SWC75
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Saturday, October 3rd - a bye
Saturday October 10 in the Dome vs. DUKE
Amidst the wreckage of last season, we travelled to Durham and gave the Blue Devils a surreal 49-6 licking. It was our first ever victory over Duke, (in only the fourth game and only the second since anyone here was born). In a way it was similar to the SU basketball team’s improbable season-ending destruction of North Carolina, 81-53. Every team deserves a day when everything goes their way and that was it. We don’t know if there would have been any ‘transitive property’ to the basketball win but there was none to the Duke game as SU got clobbered by Louisville the next week. But for one game, 2019 was ‘fun’.
Duke didn’t have much more fun than we did last year, also going 5-7after a 4-2 start. They also got hammered by Coastal champ Virginia 14-48 and by Notre Dame 7-38. What they were was boring: 129th out of 130 FBS teams in ‘explosive plays (a run of 10+ yards or a pass of 30+). They were also 126th in the country in avoiding fumbles, a bad combination.
They have a new QB, our old friend Chase Brice from Clemson, who got sick of backing up Trevor Lawrence. Brice was 50/85 (58.8%) for 581 yards 4 scores and 1 pick at the end of blow-outs. He’s got the ‘quarterback whisperer’, David Cutcliffe, coaching him, although what Cutcliffe whispered last year when his team finished 110th in the country in passing is unknown. Brice will have a couple of good targets in wideout Jalon Calhoun, (46 catches) and tight end Noah Gray (51). But Calhoun only averaged 9.1 yards per catch and Gray 7.7. They scored 7TDs between them. Top rusher Deon Jackson is back but he only averaged 3.7 yards per carry. Mateen Durant did better at 4.8 but they totaled only 1,102 yards between them while quarterback Quentin Harris, who rushed for another 510, is gone. They do have 4 starters back in the line plus Dewey Hamilton, a grad transfer from Stanford.
The picture is brighter on defense. Like us last year, they have an excellent pair of defensive ends In Victor Dimukeje and drew Jordan and a fine tackle in Chris Rumph, (great name for a tackle!). They are rebuilding at linebacker but have 4 of 5 D-backs returning. They lost both kickers. Damond Philyaw-Johnson averaged and astonishing 32.3 yards per kickoff return with 2 TDs, probably because it took too long to read the name on the back of his jersey.
Update: Brandon Hill, Myles Hudzick, Jacob Rimmer and Ben Wyatt have opted out of the 2020 seaosn due to Covid19 concerns.
Scoring Offense: 25.3 (11, 94) Defense: 29.2 (9, 77)
Rushing Offense: 150.3 (10, 79) Defense: 180.6 (10, 87)
Passing Offense: 179.3 (12, 110) Defense: 199.0 (3, 24)
Total Offense: 329.7 (13, 114) Defense: 379.6 (7, 56)
TO Margin -11 (13, 123) Average field position 31.9-30.6 = +1.3 (7, 54)
Saturday October 17 in the Dome vs. LIBERTY
A lot of people don’t want SU to play this game because the politics behind Liberty University. A second reason would be their minimal measures to limit the spread of CoVid19, (also related to their politics). I have still another reason: it’s a game we get little credit for winning but would get a lot of blame for losing. We’ve lost games like this before and they can be damaging to a Coach’s and a program’s reputation. Liberty is not in the Group of 5 but they are an FBS team, not and FCS team. They are in a good recruiting area and very ambitious and would love to take down an ACC team. If we go 5-5 in the ACC and win this, we’ll be in a bowl. But we would have been in at 5-5. If we go 5-5 in the ACC and lose it, we’ll be out of a bowl. If we’re 4-6, this game does nothing for us. So why are we playing it?
Last year we shut them out 24-0 in their place, leading us to believe that we had offensive problems, (true) but a great defense, (false). The Flames went on to go 8-5 over a makeshift schedule, (0-3 vs. power conference teams) and win a bowl game over Georgia Southern after an 0-2 start. But they have to do some serious rebuilding with 4 offensive starters and 5 on defense coming back. The passing combination with the wonderful names, Buckshot Calvert to Antonio Gandy-Golden, is gone, as is their leading rusher Frankie Hickson.
