So What Else Have You Been Watching?

'07 Football General47

There are plenty of threads around where we’ve dissected State’s weaknesses, but what other teams have you watched and what has surprised you about the games that you have watched? In no particular order, here’s what caught my eye:

Virginia Tech

When VT’s first offensive play from scrimmage against ECU was a play-action pass, you have to wonder what Beamer is up to. Is it:

– New found confidence in Glennon?
– Outstanding bunch of receivers?
– Trying to get ready for LSU?

My VT sources (ie, friends at work) say that this year’s WR’s may be the best that Beamer has ever had. “However, it is a shame that we don’t have anyone that can get them the ball.” (Direct quote after ECU game.) They concluded that the play calling against ECU was geared towards LSU and not ECU. (Guess it still wasn’t enough.)

It seems that many in the national media knew far less about VT than the alums that I work with. Long before they got roughed up in the Bayou, my friends had deep and serious concerns about their QB and OL (sound familiar?). No one has a clue what Beamer will do now, but there are no optimistic projections about BCS bowls now. (The guess is that the freshman QB will get a chance to play his way into or out of the lineup over the next several games against cupcakes.)

Luckily for Tech, no one in the ACC has even half of the offense that LSU displayed Saturday night. Looks to me like the Coastal division will still come down to one of the Techs.

Carolina (East and North)

The game wasn’t even on ESPN 360, so I all saw was the one-line updates at yahoo while I was watching something else on TV. From that less than ideal vantage point, it appeared that the two teams were roughly equal….with ECU having the slight edge.

UNC had 79 yds net rushing, 344 yds passing, 423 yds total offense
ECU had 64 yds net rushing, 406 yds passing, 470 yds total offense

Wake Forest

Has any team face a tougher two-week stretch to open a season? While Wake looked over matched against BC, they hung tough against Nebraska. Only the most delusional Kool-Aid drinkers (is that yellow or black Kool-Aid?) would be shocked with their 0-2 start. It gets a little easier for the Deacs over the next month with Army, Maryland, week off, and Duke.

WF’s two-yard net rushing effort against BC had to disappoint everyone associated with the Deacs. Note that I’m talking two yards total, not per carry.

Hopefully, 236 yards on 53 rushes (4.5 yds/carry) got the Deacon supporters to back away from the ledge. Can I see a show of hands from everyone that expected WF’s passing offense to be ranked 45 spots higher than their rushing offense after the first two games?

On the other hand, with State being ranked 11th in the conference against the run, it would seem that WF has more than enough rushing offense for State’s visit to Winston.

Schedule Alert: WF vs Navy on October 20. This game could be interesting and I hope that it is on TV.

Clemson vs FSU

It is usually a mistake to make a lot of conclusions about an entire season based solely on the first game of the year. However, it is safe to say that Clemson passed their first big test and FSU failed their’s miserably.

Davis had 102 yds on 18 carries and Spiller added 48 yds on 11 carries against FSU. I was actually expecting Clemson’s offensive numbers to be a lot higher because it seemed like they were simply dominating FSU on both sides of the ball. If this game is any indication, it looks like Clemson has done a good job of rebuilding their OL after losing all but one of their starters from last year.

It may be premature to write off FSU, but that’s what I’m doing until I see something that looked a whole lot better than what they showed against Clemson. The new OL coach from WVU and Jimbo are going to have to pick up the pace if they want to justify their salaries.

Based on this game and BC’s first two games, it looks like the Atlantic Division will come down to BC and Clemson.

Virginia

I haven’t seen even one second of a UVa game, but I just have to comment on the whipping they took from Wyoming….23-3 (Ouch!).

However, I have to laugh every time that I read about Al Groh being on the hot seat. Craig Littlepage (UVA AD) learned so little from the Pete Gillen contract disaster that he also signed Groh to a long-term contract (10 yrs?). Since Groh is only in the second or third year of this contract, it may prove to be too expensive him to fire him no matter how poorly UVA does. Wouldn’t it be interesting to know what the buy-out terms are?

It seems to me that State fans should pull for UVA every week except when they play State. The longer that Groh dangles in the breeze, the more chances State will have to get talent from Virginia.

Michigan

Is this the most over-rated team in all of college football? I don’t really have any strong feelings about Michigan one way or the other, but I just have to laugh every time I see something about them on Sports Center.

I have thought that they were over-rated ever since their loss to OSU last year. I could never figure out why so many talking heads thought that they had “earned” a rematch with OSU for the BCS title. I was also never able to figure out how the team that got destroyed in the Rose Bowl was going to be so much better this year. Guess what?…..they’re not!

