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Friday, November 28, 2014

UGA Preview


So here it is.  Clean Old Fashioned Hate.  Another year, another chance.

Once again I have time to write a full post but I don't want to mess with success.  We'll keep it short and sweet.

I take partial credit for the Clemson prediction.  Their offense was moving the ball OK with Watson.  Hard to tell how that game would have turned out if he had stayed healthy.  Their defense did an excellent job, holding our offense to 15 points, although we did miss a FG and we moved the ball pretty well.  Altogether it was what you would expect from a great offense against a great defense.  We did not score as much as I'd like, but we only had 8 possessions (not counting the two possessions running out the clock in both halves).  Moving the ball as well as we did, scoring a TD and getting into FG range 4 times, and eating clock, all of those things help you win a game that only has 8 possessions.  Of course, the defense scoring 2 TD's thanks to a Cole Stoudt meltdown was also a big help.  In the end the game was a comfortable win, but its likely a hard fought battle if Watson had played.

Nevertheless, however it happened, the defense has now played great 4 weeks in a row.  And yet I still have this nervous feeling that we really aren't any better.  That if we played UNC or Duke again, we'd get the same result defensively.  Pitt, UVA, NC State and now Clemson all made a lot of errors that I'm just not sure we forced.  And I highly doubt UGA does the same.

First of all, their strength is our biggest weakness.  Power running.  I don't know what we plan to do with their offensive line and Chubb.  I don't know what we can do.  I'm worried this game might look a lot like 2012, where we have a hard time forcing 3rd down.  And even if we do limit the run, their passing attack is pretty good too.  They are 7th nationally in both yards per carry and passer rating.  Probably why their offense is ranked 7th in the country according to Football Outsiders.  Its an excellent offense.

But here is the real problem for us in my opinion.  We have a great offense too, actually ranked #1 currently by Football Outsiders, but we will be playing a different defense.  Georgia hasn't been a bad defense all year, but they appear to be peaking.  They are currently 24th in Football outsiders - not bad at all.  (Our own defense has risen from 100th to 58th with our play the past 4 weeks, but that still isn't that good unfortunately).

As great as our offense is, a pretty good defense should be able to slow it down some and get a few stops.  And the worry is, even if we score a TD on half our possessions (which would be a great day offensively), they might beat that.  They might have 28 or 35 points on their first 4 or 5 possessions, literally.

If we can find a way to get a few stops - turnovers, penalties, whatever - then I like our chances a lot better and this game may be a tossup.  But I just don't know if we can do that.  I'm not even sure our defense can do as "well" as 2009 and force some FG's.

I fear we may lose by 2 or 3 TD's in a game that isn't really in doubt in the 4th quarter.  Hopefully, we can make plays defensively and keep the game close and pull it out in the end.

As always, Go Jackets!









Playoffs?!? Don't talk about... Playoffs?!? You Kidding Me? Playoffs??


So, believe it or not, I think we actually are not out of the playoff picture.  I know, I know, we have two losses, they aren't particularly good losses, and we haven't played the toughest schedule.  But just stay with me for a second...

Ole Miss beat Miss. St.  We beat UGA and FSU.  UGA beats Alabama (we need Missou to lose for this to happen obviously).  Who does the SEC send ahead of us?  Every SEC team has two losses or more, we would have two losses, and we have a head to head victory over the SEC Champ.

We would also be a 2 loss champion of a Power 5 conference, with wins over Clemson, UGA and FSU to end the season.  SEC Champ UGA and FSU previously on a 28 game unbeaten streak (we probably need them to beat Florida for this to work).

In that scenario, I think we would be in the 4 team playoff unless another conference got 2 teams into the playoff.  The only real threat to do so would be the Big 12, with Baylor and TCU.  I'm not sure how the committee would decide that if they both finish with 1 loss, and we do all of the above.

Obviously the above is a long shot.  We are probably no better than about 10% to win the next two games and we still need help if we do.  But it is fun to think about.  In the first 4 team playoff, we are still technically in the discussion at Thanksgiving.  I guess that's something...

Friday, November 14, 2014

Clemson Preview

So I've actually got a little more time this week, but I'm not going to mess with success.  The short and sweet blog method has been working well, so this week will also be short and sweet.

First of all I want to say don't be fooled by the defense.  Yes, I know, it appears that we have been improving.  Certainly we've put up good results the past two weeks on paper.  But its mostly been caused by two things.  One, we have played bad offenses, and two, those bad offenses have made unforced errors.  Mostly, dropped passes.  Not our fault, but we'll take it. We did force some turnovers, although some other turnovers have been mostly unforced errors.  But the defense deserves a little credit for making plays.

Unfortunately, I just don't think we are any better on defense.  Its the same old story.  We need to score and score and score some more or we could get beaten badly.  Because we just can't depend on getting stops, unless the other team gives it to us with silly mistakes.  Maybe things would be different if Cole Stoudt were playing, but I believe Clemson has Deshaun Watson back this week.  Stoudt's passer rating on the season is 119.  Watson's is 186.  Its not even close.  Watson is also the better runner if anybody is wondering.  They are a different offense with him.  Maybe he'll be sluggish in his first game back after the injury.  But if their offense is back to the pre injury Watson efficiency level, they will score and score a lot.

I'd like to think our offense, as good as it is, could keep pace.  But this may be the best defense we will play all year.  They are loaded, and extremely good up front.  Their only real poor game all year was the UGA game, and that wasn't all bad.  In fact, they played quite well until the 4th quarter, when you figure they had to be getting tired with their offense going 3 and out most every second half drive.  And UGA is an excellent offense anyway.

Most of UGA's success on this defense came at the expense of the LB's being out of position against the run, and the DB's not being very good in run support (read: poor tacklers, easy to block).  We will need to exploit the same weaknesses.  Because Clemson's D-Line is excellent.  No weaknesses.  And their LB's are big and fast and hard to block.  We need to try to get them running to the wrong place.  We should be able to have some success on the edge, blocking their corners and safeties.

But most importantly, we need to execute well and make no mistakes, because there isn't much margin for error this week.  The defense won't surrender many openings.  When they do, we need to take advantage.  And we'll just have to hope something good happens on defense.  I'm nervous, but if we play well, we could win.  It should be close, but if anyone is getting blown out, it'll be us.  I hope we play well.

As always, go Jackets!

Thursday, November 6, 2014

NC State Preview


Well that was fun.  Truly shocking defense.  10 points?  Anybody know where that came from?

So I'm still on the same business trip.  Didn't even get to watch all of the game thanks to a wedding.  Have had basically zero free time to research this stuff.  So we are going to have a very short blog again this week.

Easily the worst part of last weekend was Pitt missing a 26 yard field goal.  Come on man... We need Duke to lose twice and that is if we win out.  We are running out of chances.  Duke is similar to us - the kind of team that could lose nearly any game if they don't play well.  So there is a chance.  But we now need to beat NC State and Clemson to finish 6-2 to have any realistic shot in my opinion.  Let's just handle our business and hope two of Cuse, VT, UNC or Wake can beat Duke.

I haven't really watched NC State play much this year.  They aren't terribly good.  Mediocre on both sides of the ball.  The kind of team we should be able to beat.  But they are at home and it really depends on which defense shows up.  The defense that found ways to get stops against Pitt and Miami (luck) and shut down UVA (what the?) or the UNC and Duke defense?  We should be able to score.

Here's hoping good GT shows up and we win easily, like we could.

Go Jackets!