Coach Hugh Freeze brought in a transfer from Auburn, Malik Willis, to replace ‘Buckshot’. Willis is a dual threat, RPO type who ran for 309 yards on 28 carries for the War Eagles, a whopping 11 yards per carry. He actually had fewer yards passing (64) but completed 11 of 14 passes, (78.6%), mostly because the defense was more worried about his running the ball. Joshua Mack will be the running back and he averaged 5.8 yards a crack himself scored 7TDs. DJ Stubbs is the leading returning receiver with 32 catches for 401 yards and 3 scores. The left side of the line is back. The right side is not. They will be bolstered by still another SEC transfer, Bryce Mathews of Ole Miss. He’s 6-6, 300, (of course-what did you expect?)
They lost the ‘backbone of their defense, linebacker Solomon Ajayi, rover Elijah Benton and end Jessie Lemonier. Their pass rush was in the top 20 nationally, helped by end TraShon Clark, (4 ½ sacks). Nose tackle Ralfs Rusins had 60 tackles, (hard to do surrounded by offensive linemen), and James Scruggs “shined at free safety”. Freeze has brought in a Penn State transfer, Alex Barbit, to do the kicking.
Scoring Offense: 32.8 (34th) Defense: 28.1 (68th)
Rushing Offense: 150.5 (78th) Defense: 189.7 (96th)
Passing Offense: 288.9 (21st) Defense: 219.5 (52nd)
Total Offense: 439.4 (32nd) Defense: 409.2 (80th)
TO Margin +2 (50th nationally) Average field position: not available
Saturday October 24 at CLEMSON (Memorial Stadium)
A year ago, I thought perhaps an all-orange rivalry could develop between Syracuse and Clemson: the winner of last year’s game would play all in orange while the loser would have to use an alternate color, (blue for us, purple for them). It was an illusion. We aren’t Clemson and aren’t likely to be anytime soon. We caught them at the right time in 2017 and 2018. The upset came at a time when they had memories of the 0-54 game the year before, we were at home and had lost to the likes of Middle Tennessee State. They thought they’d have an easy time and why wouldn’t they think that way? In 2018, we had our best team in years and caught them just as they were changing quarterbacks and Kendall Coleman knocked Trevor Lawrence out of the game early. Last year we sort of hung with them until some big plays late in the game turned a 6-17 snoozer into a 6-41 rout. They are going for another national title and we are just trying to resurface to get another gulp of air and the game’s in their place, (FWIW). If we can just hang in there a bit longer, not get hurt and not get sick that would be an accomplishment.
(YEAH BUT WE’RE SYRACUSE AND WE AREN’T SCARED OF ANYBODY!!!!)
Trevor Lawrence is back at quarterback, (now with two fabulous years of experience at the college level) and Travis Etienne came back for his senior season. Either could win the Heisman. Lawrence was 268/407 ((65.8) for 3,665 yards, 36TDs and 8 interceptions. Over the last 8 regular season games he had 22 TDs and no interceptions. (I still think he was hurt or got his bell rung in the national title game or they might have repeated.) He also ran for 563 yards (5.5) and 9TDS. Etienne ran for 1,614 yards at a whopping 7.8 per carry and scored 19 times. He also caught 37 passes for 432 yards (11.7) and 4 scores. These guys are superstars and might be on the next level as well. Justin Ross caught 66 balls for 865 yards (13.1) and 9 TDs and remember Amari Rogers who broke up last year’s game with and 87 yard catch-and-run, (mostly run)? He’s back, too, having caught 30 balls for 426 yards and 4 scores. Tight end Brandon Gallway comes back from an injury. He’s “big, (6-4 240) fast and should be a match-up nightmare”.
The Tigers are famous for their defensive lines but I’ve been even more impressed with their offensive lines, especially when they took over the 2018 game with their power running attack. They have to replace four starters there. Would we still trade our line for theirs? Probably. Their back-ups are next year’s stars not just back-ups and they played a lot as back-ups for a team that won 11 games by 30 points or more. Their D-line lost All-American Isaiah Simmons but they still think the front four will be the strength of the defense as everybody else comes back. Last year, it was the ‘back seven’ that was the strength but only the Mike and one CB return from the starting line-up. But we’ll wish they had their guys here, too. The big names are DT Tyler Davis and that Mike, James Skalsi and that CB, Derion Kendrick, all of whom are expected to be all-ACC. By the way, Clemson’s recruiting class was rated “as good as anyone in the country”, with the top names DE Bryan Bresee, DT Myles Murphy and QB DJ Uagalelei, all 5-star guys. Get used to their names. The Tigers have a good placekicker, BT Potter, a better punter in Will Piers and “plenty of dynamic playmakers”, including Etienne and Rodgers.
