[Goose]

I may be misremembering, but while there were problems in the secondary, I don't think it was due to bad play from the guys we expected to be the strength of our secondary--Meeks, Holder, and Reid.

Meeks and Holder did a good job in coverage. Their run support wasn't stellar, but with the U$C receivers being as good as they are, asking your CBs to provide much in the run game is unrealistic. I can't say I noticed Reid making big mistakes. I did see some problems with Buncom, but he is new at the position, as you point out. It is true that U$C had lots of time to throw, but it is also true that their third receiver got open a lot. Sometimes, on TV, the defender wasn't even in the picture. OK, against good teams that can happen, but in this game it happened too much. It wasn't like they were broken patterns. The receiver was doing what was planned. We didn't cover it correctly. Whose "fault" these plays were, I don't know, but having guys running free across the field is somebody's fault. Since we were in nickle most of the time, there should have been some kind of coverage. It is not like a linebacker got beat by pure speed.  Good teams make you pay for mistakes, and we made some mistakes.
I am more disturbed by some missed tackles in space. That disturbs me, because against the spread teams in the PAC-12, the DBs have to be able to make open field tackles most of the time or you are going to get beat. I am sure we all can remember the battles with Oregon, where we would hold them on defense, only to give up a touchdown because they got somebody isolated on a DB who simply couldn't/didn't bring the runner down. We started beating Oregon when we got guys who could make those tackles.

[Goose]

I may be misremembering, but while there were problems in the secondary, I don't think it was due to bad play from the guys we expected to be the strength of our secondary--Meeks, Holder, and Reid.

Meeks and Holder did a good job in coverage. Their run support wasn't stellar, but with the U$C receivers being as good as they are, asking your CBs to provide much in the run game is unrealistic. I can't say I noticed Reid making big mistakes. I did see some problems with Buncom, but he is new at the position, as you point out. It is true that U$C had lots of time to throw, but it is also true that their third receiver got open a lot. Sometimes, on TV, the defender wasn't even in the picture. OK, against good teams that can happen, but in this game it happened too much. It wasn't like they were broken patterns. The receiver was doing what was planned. We didn't cover it correctly. Whose "fault" these plays were, I don't know, but having guys running free across the field is somebody's fault. Since we were in nickle most of the time, there should have been some kind of coverage. It is not like a linebacker got beat by pure speed.  Good teams make you pay for mistakes, and we made some mistakes.
I am more disturbed by some missed tackles in space. That disturbs me, because against the spread teams in the PAC-12, the DBs have to be able to make open field tackles most of the time or you are going to get beat. I am sure we all can remember the battles with Oregon, where we would hold them on defense, only to give up a touchdown because they got somebody isolated on a DB who simply couldn't/didn't bring the runner down. We started beating Oregon when we got guys who could make those tackles.