly skew your average, but the Blazers actually appear to be very good at kicking the ball high and long, so don't expect anything spectacular for the Vols on punt returns. The good news: we probably don't need to worry about them returning punts against us, either. Or so we hope. Kickoff returns may be another story.

Stastical Comparison

Here's how the teams looked when the RTT BlogPoll Computery Thing chewed them up and spit them out.

Rank	Team	WL	SOS	PED	RD	3DO	TD	PEO	OPPG	TO	3DD	SCORE
71		-0.867	1.462	0.704	-0.087	-2.118	0.629	-0.717	-0.271	0.010	0.291	-25.804
103		-0.867	-0.010	-0.972	-0.306	-0.710	-1.209	-0.627	-0.752	0.266	-0.002	-67.167

 

So UAB appears to be better than Tennessee at 3rd down offense (anyone surprised?), pass efficiency offense, and turnover margin, but Tennessee has better numbers everywhere else and has done it against better competition.

Players to watch for

Category	Player	National Rank	Actual
Rushing	David Isabelle	T-43	88.00
	Pat Shed	73	68.67
Passing Efficiency (Min. 15 Att./Game)	David Isabelle		89.85
Total Offense	David Isabelle	94	156.00
	Pat Shed		68.67
Receptions Per Game	Frantrell Forrest		3.33
Receiving Yards Per Game	Frantrell Forrest		50.67
	Jackie Williams		39.33
Interceptions	T.J. Ballou	T-69	.33
Punting (Min. 3.6 Punts/Game)	Trey Ragland	3	48.40
Punt Returns (Min. 1.2 Ret./Game)	Pat Shed	65	4.38
Kickoff Returns (Min. 1.2 Ret./Game)	Pat Shed	20	28.83
	Frantrell Forrest	T-40	24.83
Field Goals	Josh Zahn	T-94	.33
Scoring	Jackie Williams		6.00
	David Isabelle		6.00
All-Purpose Runners	Pat Shed	21	157.67
	Frantrell Forrest		99.67
	David Isabelle		88.00
Sacks	Bryant Turner	T-7	1.33
	Marvin Burdette	T-56	.67
	Connor Boyett		.33
Tackles
Tackles For Loss	Bryant Turner	T-9	2.00
	Elliott Henigan		1.00

Observations

Offense. This looks a lot like a true three-man game on offense for the Blazers. The QB, David Isabelle, despite having a woman's given name for a surname, appears to be the real deal, but more of a threat on the ground than through the air. He's tied for 43rd in rushing in the nation, ranked against true running backs, but he's not ranked at all in either passing yards or passing efficiency. [Note by Joel, 09/21/10 10:39 AM EDT ] Backup QB Bryan Ellis had some significant success late last week. (HT: I_S) The running back, Pat Shed, gets a respectable 69 yards per game but ranks in the lower half in the nation. He's also the punt and kickoff return guy, and he does quite well returning kicks, thank you. The team's leading receiver is Frantrell Forrest, and he's getting 3.33 catches per game for 50.67 yards, but isn't ranked nationally. He's also the other guy back for kickoffs. Other than that, though, nobody really shows up as a true threat on offense. Jackie Williams does get nearly 40 receiving yards per game.

Defense. The main guy here appears to be defensive lineman Bryant Turner, who's tied for 7th nationally in sacks and 9th nationally in tackles for loss. Marvin Burdette is also getting some pressure in the backfield. Notice that empty Tackles category. Not just nothing special to see here, nothing to see here.

Special teams. Trey Ragland is the name behind the excellent punting for the Blazers. The field goal kicker, Josh Zahn, is one of two on the season. Again, Pat Shed is both the punt and kickoff returner, and to date, he's done better returning kicks than punts.