Update: Xavier Thomas has decided to reshirt after contracting Covid 19. Justin Ross has had season-ending surgery.
Scoring Offense: 42.9 (1, 4) Defense: 13.5 (1, 3)
Rushing Offense: 240.4 (2, 13) Defense: 116.1 (3, 19)
Passing Offense: 288.3 (1, 23) Defense: 172.3 (1, 4)
Total Offense: 528.7 (1, 5) Defense: 288.3 (1, 6)
TO Margin +15 (1, 8) Average field position: 30.9-25.7 = +5.2 (2, 10)
That’s a lot of 1’s.
Saturday October 31 in the Dome vs. WAKE FOREST
The next two opponents are the schools we have traditionally battled with to stay out of last place in this division. How have we done? Against Wake we’ve won 13-0 here and 30-7 there, then 30-17 here. But then we lost 9-28 at the edge of a hurricane there, lost 43-64 after having a 38-24 halftime lead here, beaten them 41-24 there and had Trill Williams steal one for a 39-30 win here. Last year we were 5-7 while Wake went 8-5. They were 7-6 the year before that, 8-5 the year before that and 7-6 the year before that. No 10-3s but a record of consistency we can admire.
Dave Clawsons, (Dino Babers’ predecessor at Bowling Green), “has forged a reputation as one of the top program builders in the country” (Athlon) He’ll have to use those skills this year as he’s lost his “quarterback, his leading rusher and receiver, three starters from the line, his tight end, his best linebacker and two starting cornerbacks. Oh and depth has been his programs biggest issue.” Sam Hartman, a former starter, has the inside track on the QB spot. He’s not the running threat Jamie Newman was. Receiver Sage Surratt is returning from a shoulder injury. He already had 66 catches for 1,001 yards and 11TDs. Donavan Greene had 172s receiving against us. “The Deacons have high hopes for (RB) Christian Beal-Smith, who was suspended for part of last season” and also have Kenneth Walker who averaged 5.9 yards per carry. Like seemingly everyone else, they have a grad transfer from a power conference school, Terrance Davis of Maryland.
Per Athlon, Wake “hasn’t been good on defense since 2016” and have “covered up defensive issues with record-setting offensive numbers”. Injuries “wiped them out” last year and now they have to replace that linebacker and those two cornerbacks. The well-named Carlos Basham, a 6-5 275 end was second in the conference in sacks and TFLs and looks to be playing on Sundays after this year. The other two linebackers are back and safeties Cody Davis and Nasir Greer are “primed to be standouts”. Kicker Nick Sciba made an NCAA record 34 straight field goals over two years and kicked for 119 points. They were 122th in defending kick-off returns and 129th vs. punt returns. As you can imagine they have a new special teams coach.
Update: Kendrell Flowers and Sage Surratt have opted out of the 2020 season due to Covid 19 concerns.
Scoring Offense: 31.8 (5, 42) Defense: 29.1 (8, 76)
Rushing Offense: 175.7 (6, 50) Defense: 163.7 (9, 74)
Passing Offense: 288.3 (2, 24) Defense: 252.8 (10, 101)
Total Offense: 464.0 (3, 15) Defense: 416.5 (9, 84
TO Margin +8 (3, 19) Average field position: 29.5-28.1 = +1.4 (6, 49)
Saturday October 10 in the Dome vs. DUKE
Amidst the wreckage of last season, we travelled to Durham and gave the Blue Devils a surreal 49-6 licking. It was our first ever victory over Duke, (in only the fourth game and only the second since anyone here was born). In a way it was similar to the SU basketball team’s improbable season-ending destruction of North Carolina, 81-53. Every team deserves a day when everything goes their way and that was it. We don’t know if there would have been any ‘transitive property’ to the basketball win but there was none to the Duke game as SU got clobbered by Louisville the next week. But for one game, 2019 was ‘fun’.
Duke didn’t have much more fun than we did last year, also going 5-7after a 4-2 start. They also got hammered by Coastal champ Virginia 14-48 and by Notre Dame 7-38. What they were was boring: 129th out of 130 FBS teams in ‘explosive plays (a run of 10+ yards or a pass of 30+). They were also 126th in the country in avoiding fumbles, a bad combination.
