Five Takeaways From the Cincinnati Bearcats' Win Over Tulsa

Cincinnati improved to 9-0 on Saturday.

After a Homecoming day full of awesomeness, the Cincinnati Bearcats delivered a heart-pounding, nail-biting, and cringeworthy 28-20 win over Tulsa. Most of the faithful fans at Nippert Stadium left with a sour taste in their mouths, despite the victory. 

Now that we're 36 hours removed from the madness, here are five thoughts on the game: 

1. Enjoy the ride, Bearcats fans. This may be the best football team UC has ever had and at the end of the day, all they can do is win. Whether the Committee to plan parties the College Football Playoff votes them into the playoff is out of their hands. The Bearcats could help their caus if they covered the spread against their opponents, but there are still plenty of strength of schedule-type arguments to be had by those who would choose to do so. An undefeated season and a conference title will make this an amazing year.

The second thought that I woke up with pertained to Cincinnati’s valiant quarterback.

2. Desmond Ridder continues to play impressive football, despite a fumble that some are choosing to focus solely on while forgetting the rest of his performance. The Bearcats opened up the running side of the "Des playbook" and reaped the benefits. Much of the success the offense tasted came whenever they were mixing up option runs with Ridder keepers, which took pressure off Ryan Montgomery and Charles McClelland as they tried to fill in for an injured Jerome Ford. The fumble at the end was astonishing and it sucked, but it doesn’t remove the entirety of the performance Ridder put together, for me.

Speaking of Ford…

3. The offense foley relied on Ridder as the Bearcats seemed to struggle to replace Ford’s production I the second half. They definitely don’t need to rush him back, though, as they can take the safe road with his lower-leg injury with South Florida this week. Give it time to heal for a massively important matchup at home against SMU where the Bearcats will need all hands on deck.

Meanwhile, on to the defense and a unit that was supposed to be rock solid.

4. They got manhandled by Tulsa’s offensive line. They had all the push they wanted on virtually every play. It also gives opponents of Cincinnati the blueprint on how to run it on them: isolate Myjai Sanders on the outside. 

The right tackle was able to keep Sanders on the outside of the pocket, despite the Bearcats' star being the faster player. Any time Sanders would attempt to come inside, the Golden Hurricane tasked the right guard to jump in and create a wall with the right tackle. Without Sanders creating chaos, the other three defensive linemen weren’t as effective.

Which leads me to my final thought about this game.

5. South Florida, SMU, and ECU will all be scheming a run heavy offense. Their success will depend on their trenches, which is why Tulsa dominated the run game, almost eclipsing 300 rushing yards. It’s obvious enough, from a keep away from Ridder-standpoint, but Tulsa clearly stayed in the ballgame because of their rushing attack. UC cannot continue to get beat in the tranches the way they were getting beat by Tulsa. Luck doesn’t always fall your way.

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