4 and 3 with a bye week and 5 more games

[FrancoPizza]

I was referring to the Mcnabb years where we competed against good competition.Getting beat is one thing but knowing before the game starts you have zero chance is not acceptable.

To be blunt, we didn't fare well vs Top 10 competition during the McNabb years. We had some nice top 25 wins and some great finishes to go along with several What losses every year. But when we suited up against a legit top 10 team we lost and looked outmatched. The What losses, I'm convinced, were a result of overcomplicating things too often and not letting the elite talent at the skill positions just do their thing. Against top 10 talent, the deficiencies in line play were just too much to overcome unless we had a brilliant scheme in place to mitigate that somehow.

I think Marvin Graves' sophomore and junior years were a better testament to the feeling we could compete with anybody. Beat a top 10 team in both years. But again, we're talking 2 years. That's it. Out of the last 30. Oh vey.

 

[Bayside44]

Meh, you play the schedule. 9 wins is 9 wins.

If you want to be miserable that we end up with 9 wins, you're welcome to. And you're going to be pretty alone on that island.

We can start complaining about the 2001 10-3 season for giggles.

 

[Scooch]

You think I’m the only fan that wants to see us be competitive against good teams?

I think if SU reels off 5 straight wins you're not going to find a lot of people still b!tching about games against top 10 UNC and FSU.

I mean, ND smoked us in 2018 and people seem to have fond recollections of that season.

 

[Scooch]

And FWIW, I laugh at the whole "I just want them to be competitive" stuff.

Let's be real, if we lost to UNC and FSU "competitively" then we'd have threads here devoted to picking over every last mistake we made, and railing about how we should have won.

No one is happy when you lose, by any margin.

 

[JustPherU]

We can start complaining about the 2001 10-3 season for giggles.

You mean the year we beat 2 ranked teams and an Auburn squad that beat the number 1 team in the country that year? I’ll take that team everyday all day.

 

[Reyes39]

If we don't care who we beat, why do we care about conference reallignment and who we play?

Join the MAC, win 10 games, get smoked by 50 in a bowl game and it sounds like half our fanbase would be happy as a clam.

 

[JustPherU]

And FWIW, I laugh at the whole "I just want them to be competitive" stuff.

Let's be real, if we lost to UNC and FSU "competitively" then we'd have threads here devoted to picking over every last mistake we made, and railing about how we should have won.

No one is happy when you lose, by any margin.

You wouldn’t have former players begging to keep us off national tv.

 

[Reyes39]

Meh, you play the schedule. 9 wins is 9 wins.

If you want to be miserable that we end up with 9 wins, you're welcome to. And you're going to be pretty alone on that island.

With that logic of "9 wins is 9 wins" you're insinuating a win over Colgate would have been the same as a win over Florida State. It would have been on paper, but nowhere else.

 

[CNYGuy]

You mean the year we beat 2 ranked teams and an Auburn squad that beat the number 1 team in the country that year? I’ll take that team everyday all day.

That Auburn team finished 7-5. We lost 59-0 to the #1 team in the country that year - who might have been the greatest team of all time in college football if we're being fair.

 

[CNYGuy]

With that logic of "9 wins is 9 wins" you're insinuating a win over Colgate would have been the same as a win over Florida State. It would have been on paper, but nowhere else.

Not all wins are equal for sure. But I'd rather win nine games than beat the best team in the country and finish 4-8 like we did in 2017.

 

[Bayside44]

You mean the year we beat 2 ranked teams and an Auburn squad that beat the number 1 team in the country that year? I’ll take that team everyday all day.

And we got boatraced three times too. Just saying it happens, like Scooch said the team just plays who is on the schedule.

 

[Reyes39]

Not all wins are equal for sure. But I'd rather win nine games than beat the best team in the country and finish 4-8 like we did in 2017.

If you told me walking out of the Dome after beating Clemson that year that in the next 6 seasons the only ranked teams we'd beat were NCST and Liberty, but we had a 9 win season, I'd be pretty bummed.