They have a new QB, our old friend Chase Brice from Clemson, who got sick of backing up Trevor Lawrence. Brice was 50/85 (58.8%) for 581 yards 4 scores and 1 pick at the end of blow-outs. He’s got the ‘quarterback whisperer’, David Cutcliffe, coaching him, although what Cutcliffe whispered last year when his team finished 110th in the country in passing is unknown. Brice will have a couple of good targets in wideout Jalon Calhoun, (46 catches) and tight end Noah Gray (51). But Calhoun only averaged 9.1 yards per catch and Gray 7.7. They scored 7TDs between them. Top rusher Deon Jackson is back but he only averaged 3.7 yards per carry. Mateen Durant did better at 4.8 but they totaled only 1,102 yards between them while quarterback Quentin Harris, who rushed for another 510, is gone. They do have 4 starters back in the line plus Dewey Hamilton, a grad transfer from Stanford.
The picture is brighter on defense. Like us last year, they have an excellent pair of defensive ends In Victor Dimukeje and drew Jordan and a fine tackle in Chris Rumph, (great name for a tackle!). They are rebuilding at linebacker but have 4 of 5 D-backs returning. They lost both kickers. Damond Philyaw-Johnson averaged and astonishing 32.3 yards per kickoff return with 2 TDs, probably because it took too long to read the name on the back of his jersey.
Update: Brandon Hill, Myles Hudzick, Jacob Rimmer and Ben Wyatt have opted out of the 2020 seaosn due to Covid19 concerns.
Scoring Offense: 25.3 (11, 94) Defense: 29.2 (9, 77)
Rushing Offense: 150.3 (10, 79) Defense: 180.6 (10, 87)
Passing Offense: 179.3 (12, 110) Defense: 199.0 (3, 24)
Total Offense: 329.7 (13, 114) Defense: 379.6 (7, 56)
TO Margin -11 (13, 123) Average field position 31.9-30.6 = +1.3 (7, 54)
Saturday October 17 in the Dome vs. LIBERTY
A lot of people don’t want SU to play this game because the politics behind Liberty University. A second reason would be their minimal measures to limit the spread of CoVid19, (also related to their politics). I have still another reason: it’s a game we get little credit for winning but would get a lot of blame for losing. We’ve lost games like this before and they can be damaging to a Coach’s and a program’s reputation. Liberty is not in the Group of 5 but they are an FBS team, not and FCS team. They are in a good recruiting area and very ambitious and would love to take down an ACC team. If we go 5-5 in the ACC and win this, we’ll be in a bowl. But we would have been in at 5-5. If we go 5-5 in the ACC and lose it, we’ll be out of a bowl. If we’re 4-6, this game does nothing for us. So why are we playing it?
Last year we shut them out 24-0 in their place, leading us to believe that we had offensive problems, (true) but a great defense, (false). The Flames went on to go 8-5 over a makeshift schedule, (0-3 vs. power conference teams) and win a bowl game over Georgia Southern after an 0-2 start. But they have to do some serious rebuilding with 4 offensive starters and 5 on defense coming back. The passing combination with the wonderful names, Buckshot Calvert to Antonio Gandy-Golden, is gone, as is their leading rusher Frankie Hickson.
Coach Hugh Freeze brought in a transfer from Auburn, Malik Willis, to replace ‘Buckshot’. Willis is a dual threat, RPO type who ran for 309 yards on 28 carries for the War Eagles, a whopping 11 yards per carry. He actually had fewer yards passing (64) but completed 11 of 14 passes, (78.6%), mostly because the defense was more worried about his running the ball. Joshua Mack will be the running back and he averaged 5.8 yards a crack himself scored 7TDs. DJ Stubbs is the leading returning receiver with 32 catches for 401 yards and 3 scores. The left side of the line is back. The right side is not. They will be bolstered by still another SEC transfer, Bryce Mathews of Ole Miss. He’s 6-6, 300, (of course-what did you expect?)
They lost the ‘backbone of their defense, linebacker Solomon Ajayi, rover Elijah Benton and end Jessie Lemonier. Their pass rush was in the top 20 nationally, helped by end TraShon Clark, (4 ½ sacks). Nose tackle Ralfs Rusins had 60 tackles, (hard to do surrounded by offensive linemen), and James Scruggs “shined at free safety”. Freeze has brought in a Penn State transfer, Alex Barbit, to do the kicking.
