Discuss the tooth fairy with a 7 year old. Here goes
The relevant number isn’t just the starters it is the two deep. Why? Because when you play football you rotate players and that is where your two deep comes in. Even though they had a starting receiver, he only played 60% of the downs for his spot. You guys saw backups all night.
Do you practice people who aren’t going to play? No. So the prep team was gone and they had to learn on the go in real time. This accounts for your early success.
Once they got up to speed their backups in the two deep were plenty good enough to erase the deficit and beat ewe