Holy crap. I can't believe how that game went and I'm very elated we came away with the W. Some thoughts:
- Pickett did exactly what you want at the end of the game. Regardless of anything that happened, including 2 very poor interceptions where he didn't see a blue jersey, he came through and won the game. 2 4th quarter comebacks already this year. More than Tino had in a career ;-)
- I'm not sure why we didn't run with Sibley more. He seemed to get comfortable as the game went on. I think Carter is electric but stop running this kid between the tackles. You want to use him in the run game? How about on the direct snaps to Sibley. They know he's running the ball. You combine the 2 and you have a good play instead of two poor ones.
- I don't see anywhere that counts drops but I remember at least 3. They need better concentration. We also need to use French on more than 2 yard outs. How someone catches 10 balls for only 54 yards is beyond me other than poor play calling.
- The line wasn't great most of the night but protected when it counted on the last drive. We are starting to see the run game open up a bit and I expect to see an improvement when we are at full strength at RB.
- The defense was awesome again. You really can't pin 30 points on them (including 2 that weren't actually scored - more on that shortly) when you give up less than 300 yards. Again, pass rush came through to snuff out the chance for a game tying FG. Ironically, the blown coverage by Brightwell on the go ahead TD gave us enough time to respond.
- Ford was phenomenal and quite honestly was a victim of the right intention (player safety) but wrong application (clearly Ford was only trying to make a tackle). 12 tackles, 2 picks, and what should have been a crucial hit that lead to a 4th down.
- I get that you blow a play dead on encroachment but making the XP and then missing it because the D was offsides seems like another example of poor implementation of a rule with a reasonable purpose behind it. He did look better on FGs and is finally back up to 50%.
- Ok - the refs. Or as they were referred to on twitter and text message = the F'ing refs. I realize we are never going to get the benefit of the doubt calls in ACC road games but that was flat out embarrassing. On the first 2 point conversion, the kid doesn't get in, it's obvious on replay, and they still keep the 2 on the board. On the second 2 point conversion, he's stopped for a good 2 seconds and they don't blow it dead. I don't blame those kids for holding up the way they were calling every little ticky tack foul. The call against Ffrench in the first half that lead to an FG instead of first and goal was ridiculous. He didn't even touch him during the celebration. Same on Patrick Jones who barely touched Harris on second to last Duke TD. Same on Baldanado on the "horse collar" where he had the player by his name on his jersey. Shall I go on? If I'm Narduzzi, I'm going full fire and brimstone with these officials. If we lost this game, we made a lot of mistakes, yes, but the refs did everything they could to assist.
- Decision making - Narduzzi has at least one full head scractcher a week and this week he had 2. I'm not talking about a second guessing, I'm talking about something that looks bad at the time and worse in retrospect. You are up 23 points and should basically be able to run the clock out the way your defense is playing (not to mention Duke immediately went to the triple option which burns time as well) and you send a kid back there to field a punt who hasn't done it all year? I'm sure this had to do with Ffrench discipline but you tell whoever you put back there "heels on the 10, if it's over your head, run away". The call at the end of the half was equally head scratching. You have the ball at the 42 you can go for the 59 yarder I guess but if you're going to go for it, call the time out and try and get the first. You have 31 seconds. Call the time out. At worst, you give the ball back to Duke at the 42 with 25 seconds left when your D is playing lights out. If we get 6-12 yards you are looking at a fresh set of downs with more time outs and at worst a 53 yarder.
- Between the end of the half play calling, the Pickett interception on first and goal on a forced throw, and the Kessman missed XP, you are looking at 4-7 extra points on the board.
- The penalties - yes the refs were bad but some of these were discipline penalties. You can't have 145 penalty yards in a game and continue to win. Just can't happen.
- So now the good news - WE WON! We will still need UVA to lose twice and to win out to win the coastal but we came out of the much tougher first half of the schedule 4-2. More importantly, we were 2-2 in games we weren't favored in. There isn't a single game on the schedule that we shouldn't be able to win. This Syracuse game could be a big opportunity to set up the rest of our season. We in this game, we finish the regular season with 8 wins at the absolute worst and quite honestly, we really would disappoint if we didn't get at least 9 in that scenario.
- This team could use the bye week to get healthy (and I could use since I'll be at a wedding).
