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StumbleuponMIAMI FOOTBALL
Montgomery: RedHawks need to improve offensive output
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
OXFORD — Some people have said over the last several days that Miami University's football team played well enough to beat the University of Michigan last weekend.
Miami head coach Shane Montgomery is not one of them.
"We haven't played well enough to win yet," said Montgomery, whose team lost to the Wolverines 16-6 despite having a massive advantage in passing yards (205 to 103), time of possession (35:13 to 24:47) and third-down conversions (8-of-19 to 2-of-11).
"In the second half of both games we've played really well on defense," Montgomery pointed out. "Offensively, we have not played well enough to win yet. We've got to score some points."
Through a total of eight quarters, the RedHawks have scored exactly one touchdown.
"We've still got a lot to prove," Montgomery said. "If we want to get anywhere near the goals we set before the season, we've got to score some points and have some explosive plays."
Much in common
The RedHawks and Charleston Southern Buccaneers have never met on the football field, but they probably feel some empathy for each other.
Both teams are 0-2 and both have struggled on offense.
The Buccaneers will face a Miami team for the second time in three weeks when they take the field at Yager Stadium. They opened the season against the University of Miami Hurricanes and were battered 52-7.
Last week they lost 41-23 to Wofford, a formidable team in the Championship Subdivision (what used to be Division I-AA).
"They don't have much rushing yardage," Montgomery said of the Buccaneers, who have averaged just 1.7 yards per carry, "but they've played two pretty tough teams."
Charleston Southern is a member of the Big South, which also includes Virginia Military Institute, Liberty, Gardner-Webb, Presbyterian, Stony Brook and Coastal Carolina.
Belton gets belted
Montgomery feels for quarterback Clay Belton, who was thrown into the Michigan game with no warning when starter Daniel Raudabaugh was hit hard in the fourth quarter. The same fate awaited the red-shirt freshman from Northmont High School.
"That was a tough place to go in. Having played that position, I don't wish that on anybody," said Montgomery, a former quarterback at North Carolina State.
"You can talk (to back-up quarterbacks) all you want about being one play away from being the guy," he said, "but until it actually happens it doesn't really sink in ... On the first pass he got hit in his sternum. It was sort of a welcome to college football."
Contact this reporter at (513) 820-2197 or pconrad@coxohio.com.
