18 hours Ago
Rutgers walked off the field at SHI Stadium on the final Friday of September with a path to a special season directly in front of it. The Scarlet Knights were 4-0 after a signature win over national runner-up Washington , earning votes in the AP Top 25 and entering the College GameDay conversation . Head coach Greg Schiano’s team showed toughness in eking out back-to-back one-score wins over the Huskies and Virginia Tech, keeping hopes of an unforgettable fall alive and well.
A trip to Lincoln looked daunting, but a win over Nebraska did not seem impossible. Rutgers was on the verge of a 5-0 start and the national recognition that comes with it. Three weeks and one day later, Rutgers walked off the field after a disheartening 35-32 loss to UCLA on Homecoming , a third consecutive defeat that shattered any realistic hope of the Scarlet Knights (4-3, 1-3) taking a step forward this fall.
Their ceiling has gone from a College Football Playoff dark horse to scraping their way toward a second consecutive bowl bid; the possibility of the second double-digit win campaign in program history has been replaced by the likelihood of another 6-6 regular season. Even that postseason possibility is now in question. ESPN’s Football Power Index’s projections currently give the Scarlet Knights a 58.
3% chance of winning at least six games, a 38.3% drop from a peak of 96.6% after their win over Washington.
So much has changed in such little time. Schiano seems to believe that Rutgers can build itself back up as quickly as things fell apart, saying in his postgame press conference that he “will not come up here and start to feel like the sky is falling down, I promise you.” But there are many reasons to believe that the walls are caving in on the Scarlet Knights: — They are decimated by injuries, having now lost five contributors for the remainder of the season, including three starters — linebacker Mohamed Toure, left guard Bryan Felter and tight end Kenny Fletcher — and key backup in running back Samuel Brown V and Victor Konopka.
Defensive ends Aaron Lewis and Wesley Bailey missed Saturday’s game. Multiple other key contributors — cornerbacks Robert Longerbeam and Eric Rogers; safety Flip Dixon; star running back Kyle Monangai — were listed as questionable and clearly playing through pain. “We were very fortunate a year ago with injuries; we’re not so fortunate this year,” Schiano said.
“Nobody cares. That’s life in the big city. Figure it out.
And that’s what we’ll go do. We’ll go figure it out.” — Their defense has taken a significant step back; Joe Harasymiak’s unit gave up more points in the past two games combined (77) than any two-game stretch last season.
And it is not a recent issue, either. Rutgers got carved up by Washington and in the second half of its tight win over Virginia Tech. — Rutgers entered the season with what was projected to be the lightest schedule in the Big Ten, and that’s remained the case.
Its strength of schedule through six games ranks 88th nationally, per ESPN’s FPI, and it is only going to get harder. Even without an elite team like Ohio State or Oregon on its plate, the Scarlet Knights’ final five games rank 43rd nationally in remaining SOS, the 13th-toughest of the Big Ten’s 18 teams. It is undeniable that Rutgers is falling well short of preseason expectations, and if you want some math to prove it, look no further than ESPN’s SP+ , which says only six FBS programs are underperforming their preseason projections more than the Scarlet Knights.
Whether that means the sky is falling is up for interpretation. Here is what we saw while reviewing film from Rutgers’ loss to UCLA (stats are from ProFootballFocus and CFBStats, unless otherwise noted): Defense hits rock bottom Let’s get this out of the way: the Scarlet Knights were decimated by defense on Saturday. Of the 11 defensive players projected to start in the preseason, they were missing three — Toure and defensive ends Aaron Lewis and Wesley Bailey — and had four playing banged up, evidenced by the fact they were listed as questionable (cornerbacks Robert Longerbeam and Eric Rogers, safety Flip Dixon and linebacker Tyreem Powell).
But that does not excuse one of the worst defensive performances in Piscataway in recent memory. The Scarlet Knights were shredded by UCLA, which entered the day ranking in the bottom 10 nationally across multiple offensive statistics. Rutgers allowed the Bruins to set season highs in total offense (478 yards), scoring (35 points), passing yards (383) and rushing yards (101 before three game-clinching kneel downs).
The Bruins scored nearly as many touchdowns on Saturday (5) as they did in the first six games combined (7). Quarterback Ethan Garbers had a career day, completing 32 of his 38 pass attempts (84.2%) and surpassing the 300 passing yard mark for the first time.
He threw as many touchdown passes in Piscataway (4) as he did in his first six appearances combined, and for the first time all season, he did not throw a single interception. He scored a 49-yard touchdown run, more than twice as long as his previous career-high carry (20 yards). Garbers carved Rutgers up with short-yardage passes, completing 26 of his 27 attempts from 9 yards or closer, including all 11 of his attempts behind the line of scrimmage.
He threw for 272 yards and three touchdowns in that scenario. The Scarlet Knights pressured Garbers on 15 of his 44 drop backs (34.1%), but only sacked him three times.
Garbers and offensive coordinator Eric Bienamy used the pressure to their advantage, consistently putting the ball in the hands of their playmakers in space. They destroyed the Rutgers defense from there. The Scarlet Knights missed 14 tackles — more than their previous two games (13) combined and the second-most in a game this season (15 against Washington) — and allowed 258 yards after the catch, accounting for 67.
