Special teams is awful, and can account for at least one of our losses (Iowa). However, I refuse to give Coach Heacock a free pass this year. He was instrumental in designing a defense to keep us competitive 2 years ago. Still pretty decent last season. But this season they have been a sieve. The 3 man front is old news, Jon. Everyone is doing it now. It is reminiscent of how Fred revolutionized college basketball with transfers, spacing the floor, and winning by trying to score more points as opposed to playing tough defense. It took a few years, but now everyone is doing it, and Fred is no longer special.
Jon needs to reach into his bag of tricks and find something new for this defense. Big 12 teams have seen it 3 years now, most have adopted it, and a few even do it better than we do. We went to a 3 man front when we didn't have the dudes on the d-line. Well, now we do. I'd love to see a more traditional defense, one that doesn't rely on just 3 guys beating 5, sometimes 6 guys to go get the QB. Fact is, we didn't have the guys in the second level this year to compensate only rushing 3. Harvey, Peavy, and Payne are what made that defense work, all were plus defenders in pass coverage. We replace them with underclassmen and less talented players like Lewis and Bickham. Frustrating to watch under-skilled offenses like Kansas and K-State feast on what is supposed to be a good defense