 

[JustPherU]

And we got boatraced three times too. Just saying it happens, like Scooch said the team just plays who is on the schedule.

I’ll give ya 2 blowouts but Ga tech 13-7 loss ain’t quite an embarrassment.

 

[Bayside44]

I’ll give ya 2 blowouts but Ga tech 13-7 loss ain’t quite an embarrassment.

Yeah you're right, drew a blank on that one. Their band did wallop ours.

 

[Scooch]

With that logic of "9 wins is 9 wins" you're insinuating a win over Colgate would have been the same as a win over Florida State. It would have been on paper, but nowhere else.

Yeah, that's totally what I'm saying.

Good work.

 

[Scooch]

You wouldn’t have former players begging to keep us off national tv.

Who cares?

And you didn't address my point at all.

We lose to FSU by 4. You're not in a thread killing Dino about blowing a winnable game? You're just posting rainbows and unicorns about how super awesome it was that we played them close?

 

[Reyes39]

Yeah, that's totally what I'm saying.

Good work.

Thanks, I put just as much brainpower into it as you did with this snarky passive aggressive response.

 

[Scooch]

Thanks, I put just as much brainpower into it as you did with this snarky passive aggressive response.

I mean you're the one preemptively complaining about going 9-3.

 

[Reyes39]

I mean you're the one preemptively complaining about going 9-3.

Looks like you didn't actually read what I wrote. I've included what I've actually said below. I don't feel I'm complaining and I said I think I need to drastically lower my expectations, perhaps to allign with yours.

Even if we ran the table, we'd have maybe 1 or 2 wins over a D1 team with a record over .500. That just doesn't excite me and it just sets the table for more mediocrity in the future.

Maybe my expectations are too high but I don't want SU's ceiling to be that of a good MAC season...ie: Get crushed by the big dogs but rack up a bunch of wins vs mediocre competition.

In all honesty I think I do have to just lower my expectations.

I certainly wouldn't be calling for Dino's job...but I wouldn't look back on this season being a memorable or special one either.

It's not only that none of the wins were against top competition, but also that we weren't even competitive against top competition.

I get I'm supposed to be excited about 8-9 wins, no matter who they came against...but I can tell you I'm going to remember the seasons (bad ones) we beat VT in 3OT, Louisville as 35 point dogs, and Clemson in 2017 a lot more than if we win 9 games and beat WVU in the Pinstripe Bowl again.

I wouldn't complain, but I wouldnt be excited and it wouldn't have me feeling optimistic for the future. If we lost to Purdue, beat Clemson, lost to UNC by 50 bc we refused to punt or kick a FG, and even showed somewhat of a functional offense at FSU then I'd feel a lot different even though the record would be the same.

I think we should be at the point where we should expect to compete with the top half of the conference, but we seem to be getting further from that. I'm tired of thinking making a meaningless bowl game is going to do anything to change that.

 

[Cusefan95]

Who cares?

And you didn't address my point at all.

We lose to FSU by 4. You're not in a thread killing Dino about blowing a winnable game? You're just posting rainbows and unicorns about how super awesome it was that we played them close?

Honestly, I don’t care if Syracuse loses by 3 or 38. I’ll find reasons to justify how I feel at the moment after a loss (“can’t we at least be competitive” or “I’d rather lose by 30 if we’re gunna make a stupid call like that!”) - but at least deep down I know I’m just irrationally rationalizing my frustrations.

I see a lot of irrational rationalizations on this board and in this thread…I’m doubtful many of the commenters have the self awareness to realize that’s what they are doing though.

 

[Reyes39]

Who cares?

And you didn't address my point at all.

We lose to FSU by 4. You're not in a thread killing Dino about blowing a winnable game? You're just posting rainbows and unicorns about how super awesome it was that we played them close?

Same situation happened last year when we were 6-0 and lost to Clemson by 4 last year.

I certainly wasn't calling for Dinos head and I felt we had turned a corner. I blamed the loss on inconsistent officiating on the late hits to the QBs and the fact that I updated the SU football helmet decal on my car before the game.

