Actually Rhule didn't recruit Alvano. Mickey Joseph was who offered Alvano when he was the interim HC. It wasn't long after the offer that Alvano accepted. Rhule honored the offer and commitment.
He kicked a school record 57 yard FG with no wind. That kick put us ahead but the pick 6 by Suh sealed the game.
Our punter had far less of a negative impact than our inconsistency in FG kicking and turnovers.
This is true, but far too often the field wasn't "flipped" after his 22 yard effort.
I don't disagree that the field wasn't flipped often enough, but it was very low on the list of why we lost.
We're in agreement SUH. But sometimes it's the little not so obvious things that result in 13-10 losses instead of 17-13 victories. How often did this scenario play out last season.
Turnovers, I agree, but he was far more impactful from a negative standpoint than our FG kicker. One was a freshman finding his way, the other was on the Ray Guy watchlist. The stats don’t lie, Buschini had a poor year. Alvano was solid with the exception of 40-49 yard kicks. He was also perfect on XP.
Buschini was pretty good most of the time but I agree he had bad punts that put us in bad situations. And Kemp as well during the Michigan State game fair catching punts inside the 5 yardline didn't help in that game either. If we are more consistent on the FG game of which Alvano was 60% which is not good but yet we have a kicker behind him who over his career made over 79% of his kicks rides the bench? Heck those 2 missed FGs against Wisconsin and Iowa would've put Alvano at over 70% if he makes those. 2 losses hinged on his missed FGs. Turnovers cost us 6 wins including the 2 games against Wisconsin and Iowa. Turnovers cost us the Maryland, Minnesota, and Michigan State games too. I just realized we lost to every team on our schedule that starts with an M. Maybe we shouldn't play so many M schools.
Not one of Buschinis punts cost us a game much less 2. I agree they didn't help matters but they didn't cost us a game like the Turnovers and missed FGs did. That's a fact.
That's 'woulda, coulda, shoulda' stuff, SUH. They practice their skills in front of the coaches for a reason.
Don't forget CU. And I'd opine that turnovers cost us in every one of our losses. Heck, without turnovers, our game with Michigan might have been competitive as well. While you can point to various parts of the game, be it offense, special teams, or even defense, the turnovers were beyond ridiculous. And to be fair, the lion's share were on the QB.
Correct - did pass protection or bad snaps contribute? Yes. So did terrible blocking by TEs. Not putting this 100% on QBs but the lion's share of issues causing TOs was decision making and failure to protect the ball from the QB position.
I've never disputed that turnovers weren't our Achilles heal. Those cost us in almost every game.
Wrong, field position matters, and Buschini failed miserably on numerous occasions to reduce pressure on the defense AND to help our offense gain better field position because he failed to flip the field. One player struck the ball 57 times, the other 15 times. Buschini had 5 games he AVERAGED in the 30s. Decent high schoolers do better than that. When we were in the hole, he’d fail to bail us out, and for a senior that’s inexcusable.
You have not proven to anyone that Buschinis punts directly cost us games. You can say wrong all you want. Still doesn't change the fact that no one can directly link his punting to a loss in any of our games. Yet everyone knows we lost every game due to too many turnovers and missed FGs. Those facts are indisputable. Basically we beat ourselves in pretty much every loss but Michigan. They were just flat out better and more talented than we were.
