Depth?

[gopheryote]

How does someone measure the depth of a football team? Either in-season or for prior seasons? I read a comment about the SEC and their 'not technically cheating but certainly not in the spirit of the rules' methods and wanted to see if it could apply to MVFC. I just don't know how to measure quality depth. 

Any ideas?

[Yotes]

The most important thing when you're working with less scholarships is to find and retain talent ("thank you captain obvious"). It seems like we have too many kids leave the program after a year or two which has had us working at a disadvantage at some positions for years.

What SEC model are you referring to? Is it where they revoke scholarships from kids they don't want anymore? That can work at larger schools who have more scholarships and way more kids interested in playing. How many times have we lost a recruit who instead decided to walk on at a Big Ten school? Those schools have so much more talent lined up and waiting for an offer.

A quick glance at Alabama's roster shows 21 seniors and 25 juniors. They can revoke some scholarships and not worry about having to throw freshmen into action. I don't think that works with reduced scholarships and rosters.

[yotefbfan]

Great question, can you send a link to the article or comment you were referring to? In my opinion, depth is created by great recruiting. Obviously, the SEC recruits some of the best players in college football. The NCAA limited scholarships with the intended purpose of limiting schools from stock pilling or hiding great players from other schools and protecting the players opportunity to actually play. The fact of the matter is still the same, within the limits of the number of scholarships, great teams seem to have talent on their bench that could outplay starters on lesser teams. Look at the top teams in the MVFC and you see teams that continue to "re-load" every year. Kids will come to a great program with the great facilities, coaching and traditions knowing that they may have to sit longer than they would like, but in the end, they might be playing for a championship and greater exposure for NFL scouts. Our challenge at USD is to create that environment. The athletic department is really doing a terrific job of getting our facilities up to that level. I do feel Coach Nielsen and his staff are slowly building that "Depth" that can help this program have a regular high level of success. Look at our current depth at LB, DB & WR. All three of these position groups have quality players throughout and in the case of the DBs and WRs both have sustained significant injuries and the "next up" philosophy seems to be doing great. I know Coach has mentioned many times he likes the current freshman class especially the O-lineman that he feels will develop. That is impressive since we will be returning all of our line (excluding 1) for next year. That is the depth we need at all positions. The long winded answer to the question is that depth can only be measured by the quality of players that replace others either during the season or for the next season. I truly feel we are getting there at USD!

[easmus]

Feels like depth is built from winning. If you’re winning, guys who aren’t starting or playing are probably more likely to stay and wait for an opportunity. We’ve seen it where we’ve been losing and guys bail because they weren’t happy and you’re always young. If we can show growth and keep guys so we have sophomore and junior depth and not freshman and RS freshman depth.

[gopheryote]

Great insights, but how would someone measure depth quality? Or is it always going to be subjective?
Is underclassmen minutes an indication of something?
I do suspect the Yotes are deeper this year than they have been since moving to FCS, but that isn't what I'm going after. I'm trying to measure depth of Team A vs. Team B.

[Yotes]

Oct 14, 2019 14:54:13 GMT -6 gopheryote said:

Great insights, but how would someone measure depth quality? Or is it always going to be subjective?
Is underclassmen minutes an indication of something?
I do suspect the Yotes are deeper this year than they have been since moving to FCS, but that isn't what I'm going after. I'm trying to measure depth of Team A vs. Team B.

I guess unless we get the Madden player ratings guys on the books the best metric to use would be to look at experience. Year in school, time played, etc.

[gopheryote]

I was curious (you may not be) so I took a look and noted what I found (blog form, so it is pretty long...):
The SEC gives everyone plenty of reasons why you love to hate them. But recently a national commentator had a throw-away phrase when discussing FCS-over-FBS upsets that really stuck with me. “That is why the SEC moved their FCS games to later in the year. The starting 11 for many FCS teams can line up with the starting 11 of most FBS teams. But when it comes to depth, the FBS teams have more scholarships and have better players at the 2, 3, 4 deep. The SEC waits until the FCS teams are banged up and have back-ups playing.” The timing of when you play is as important as how ‘good’ is your team.

That is an astute, accurate, and obvious statement. But I don’t think it is given enough consideration, especially as some FCS teams – including the Yotes – seem to fade by the end of the year.