4% of their passing yards. Many of them were inexcusable (watch here ). Rutgers’ linebackers were targeted consistently, and they could not rise to the challenge.
As a unit, they gave up 14 catches on 15 targets for 196 yards and three touchdowns, with all but one completion going to a running back or tight end. UCLA running back Keegan Jones said he was “surprised” at how open he was on his 67-yard touchdown. Starting linebacker Dariel Djabome was picked on the most, giving up six receptions on seven targets for 63 yards and a touchdown.
Fellow starter Tyreem Powell gave up three catches on three targets for 22 yards. Backup linebackers Moses Walker and Abram Wright played 20 snaps combined, but they were responsible for a bulk of the damage, conceding five completions on five targets that resulted in 111 yards and two touchdowns. Wright did have one of the few bright moments of the day for the Rutgers defense, getting a sack early in the third quarter to force the only three-and-out of the game for the Rutgers defense.
The secondary was not much better. Starting safety Desmond Igbinosun gave up seven catches on seven targets for 69 yards (29 after catch). He also missed two tackles on 10 attempts (20%), most notably missing a chance to get Garbers down in space before his eventual 49-yard touchdown run.
Igbinosun has a team-high nine missed tackles — matching his total from last season — on 49 attempts (18.4%). He is on pace to lead the Scarlet Knights in the category for the second time in the past three seasons.
Rutgers tried multiple different solutions, using 22 different defensive players, but nothing seemed to work. There were 11 players — half of those who played — who missed at least one tackle. Senior defensive lineman Kyonte Hamilton — playing defensive end to compensate for Lewis and Bailey’s absence — was one of the few defensive players to have a standout performance.
He had a team-high six pressures — five hurries, one sack — and a forced fumble that he recovered on a spectacular individual play. Backup defensive end Jordan Walker also had five pressures, all of which hurries, including one that forced UCLA’s second (and final) punt of the day. “We didn’t forget how (to tackle),” Schiano said.
“We didn’t forget how to coach it. We didn’t forget how to do it. It’s mostly the same guys.
But that’s the hardest part of playing defensive football, and if you have never done it, then you don’t understand and nor will you ever understand, and if you’ve done it, you know exactly what I’m talking about. It looks easy. It’s like a video game, just go take that guy out and he’s down.
That’s not the way it is. And when you tackle somebody and you’re hurting, that amplifies the pain quite a bit.” Rutgers offense improved The Jekkyl-and-Hyde inconsistency that Rutgers has shown during its season-shifting three-game losing streak continued on Saturday, with its offense counterbalancing the defense’s worst day of the season with arguably its best performance of the fall.
An offensive line that looked hopeless without Felter had a strong day in protecting quarterback Athan Kaliakmanis, allowing just three pressures on his 35 drop backs (8.6%). Taj White had his best game since shifting over to left guard in Felter’s place, allowing zero pressures in 63 offensive snaps.
The wide receiving corps that dropped at least five passes against Wisconsin had more catches of 40-plus yards (2) than drops (1) on 19 on-target attempts (5.3%). Seven different players caught at least one pass, with four of them earning at least one gain of 15 Kaliakmanis played a big part in that.
He was excellent when given space to operate, completing 17 of his 28 attempts with a clean pocket (60.7%), gaining 270 yards and throwing an interception. He made four big-time throws — defined by PFF as “a pass with excellent ball location and timing, generally thrown further down the field and/or into a tighter window” — in 35 attempts (11.
4% of his passes), completing nearly as many passes of 40+ yards against UCLA (2) than he did in the first six games combined (3). “I do think Athan played well,” Schiano said. “I think that the offensive line gave him time and protected him pretty well.
Athan did a great job moving in the pocket. The way you move in the pocket as a quarterback is critical. If you move with your platform underneath you, you can deliver an accurate pass.
He did that. He moved with a great platform and delivered an accurate pass several times today, which was critical.” Rutgers quarterback Athan Kaliakmanis' passing chart against UCLA.
(Graphic via ProFootballFocus). PFF Monangai gutted out a game that he entered as questionable and in which he took a huge hit to the gut at the end of the second quarter. He gained 106 yards — 91 of which (85.
8%) after contact — on 19 carries, scoring three touchdowns of six yards or less. Monangai now ranks fifth in program history in career rushing yards (2,787) and eighth in career rushing touchdowns (24). Altogether, the Rutgers offense averaged 7.
2 yards per play and scored its most points in a Big Ten game since it beat Indiana 38-3 in 2021, the second season of Schiano’s second stint at the helm. Last Few Things — Between kicker Jai Patel nailing both his field goal attempts and punter Jakob Anderson hitting the ball 44 yards on both punts and pinning UCLA inside its 20-yard line once, special teams was as solid as its been all season. The only thing missing was a game-changing play, whether that be a block on one of the Bruins’ two punts on the day or executing the onside kick at the end of the game.
— Greg Schiano asked everyone to call their shot , so we opened the floor on Twitter, asking followers of the Rutgers Rant the following: Will Rutgers make a bowl game this season? Will the program “get there?” Of the 170 who answered, 105 — 61.8% — said no. If you’d like to call your shot, send us an email, reply to us on Twitter or text us at NJ.
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Brian Fonseca may be reached at [email protected] ..