Louisville

Giving up 265 yards rushing and 290 yards passing to Middle Tenn is not good no matter how you slice it. While State’s offense will probably stop itself, Louisville can’t count on their other opponents being as inept. However, Louisville’s schedule looks so easy that we may not know much more until their last three games of the year….WVU, USF, and Rutgers.

Unbalanced Conference Schedules

I heard Phil Steele talking about the ACC during one of his many radio appearances pimping his college football magazine. He pointed out that BC probably has the ACC’s toughest schedule with GT, VT, and UM as their cross-divisional games this year.

That got me wondering about what the other top contenders had in the ACC this year. So here are the cross-divisional games for the teams that look to be in the top-half of the conference this year:

 

Designated

Opponent

Opponent

 

Rival

#1

#2

FSU

Miami

VT

Duke

BC

VT

GT

Miami

Clemson

GT

VT

Duke

VT

BC

Clemson

FSU

GT

Clemson

BC

Maryland

Miami

FSU

BC

NCSU

At this point in the season, it appears that both VT and BC got the theoretically hardest conference schedules possible (assuming that FSU proves to be a better team than WF).

As I have already seen pointed out in comments to earlier entries here, WF has the easiest possible conference schedule with UNC, Duke, and UVa as their cross-divisional games. With wins in these three games, WF could easily end up in the top half of the Atlantic.

ACC Schedule Alert for this weekend:

BC vs GT in a possible preview of the conference title game.

WVU vs UMd as Slaton destroys the Twerps one last time because the Fridge pulled a scholarship offer at the last minute. (Nothing short of a season-ending injury will keep Slaton from an early entry into the NFL.)

So what’s caught your attention?

About VaWolf82

Engineer living in Central Va. and senior curmudgeon amongst SFN authors One wife, two kids, one dog, four vehicles on insurance, and four phones on cell plan...looking forward to empty nest status. Graduated 1982

'07 Football General

47 Responses to So What Else Have You Been Watching?

  1. ADS95 09/11/2007 at 10:17 AM #

    Michigan will not fire Lloyd Carr. He will be treated with respect and will then resign at the end of the season.

    Michigan will then load up a Brinx truck, drive down to Baton Rouge, and dump the contents on Les Miles’ front lawn. And for anyone that doesn’t think he’d take it, consider that he is a Michigan alum who really loves that school. He played and got his coaching start there under Shembeckler (sp). Also, ask yourself, is it easier to get to the National Title game in the SEC or the Big Ten?

    As for the ACC, Georgia Tech has looked very solid. BC as well. And, if they both end up in the title game, the folks in Jacksonville may simply kill themselves. You could play that game at Grove Stadium and it wouldn’t be a sellout.

    As for NC State, we need to be P-A-T-I-E-N-T this year. Mentally, we need to be prepared to start 1-5 (although at FSU is looking better now). All of the games where we should be more evenly matched are in the second half of the season. Put another way, if we start 2-4, a Bowl Game is not out of the question.

    I was glad to read that Beck went to O’Brien to re-dedicate himself to improving his play and running the offense the way the coaches want it to be run. The sooner he listens to them, the sooner our world gets better.

  2. burnbarn 09/11/2007 at 10:20 AM #

    “Why is it that we always play the Pirates in our down years? It’s uncanny.”

    It seems we play them for like the next 8 years or something.. maybe we will get it together by then.

    FSU reminds me a lot of us except they have even better athletes. They seem to have similar mental issues.

    Not so sure Holes are everyone’s rival, but they are everyone’s favorite team to beat.

    Every team except LSU, Cal, USC, Fla have big holes somewhere that can be exploited.

  3. BoKnowsNCS71 09/11/2007 at 11:20 AM #

    “Why is it that we always play the Pirates in our down years? It’s uncanny.”

    It just seems that way. Remember the Charlotte game some years back with Phillip and they got only 7 first downs. How soon we forget.

    And give them some credit, they have two QBs that have been playing in the pros (Blake and Garrard) and they went up against some good Pack teams.

    We only have 1 QB in the pros and only 3 in our history (Rivers, Gabriel, Kramer). Hopefully, someday a pro level talent player will show up again.

  4. RAWFS 09/11/2007 at 11:22 AM #

    “Not so sure Holes are everyone’s rival, but they are everyone’s favorite team to beat.”

    Exactly.

    It is increasingly impossible to even talk sports with them — too many of them see themselves in the BCS as early as next year. It’s a wonder what beating a 1AA team and losing to a non-BCS 1A team will do to Tar Heel self-confidence.

    It doesn’t help at all that we can’t beat anyone at the moment. It gets really tiring to hear how Wofford is going to pound the Wolfpack.