Since getting meaningful stats for depth is not a real option for FCS teams (until Yotes completes his exercise to give every player a Madden rating), I decided to take a purely anecdotal approach and apply the idea that timing of when teams play matters – a lot – to FCS teams. I think it explains a lot of recent history and makes some future expectations clearer. And I’m going to use the 4 teams many of us are familiar with.

Houston Baptist – The team that came into the Dome can score on any FCS team, and they have already won more games this year than the past couple years combined. Will they make the playoffs? Almost certainly ‘no’. Why? Depth. You don’t need any advanced stats to have seen only 3 or 4 guys wearing helmets on the sidelines for HBU when they beat USD. That early in the year, they were still all playing. If we had done SEC-type scheduling, it would look like an entirely different (smaller, slower, etc.) team we would face. If this theory is true, we should expect them to win only a few conference games, even though their conference isn’t one of the strong ones.

NDSU & SDSU – Well, if you haven’t already figured it out, you now know that a big reason NDSU has knocked off FBS schools is directly tied to the timing of when they played (first couple weeks). But I think we can view the xDSU games and see an obvious correlation to the timing theory. SDSU has recently won a couple of conference games vs. NDSU. Those occurred in weeks 6 & 9 (only once in past handful of years have they played after Oct 15th). By weeks 13 & 14, NDSU avenged those losses. Not surprisingly, NDSU is known for its depth (ability to reload, yadda yadda…). I suspect if the teams played in the first few weeks of the season, SDSU would be close to a .500 record, but they will stay closer to .000 in the playoffs, regardless of star players or ‘talent’, since building depth takes a lot of time. 
Interesting NDSU sidebar regarding scheduling: next year they end the season with MSU, UND, and USD – three teams notorious for lack of depth. You will see that theme repeat again with….

USD & SDSU – Since joining the MVFC, this game has been placed as the last game 5 times and second to last the other 2 times, all seven games were L’s for the Yotes. Is SDSU’s talent really that much more elite vs. USD to warrant a streak like that? No – and a quick glance at POW honors, Payton award finishes, NFL interest, etc. shows that isn’t it. Is it because SDSU is just ‘better’ than USD? Well, here I would say ‘Yes and No’. ‘Yes’ in that by the end of the season USD has typically been a shell of its former self, including running out of health RB’s one year. SDSU has been building depth longer, so 'Yes' in week 13(ish) But ‘No’ in that had these teams lined up, oh I dunno, say, before October 15th – when the effects of depth are still minimized – I don’t think that streak would exist. Even as USD struggles with depth, 3 of the past 4 games have been decided by one score.

In other words, the very thing that has allowed SDSU to have a win streak against USD is what is allowing NDSU to have a playoff streak against SDSU. What is good for the goose… Interesting note: in 2020 the State/U game is on Oct 10th. Who did SDSU schedule (OOC) to fill the spot that would have been USD? Dixie State (Looky there - SEC-type scheduling!) 
So what are my takeaways? First, in a conference slate, it appears that quality depth matters more than top end talent. Second, it may be old news to some of you, but I was pretty astonished to see how the perceived playoff-contender team’s schedules are built with soft landings at the end of the year. We are told SDSU/USD is at the end because it is a rivalry game, but SDSU/NDSU (considered by both fan bases to be a bigger rival) is played in the first half of the conference schedule? Yeah right. It was surprising and a bit disappointing to see how that shook out, as the weaker/less depth teams don’t often get their shot at the top teams until after depth is a major factor, and thus it is harder to move up that pecking order.

And lastly, Yotes fans need to be patient. Building depth requires time (lots of it), consistency (coaches), and a bit of luck (few injuries, underclassmen who can play at all-conf level). Hopefully the staff and admin can stay the course and USD can keep redshirting talented freshmen instead of having 5 or 6 starting by the end of the year.

[elcoyote]

That was one of the most interesting and informative posts I've read on here. Great work!

[easmus]

Excellent post gopheryote.

I’d also ask, when was the one time USD beat NDSU? When they played in October! And NDSU lost Wentz the rest if the season, but their depth in Stick was able to handle it. When Kevin Earl got hurt we were doomed. Luckily we play SDSU earlier next year, AND we scheduled Dixie State the week after that AND have the bye week in November.