Head to Head Comparisons

First, a quick glance at how this analysis did last week against Florida:

	Prediction	Result
UT rush	200	29
UT pass	170	259
Florida rush	170	150
Florida pass	160	167
UT score	17	17
Florida score	28	31

 

Not bad, considering, although this early in the season, you should just chalk it up to blind luck. The Tennessee rush and passing yards were both way off, but the total yards were close enough.

Okay, so what do we have for this week?

			Best Comparable(s)	Result Against Best Comparable	Prediction
UT rush v. UAB rush defense	181 (#42)	162 (#73)	Oregon/Florida (92/94) (#26/#25)	182/29	180
UT pass v. UAB pass defense	205 (#73)	282 (#105)	Florida/Oregon (184/100) (#49/#3)	259/151	300
UAB rush v. UT rush defense	150 (#65)	204 (#30)	Florida/Oregon (168/381) (#52/#2)	150/245	200
UAB pass v. UT pass defense	152 (#24)	203 (#75)	Florida/Oregon (151/231) (#103/#49)	167/202	185
UT scoring offense v. UAB scoring defense	27 (#70)	31 (#98)	Florida/Oregon (14/4) (#16/#1)	17/13	34
UAB scoring offense v. UT scoring defense	26 (#80)	24 (#81)	Florida/Oregon (34/63) (#32/#1)	31/48	17

 

Even when we have a full season of data, this section will include the caveat that these are informed guesses rather than mathematical calculations. The general analytical framework is this: We accomplished X in a certain category. The opponent averages Y against that, which is most closely comparable to some identified previous opponent, against whom we did Z. All of that leads to an informed guess labeled as Prediction. The less data you have, the more sketchy the guess, and the guesses range from ALL CAPS SKETCHY WITH EXCLAMATION POINTS at the beginning of the season to merely lower case sketchy for the last game.

This week's example: We're averaging 181 yards on the ground. UAB, on average, is giving up 162. Of our previous opponents, Florida's rush defense most closely resembles Oregon's and Florida's, who are ranked right next to each other. Against Oregon, we managed 182, and against Florida were gained only 29, so, yeah, what in the world. Both Oregon and Florida appear to be much better than UAB, so let's assume (and hope!) it will be more like Oregon than Florida and call it 180.

This week, we again have sort of an odd scenario where the yards could be relatively more even than the score. Fortunately for the Vols, Tennessee should be on the better end of the scoreboard.

Sketchy Conclusions

• UAB has had some unfortunate oddities in their first three games, from losing on a last second field goal attempt to a certain red zone wonkiness that looks and smells like a curse. They have scored four TDs on their last four drives, though, so perhaps the curse is broken just in time for their trip to Knoxville. Yay!
• The Blazers lead C-USA in rushing yards, largely due to QB David Isabelle. Otherwise, their offense is pretty much as middle-of-the-road as you'd expect. The offense seems to be a three-man game, with Isabelle's running being the primary threat. Running back Pat Shed and receiver Frantrell Forrest are the other two main guys. [Note by Joel, 09/21/10 10:40 AM EDT ] Backup QB Bryan Ellis came in late last week and had enough success to come from way behind to win. (Hat tip to Incipient_Senescence for the discovery.)
• As funky as their offense has been, their defense appears to be consistently bad over three games. They're strongest in sacks and rushing defense, but mostly they're in the bottom fourth in defensive categories. Apart from defensive lineman Bryant Turner, who can apply pressure to the backfield, the Blazers' defense should be vulnerable.
• Trey Ragland is an excellent punter, ranks fourth in the nation with an average of 48.4 yards, and can knock one the length of the field and make it stop at the one if you let him. The Blazers are better at kickoff returns than punt returns, at least after three games.
• Like last week, the two teams may actually be relatively even on yards, but the numbers suggest that Tennessee should win on the scoreboard. Of course, that probably depends on continuation of the red zone curse for the Blazers or some other turnover advantage for the Vols, which is a sketchy thing on which to rely. But after three games, maybe it's who they are.

Predictions

• Tennessee 34, UAB 17.