Honest question?
Well, "honestly," this defense isn't as BAD and horrendous as this fan base thinks. Our fans are probably over-reacting because they simply fail to recognize the strength of opponents, at least offensively, that we've been facing this year.
Let me try to explain:
I've always hated when people reference raw stats with no strength of schedule/opponent factored in. That can be very misleading, because bad offenses will make your defense look good, and great offenses can make them look bad. No question we looked rough on defense Saturday, but we were playing a team that has made all of their opponent defenses look pretty weak this year. In fact, Miami may be the top offensive team in the entire country, at least thus far. And they had two weeks to heal up and prepare for us.
But let's look at our defensive numbers so far this year over our first 7 games. Even better, ignore the 62-0 pounding of FCS Austin Peay altogether - just look at FBS competition only. In 6 games thus far vs FBS competition, we've given up 28.3 ppg. Last year at this time, we had only allowed 24.0 ppg, considerably better because it "ranked" UofL's scoring defense much higher on the Scoring Defense ranking, right? Well, as Corso would say, not so fast. Not when you consider strength of opponent.
Last year's team faced offenses in those first 6 FBS games that averaged 27.2 ppg, giving them a defensive performance number of +3.1. This simply means the defense, on average, held their opponent offenses to about a FG below what they normally scored. Remember the Pitt game last year? It was our 7th game, just like Miami. We didn't give up 52 to Pitt, but we did allow 38 to a team that only scored 20 ppg (a putrid number of -18).
This year's defense has faced offenses that are scoring, on average, 36.8 ppg! Their defense giving up 28.3 ppg this year is actually producing a performance number of +8.5, meaning they are holding offenses on average to over a TD below what they normally score. This defense has already faced as many offenses that average over 30 ppg (5) that last years' team faced all last year over a 13 game schedule (again, FBS only). Giving up 52 Saturday sucked, but Miami averages 48 ppg, so that -4 number was not as abyssmal as many of you think, and it was the only negative number the defense has posted this year. And 7 of those points were scored by their defense on the fumble recovery.
Last year's defense posted a +6.3 performance number for the entire season. This year's defense thus far has posted a +8.5 number. The biggest difference of the two seasons thus far is the strength of offensive opponent this year's defense has faced vs last season. Last year, after the defense posted that horrific, season-worst -18 number against Pitt, they followed it up with their two top performances of the season in the shutout against Duke (23-0) and the domination of Va Tech (34-3).
Let's not talk about firing anybody, discuss meaningful stats, and see how these kids respond after their first negative number of the season.