  5. ADS95 09/11/2007 at 11:32 AM #

    BoKnows, Philip never played against ECU. The game you are thinking of was at the end the 2004 season that we finished 5-6. Jay Davis was our QB that year, and we had the best defense in the country (helps to have four future NFL draft picks on your D-Line). ECU was horrible that season, and we took a season’s worth of frustration out on them that day.

    That might have been the only game that Chris Moore ever took a snap at QB for us.

  6. EverettBeez 09/11/2007 at 11:43 AM #

    Nice piece on Beck in the N&O today:

    http://www.newsobserver.com/sports/college/ncsu/story/699896.html

    Tudor also has a column on Beck and the QB situation is . . . well, read and judge yourself.

  7. packbackr04 09/11/2007 at 12:28 PM #

    appalachian is by far the best team in the state

    the acc is terible this year.

    Nc State may only win 1 game this year.

    ADS95^^ where did you read that about Beck, re-dedicating himself? at this point i wouldnt mind seeing Russell Wilson take some snaps. How about a duel QB system…

    and…DOES ANYONE KNOW STATES OVERALL RECORD IN FBALL AGAINST ECU?

  8. BoKnowsNCS71 09/11/2007 at 12:32 PM #

    ADS95 — You’re right. Cobwebs in the attic today.

  9. PackerInRussia 09/11/2007 at 12:58 PM #

    packbackr, the article ADS95 was referring to is here:
    http://northcarolinastate.scout.com/a.z?s=178&p=2&c=678064

  10. RickJ 09/11/2007 at 2:03 PM #

    “DOES ANYONE KNOW STATES OVERALL RECORD IN FBALL AGAINST ECU?”

    NC State – 14 wins,

    ECTC – 10 wins.

  11. noah 09/11/2007 at 2:19 PM #

    “…they have two QBs that have been playing in the pros (Blake and Garrard)”

    Is Jeff Blake STILL playing in the NFL? Good Lord, he must be 38 years old.

  12. nycfan 09/11/2007 at 3:58 PM #

    Not an observation but a question, what happened to State’s O-Line? Was it this bad last year? I had expected TOB to hit the ground running this season and was pretty shocked when State was picked last in your division, which I guess shows how little I know.

    As a UNC fan, I am very pleased with what I’ve seen from the Heels thus far. The ECU game was really exciting, if riddled with critical mistakes, and UNC appears to have an unexpected gem in TJ Yates, though we’ll see how he holds up as the competition improves. The defense has serious problems, though, and no depth outside the DL. It is sad to measure our improvement against a loss to ECU, but that’s where we’re starting from. And, FTR, I have yet to talk to a UNC fan who expects UNC to contend for the BCS next year or even the year after; I think most hope for a bowl team the next few years and to see a team that can challenge in its division by year 4. Unlike hoops, you can’t turn a football program around in a year.

    Agreed on UVa looking awful in its two games. Where is all the vaunted talent they’ve been recruiting? Hopefully, they look awful this weekend.

    I’m not sold on BC as more than a 7 or 8 win team. I thought the Pack could have pulled an upset with some competent QB play. I guffawed when the broadcasters compared Ryan to Rivers (the stats were simply not comparable). Ryan may be the best QB in the ACC, but (1) that’s not saying much and (2) he lacks the judgment of a great QB.

    FSU has looked in shambles thus far. I had to LOL when they announced during the Clemson game that Chuck Amato is in charge of discipline. Sure enough, FSU is dead last in the ACC in penalties thus far (20; UNC is next with 15, I’m sad to say) and penalty yards. But the real issue for me is trying to figure out why they are sticking with Weatherford. He would rather take a sack or run out of bounds than risk throwing a pass that is not wide open. He reminds me of a pitcher who would rather walk in a run than risk giving up a hit, too timid. No help that their O-Line is awful. I know it’s far too early to tell, but this might not have been such a good career move for Jimbo Fisher, especially if LSU’s offense continues to dominate in his absence.

    Miami did not appear to have nearly the same talent level as Oklahoma in their game; they have even furhter to climb than I had realized. Fortunately for them, the ACC is weak enough to provide reasonably good results in the mean time.

    VPI has no offense to speak of; ECU proved against UNC that they don’t have a particularly good defense, so that’s not what slowed the Hokies down in that first game.

    Clemson fans should be worried, IMO. Whatever luster the win over FSU may have seemed to have is fading and Clemson had a sluggish performance against a weak sister last Saturday. The Tigers have a lot of talent but aren’t consistently playing in cohesive units; plus, they were *afraid* as FSU mounted a potential come-back.