 

[Domedog84]

So if we fire Dino after this year, and a new coach goes 9-3 or 8-4 against what looks to be an even easier schedule next year, but we get blown out in all our tough games, then it is not a memorable season?

But we can still celebrate past seasons where we won a good number of games but may have been blown out, just not any seasons moving forward?

This is all so hard to follow.

 

[Reyes39]

So if we fire Dino after this year, and a new coach goes 9-3 or 8-4 against what looks to be an even easier schedule next year, but we get blown out in all our tough games, then it is not a memorable season?

But we can still celebrate past seasons where we won a good number of games but may have been blown out, just not any seasons moving forward?

This is all so hard to follow.

Everything I'm saying is based on it being Dino's 8th year. If this was his first year and he won 8 or 9 games, I'd be estatic. I'd assume it'd take time until we could compete with the big dogs (less than 8 years).

If he reels off 9 wins this year and that gets you excited about the future, thats great and I wish I felt the same. I just feel it'd be a very soft 8-9 wins and would set us up for failure when the schedule eventually flips and becomes tougher down the road.

 

[Cusefan95]

Everything I'm saying is based on it being Dino's 8th year. If this was his first year and he won 8 or 9 games, I'd be estatic. I'd assume it'd take time until we could compete with the big dogs (less than 8 years).

If he reels off 9 wins this year and that gets you excited about the future, thats great and I wish I felt the same. I just feel it'd be a very soft 8-9 wins and would set us up for failure when the schedule eventually flips and becomes tougher down the road.

In 2001, we went 10-3, and lost to #8 Tennessee 33-9 and #1 Miami 59-0. In 2018, we won 10 games and lost to #3 Notre Dame 36-3.

We lost to Clemson 27-23 in 2018...if by "compete with the big dogs" you mean "occasionally don't get blown out by top teams even through its still going to happen most of the time", that's possible. If you mean actually be competitive and occasionally win those games on the way to 9+ win seasons - you really, really need to adjust your expectations. Or accept you're going to be miserable watching Syracuse football for the rest of your life. We haven't been a program that could do that in over 20 years, we haven't invested in a way to keep up with the top programs, and we don't have the donor pool to keep up in NIL with the top schools.

I don't know if Dino is the right guy. I do know that within 3 years you'll be calling for the firing of whoever replaces him, because your expectations are wildly unrealistic. And after they fire that guy - it won't be long before you're dissatisfied with the guy after that and want him fired, too.

 

[Reyes39]

In 2001, we went 10-3, and lost to #8 Tennessee 33-9 and #1 Miami 59-0. In 2018, we won 10 games and lost to #3 Notre Dame 36-3.

We lost to Clemson 27-23 in 2018...if by "compete with the big dogs" you mean "occasionally don't get blown out by top teams even through its still going to happen most of the time", that's possible. If you mean actually be competitive and occasionally win those games on the way to 9+ win seasons - you really, really need to adjust your expectations. Or accept you're going to be miserable watching Syracuse football for the rest of your life. We haven't been a program that could do that in over 20 years, we haven't invested in a way to keep up with the top programs, and we don't have the donor pool to keep up in NIL with the top schools.

I don't know if Dino is the right guy. I do know that within 3 years you'll be calling for the firing of whoever replaces him, because your expectations are wildly unrealistic. And after they fire that guy - it won't be long before you're dissatisfied with the guy after that and want him fired, too.

In 2001 we also won 10 of our last 11 games, finished ranked 14 and won games @ #5 VT and vs #25 BC.

In 2018 we lost one posession games @ Clemson and vs Pitt. I feel if Dungey doesnt hurt his back early vs ND then maybe that game plays out differently. At that point (year 3) I was wildly excited about Dino and the direction of SU football. I took that season as an indication that SU football would be a competitor in the conference, which apparently by your standards I should have taken it as a fluke.

Not responding to your last paragraph as you apparently have me mixed up with someone that you actually know.