[QUOTE="colhenrylives, post: 173927, member: 968"]Serra's offense, though brimming with skill guys, has a problem: The lack of a true, multi-threat QB. Leki Nunn was all that and more. That's not news. But a lot of the stuff that Serra ran to such great effect in 2015 and 2016 with Nunn at the helm doesn't work now because the run threat simply isn't there. Nunn is gone. Defenses can cheat and load up on the pass now. Look for the Padres to alter their offensive approach as the WCAL part of the schedule looms. Serra remains a work in progress as a result.
That's a good assessment
colhenry, but still early and I'm not convinced that Leki Nunn drove the Serra team entirely by himself. I look at other teams such as St. Francis who lost Bennett Williams the WCAL MVP [though not in agreement he was the right choice over Nunn} along with Cyrus Habibi-Likio. 2 dynamic players that would IMO equal the presence of Leki Nunn for Serra to degree in importance to their team. Now before anyone jumps on the dual-threat of Leki Nunn which I'm not disputing, you must keep in mind that BOTH Bennett Williams and Habibi-Likio played both sides of the ball and both played well [Willaims as WR/DB & Habibi-Likio as RB/LB] or in short 4 positions for SF.
Serra is now more of a conventional offense and misses the scrambling & unpredictability of Nunn, similar to the Pittsburg QB who ran wild on Serra 2 weeks ago & was the difference in that game - Pitt's QB "ran at will" often and for large gains wearing down Serra's D [the Pitt QB which looked at times like the 2nd coming of Leki Nunn].
Is the 2017 Serra team a mere shadow of the team that won a school record 10-games straight in one season in 2016 enroute to a state bowl game or is there still any glimmer of hope still left? Lets look at the first 3 games of 2016 vs 2017 for a clue.
2016 Serra loses opener 63-35 to St. Mary's, drops 2nd game to DLS 47-13 and then Pitt 48-25 losing first 3 games by 85 points or an average loss by 28+ points per game. Serra then dropped its opener in league to VC by 35-28. Serra scored a total of 73 points in those 3 games or 24+ points per game.
2017 Serra loses opener 41-13 to St. Mary's, wins 2nd game 42-21 over Elk Grove and then loss to Pitt 35-28 losing 2 of first 3 games by an average loss of 17+ points per game and winning one game by 21 points. Serra scored a total of 83 points in those 3 games or 28 points per game.
Conclusion if there is one is that it is far too early to tell if this Serra team will struggle without a true double-threat QB as
colhenry indicates may be the case. Yes DLS in the 2016 results does make a difference. Is St. Mary's as good as last season? Early on everyone thought St. Mary's was better than 2016 after their lopsided win over Serra. That quickly changed when a very strong Central Catholic team took down St. Mary's by 20-7. Now for another question: After last weeks 34-7 DLS loss to Bishop Gorman is DLS as good a team as 2016? The answer you'll get from most fans is a resounding "NO". This is a bit surprising as DLS vanquished St. Francis by 31-7 which was considered a "good showing" by the Lancer's, yet now does not appear to be that "respectable" of a loss after all. Its difficult at best to judge scores from opponents not common to both teams being reviewed as I'm the first to admit. First we'll have to see who is the team to beat from the winner of SF-VC this week. Serra-Riordan will also be an indicator as a few fans have expressed that Riordan could win over Serra and stranger things have happened. I do know that VC has no passing game, SF goes to the air when needed and not often with short-medium passes and Serra to date airs it out on a regular basis. Yes this is going to be interesting fans...[/QUOTE]
Good work. Again.