    Is GaT that good or have their opponents been that bad? I think it is both and they may be the class of the league. They’re favored by 7 over BC, which surprised me a little, but I do expect them to win that game.

    I haven’t seen UMd yet, so no ideas on them.

  13. EverettBeez 09/11/2007 at 4:13 PM #

    Beck rededicating himself was also mentioned in the Alexander story in the N&O this am. Told Coach, on his own, on sunday or monday that he’d played badly, and he was going to work much harder saturday.

    the N&O story also mentioned how he, his brother and mom came back from camping and found his dad dead. He was 7, his dad was 37 or so. Damn tough break for his whole family.

  14. noah 09/11/2007 at 4:56 PM #

    “Not an observation but a question, what happened to State’s O-Line? Was it this bad last year?”

    Amato flopped when it came to recruiting quality OL. And yes.

  15. Mike 09/11/2007 at 5:02 PM #

    Excfellent points nycfan – you dont seem like the typical Heel fan so welcome to the site. Clempsun probably has as much talent as anyone, but Bobby Jr will find a way to screw it up and emerge with 7-8 wins. VT has always been strong running but for whatever reason they have struggled this year. Their D should be solid, but they were flat against LSU. Miami is down on talent (from normal U standards) but I truly feel like Shannon will bring them back. Excellent article in SI about him – I think it is a matter of time.

    And yes, our O-Line has been this bad. Why else would we continue to play in years past guys who had no discipline or could not line up without jumping? We had no one else to put in there. I said way back when we hired TOB that it would take time, but TOB recruits lineman and makes them into football players. Chuck would recruit 25 athletes that all play the same position, all with stars after the names to look good on paper. Problem is, you play on grass not paper. TOB is recruiting lineman – but takes a few years to get a 220 lb HS lineman in and ready to go against the big, fast D lines. Weights, roids, and general filling out takes some time. OK, just kidding on the roids, but any O line coach will say an O-line player should not play before year 3.

  16. highstick 09/11/2007 at 5:29 PM #

    NYC fan, I need to give you some email addresses of some of my UNC co-workers that are sincerely thinking Butch is “taking them to the top”. Unless both of our schools do something to improve what’s transpired in their programs in the last few years, there won’t be any BCS trips for either of them.

    I had a horrible thought last night! I watched Lou Holtz really struggle at South Carolina his first two years and it was very painful. I just wonder if TOB hasn’t inherited a similar situation and coupled with the injuries, it could get “real ugly” for a while.

  17. noah 09/11/2007 at 6:41 PM #

    (It IS real ugly)

  18. roandaddy 09/12/2007 at 9:43 AM #

    Actually Lou had one bad season.. he lost every game, but the next year SC went to a bowl game. Bad Spot’s team the year before went 1-10, then Lou was 0-11, followed by 7-4.

    On a side note.. I heard CTC is in charge of discipline at FSU, I almost fell out of my chair.. and yes, they lead the ACC in penalties.

  19. highstick 09/12/2007 at 11:19 AM #

    I messed up on giving Lou credit for both of those years. Brad Scott should have gotten credit for the 1-10 season before Lou. Those seasons were so bad, I started feeling sorry for them.

  20. noah 09/12/2007 at 11:30 AM #

    The 0-11 year at USuC was the year we beat them in the hurricane game on ESPN, right? The week before Hurricane Floyd, I think.

    I’ve seen a couple of games that were so foggy that it was hard to tell what was happening on the field. Denver and Green Bay, in 1984, played a Monday night game at Mile High in the middle of a blizzard and it was hard to tell what was happening…

    But that 1999 State-S. Carolina game was the only time I’ve ever seen it RAIN so hard that you couldn’t tell what was happening. They showed a couple of the storm drainage pipes away from the stadium where the water runs off and it looked like someone had run over a fire hydrant.

  21. roandaddy 09/12/2007 at 12:08 PM #

    don’t feel sorry anymore.. the Pack start off with them next year.
    YES.. that was the flood game. Just moved to Raleigh, only time my house leaked water, and stood in the rain with my dad. Lou got mad at the end of the game b/c State just sat back and played D, waiting for his team to screw up. Welcome back Lou!

  22. highstick 09/12/2007 at 5:31 PM #

    Yea, I’m not looking forward to that game next year. I’ve got 2 season tickets down there that I got when my son was in school there. I guess he and I will go and “kick each other” the whole game.

    Just read the post about TA. Sorry to see it happen, but it doesn’t surprise me either. Seems like the alternative for a lot of these kids is either the pro’s or selling drugs. My son(who is an educator) says he hears that aspiration even in middle school. What a shame!

1 2

Leave a Reply