[Yote 53]

In addition, USD's OOC scheduling leaves something to be desired. While it is great we schedule a legitimate OOC schedule which normally consist of 1 FBS/P5, 1 or 2 FCS peer (think Big Sky) and one FCS body bag game (Drake, etc. Though that didn't pan out with HBU as they turned out to be something different than they were supposed to be), the problem with that schedule is that when you're taking on Montana followed by a P5 school you open yourself up to injuries and depleting your depth. Which is exactly what happened this season. By the time we got to HBU we had a MASH unit defensive backfield going up against a pass happy team. In the future I would like to see USD schedule cupcakes in the OOC with one FBS game, like SDSU does. That loss to HBU is going to come back to haunt us and could be the difference between making the playoffs and sitting at home. Schedule Drake instead, get the W, and we're probably ranked around #20 right now. That loss has skewed the perception of this season that much. Playing in the MVFC we can do that, schedule cupcakes OOC, as we are always going to be tested with NDSU, SDSU, UND, UNI, YSU, ISUr. Nobody can ever point to our schedule and say it is weak with the power teams that are in this conference.


Regarding depth, it's hard to build it when we have experienced so many injuries, career ending injuries to impact players, along with players just not sticking with the program. We have to have a better player retention rate.

[coffeedrinker]

When we are talking depth - do we use all of the 63 football scholarships allowed? I know that Coach can split them up, but it's my understanding that they can only go to 85 of the players. I've been told that we don't use all of the money that we could. Does anyone have any information on that?

[easmus]

Oct 16, 2019 13:20:02 GMT -6 easmus said:

Excellent post gopheryote.

I’d also ask, when was the one time USD beat NDSU? When they played in October! And NDSU lost Wentz the rest if the season, but their depth in Stick was able to handle it. When Kevin Earl got hurt we were doomed. Luckily we play SDSU earlier next year, AND we scheduled Dixie State the week after that AND have the bye week in November.

I should correct myself. Saeger was backup to Earl, and it was Saeger who was QB when we beat NDSU. The overall point remains though.

[easmus]

Oct 16, 2019 14:32:40 GMT -6 coffeedrinker said:

When we are talking depth - do we use all of the 63 football scholarships allowed? I know that Coach can split them up, but it's my understanding that they can only go to 85 of the players. I've been told that we don't use all of the money that we could. Does anyone have any information on that?

I’m 99.99% sure we do because we also pay cost of attendance on top of it.

[elcoyote]

Oct 16, 2019 13:39:00 GMT -6 Yote 53 said:

In addition, USD's OOC scheduling leaves something to be desired. While it is great we schedule a legitimate OOC schedule which normally consist of 1 FBS/P5, 1 or 2 FCS peer (think Big Sky) and one FCS body bag game (Drake, etc. Though that didn't pan out with HBU as they turned out to be something different than they were supposed to be), the problem with that schedule is that when you're taking on Montana followed by a P5 school you open yourself up to injuries and depleting your depth. Which is exactly what happened this season. By the time we got to HBU we had a MASH unit defensive backfield going up against a pass happy team. In the future I would like to see USD schedule cupcakes in the OOC with one FBS game, like SDSU does. That loss to HBU is going to come back to haunt us and could be the difference between making the playoffs and sitting at home. Schedule Drake instead, get the W, and we're probably ranked around #20 right now. That loss has skewed the perception of this season that much. Playing in the MVFC we can do that, schedule cupcakes OOC, as we are always going to be tested with NDSU, SDSU, UND, UNI, YSU, ISUr. Nobody can ever point to our schedule and say it is weak with the power teams that are in this conference.


Regarding depth, it's hard to build it when we have experienced so many injuries, career ending injuries to impact players, along with players just not sticking with the program. We have to have a better player retention rate.

I agree with you on this point completely. I think the tough non league hurts in the long run. Look at Youngstown this season...four creampuffs to start off with, who I think any MVFC team could have gone 4-0 against, now go 4-4 in leagues play and you're in the playoffs. Same with SDSU to a degree. Minnesota, tough game, I'll give them the benefit against Southern Utah because that game was probably scheduled a few years ago and the were good a few years back, but they caught them at a good time this season. The other two though...woof. I know in a few years we open the season with at Missouri and at Montana. Certainly not doing ourselves any favors there.  Now with UND coming in and missing two teams every two year cycle all one of the eastern schools has to do is miss both the XDSUs in a given year and their conference season strength of schedule drops significantly. That's why I wish we had a nine team football conference, so each team had to play everybody.

[Yotes]

Gibbs is gone.