Analysis: UWF football found success with quick, short passes. That needs to return over the next few weeks

There was something on Saturday that hadn’t been seen for the University of West Florida football team since Week 3.

The Argos struggled with the long ball.

It wasn’t so much that quarterback Peewee Jarrett was struggling, but that the Argos’ wide receivers were heavily – and effectively – covered by Shorter University’s defensive backs in UWF’s 42-3 win at Pen Air Field.

Just one week removed from a record-breaking performance from John Jiles – who had a monstrous 277-yard receiving night with three touchdowns at North Greenville University – he only had three receptions for 24 yards against Shorter. He did score on a screen pass from Jarrett for a 15-yard touchdown in the second quarter.

Jiles was targeted 10 times in the game, one of which was bobbled around and ultimately intercepted by the Hawks in the end zone.

“They weren’t necessarily double-teaming (Jiles) a bunch. … It was sitting more at certain distances,” Nobles said after Saturday’s game. “John’s still going to go make plays. … We’ve got to makes some adjustments pass-game wise.”

Caden Leggett led the Argos with 109 yards receiving and a long reception of 49 yards where Leggett broke a few tackles along the way. Jakobe Quillen (50 yards receiving) and K.J. Franklin (16 yards receiving) both scored receiving touchdowns as well.

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Shorter played a similar defense to what Kentucky Wesleyan College brought in Week 1. The Panthers tried to avoid the “big plays” and played off of the UWF wide receivers. Jarrett quickly found receivers for short throws. Then the receivers did the work and burst out some big gains – namely Jiles with a 51-yard reception, and Franklin, with a 30-yard reception.

When the pass game wasn’t working against Shorter in the first half, that’s when the run game took over, something that hadn’t really been effective throughout the season. The Argos had 767 total rushing yards going into Week 6, and had scored 10 touchdowns.

UWF had under 300 yards rushing against Shorter, with C.J. Wilson, Jamontez Woods and T.J. Lane all finding the end zone.

“We’ve had some close plays where I’ve been telling these guys, ‘Hey, we’re one guy away from breaking a big run for a touchdown.’ Our guys finally did that tonight,” Nobles said. “Our (offensive) line did a great job answering the challenge. We’ve been challenging those guys … that we’ve got to run the football better. They’ve answered the call.”

The lack of options down the field for Jarrett caused two things. One, he was forced to scramble out of the pocket several times. While he was only sacked once, he was under pressure several times and was called for intentional grounding once. No receivers were open for those long gains that Jarrett had grown accustomed to in the last couple weeks.

Secondly, it caused an in-game adjustment at halftime.

“I felt like I was getting greedy a little bit in the first half from what we’ve done the past five weeks, just running by guys,” Jarrett said. “(Shorter) played really good in the secondary. It’s probably the best they’ve looked all year. Props to them. There’s always a way to counter something. … If they’re respecting our deep ball, we can take underneath all day. I felt like we did that, and forced them to tackle. Our guys, it’s hard to tackle them one-on-one in space.”

Jarrett went 7-for-12 in the first half with an interception, compared to going 12-for-18 in the second half. He had 191 yards passing in the second half after throwing just 66 yards in the first half.

He allowed his receivers to do the work in the later stages of the game.

“It’s always frustrating not scoring a touchdown every play. That’s what we draw it up for on offense,” Jarrett said, smirking a little bit.

“Could not agree more, actually,” Nobles interjected with a laugh.

“You have to adjust on the fly and take what the defense gives you,” Jarrett continued. “We want back to the gameplan we had against (KWC) the whole game, taking what they give us underneath. The second half, I felt like we played very efficient.”

With a tough stretch of football coming up for the Argos – in the next three weeks, UWF will travel to West Alabama and Delta State, before hosting Valdosta State on Oct. 28 – they’ll have to make some of those adjustments earlier in the game.

Delta State has put up an average of 46.17 points per game – allowing just 17.83 points per game – while allowing an average of 201 passing yards in six games. The Statesmen have also recorded eight interceptions, three coming against Valdosta State this past Saturday, and broken up 20 passes.

“(Shorter) played a little different coverage than what we anticipated, so we had to adjust a little bit and take what they gave us. But our guys answered the call by running the football well,” Nobles said. “We’ve got a lot of work to do, a lot to improve on. We know we’re in the toughest part of our schedule moving forward. We’re ready to play, and we’re excited about playing our best every week.”

UWF has a strong receiver room in general, between Jiles, Leggett, Franklin and Quillen and several others. The Argos already have over 1,500 yards passing and have scored 17 touchdowns in the air.

"Last season, we were throwing deep shots the first, second play of the game. (Nobles) really opened my eyes to (knowing) that we didn’t bring these gifted receivers in for no reason. They’re not just here to catch the ball and fall down," Jarrett said earlier in the season. "If you get the ball in their hands with space, you see what happened ... a lot of missed tackles and extra yards. Those yards add up, and it makes my completion percentage look good and we’re being efficient on offense.”

"I want people to see how deep our wide receiver room is, and see how many guys we can throw the ball to," Nobles said in Week 2. "Just being able to move the ball around keeps a lot of people honest, and makes them have to guard everybody."

Ben Grieco is a sports reporter for the Pensacola News Journal. He can be reached on X (@BenGriecoSports) and via email at BGrieco@gannett.com.

This article originally appeared on Pensacola News Journal: UWF Football: Utilizing the quick, short passes will be effective against tough teams