Scoring Offense: 32.8 (34th) Defense: 28.1 (68th)
Rushing Offense: 150.5 (78th) Defense: 189.7 (96th)
Passing Offense: 288.9 (21st) Defense: 219.5 (52nd)
Total Offense: 439.4 (32nd) Defense: 409.2 (80th)
TO Margin +2 (50th nationally) Average field position: not available
Saturday October 24 at CLEMSON (Memorial Stadium)
A year ago, I thought perhaps an all-orange rivalry could develop between Syracuse and Clemson: the winner of last year’s game would play all in orange while the loser would have to use an alternate color, (blue for us, purple for them). It was an illusion. We aren’t Clemson and aren’t likely to be anytime soon. We caught them at the right time in 2017 and 2018. The upset came at a time when they had memories of the 0-54 game the year before, we were at home and had lost to the likes of Middle Tennessee State. They thought they’d have an easy time and why wouldn’t they think that way? In 2018, we had our best team in years and caught them just as they were changing quarterbacks and Kendall Coleman knocked Trevor Lawrence out of the game early. Last year we sort of hung with them until some big plays late in the game turned a 6-17 snoozer into a 6-41 rout. They are going for another national title and we are just trying to resurface to get another gulp of air and the game’s in their place, (FWIW). If we can just hang in there a bit longer, not get hurt and not get sick that would be an accomplishment.
(YEAH BUT WE’RE SYRACUSE AND WE AREN’T SCARED OF ANYBODY!!!!)
Trevor Lawrence is back at quarterback, (now with two fabulous years of experience at the college level) and Travis Etienne came back for his senior season. Either could win the Heisman. Lawrence was 268/407 ((65.8) for 3,665 yards, 36TDs and 8 interceptions. Over the last 8 regular season games he had 22 TDs and no interceptions. (I still think he was hurt or got his bell rung in the national title game or they might have repeated.) He also ran for 563 yards (5.5) and 9TDS. Etienne ran for 1,614 yards at a whopping 7.8 per carry and scored 19 times. He also caught 37 passes for 432 yards (11.7) and 4 scores. These guys are superstars and might be on the next level as well. Justin Ross caught 66 balls for 865 yards (13.1) and 9 TDs and remember Amari Rogers who broke up last year’s game with and 87 yard catch-and-run, (mostly run)? He’s back, too, having caught 30 balls for 426 yards and 4 scores. Tight end Brandon Gallway comes back from an injury. He’s “big, (6-4 240) fast and should be a match-up nightmare”.
The Tigers are famous for their defensive lines but I’ve been even more impressed with their offensive lines, especially when they took over the 2018 game with their power running attack. They have to replace four starters there. Would we still trade our line for theirs? Probably. Their back-ups are next year’s stars not just back-ups and they played a lot as back-ups for a team that won 11 games by 30 points or more. Their D-line lost All-American Isaiah Simmons but they still think the front four will be the strength of the defense as everybody else comes back. Last year, it was the ‘back seven’ that was the strength but only the Mike and one CB return from the starting line-up. But we’ll wish they had their guys here, too. The big names are DT Tyler Davis and that Mike, James Skalsi and that CB, Derion Kendrick, all of whom are expected to be all-ACC. By the way, Clemson’s recruiting class was rated “as good as anyone in the country”, with the top names DE Bryan Bresee, DT Myles Murphy and QB DJ Uagalelei, all 5-star guys. Get used to their names. The Tigers have a good placekicker, BT Potter, a better punter in Will Piers and “plenty of dynamic playmakers”, including Etienne and Rodgers.
Update: Xavier Thomas has decided to reshirt after contracting Covid 19. Justin Ross has had season-ending surgery.
Scoring Offense: 42.9 (1, 4) Defense: 13.5 (1, 3)
Rushing Offense: 240.4 (2, 13) Defense: 116.1 (3, 19)
Passing Offense: 288.3 (1, 23) Defense: 172.3 (1, 4)
Total Offense: 528.7 (1, 5) Defense: 288.3 (1, 6)
TO Margin +15 (1, 8) Average field position: 30.9-25.7 = +5.2 (2, 10)
That’s a lot of 1’s.
Saturday October 31 in the Dome vs. WAKE FOREST
The next two opponents are the schools we have traditionally battled with to stay out of last place in this division. How have we done? Against Wake we’ve won 13-0 here and 30-7 there, then 30-17 here. But then we lost 9-28 at the edge of a hurricane there, lost 43-64 after having a 38-24 halftime lead here, beaten them 41-24 there and had Trill Williams steal one for a 39-30 win here. Last year we were 5-7 while Wake went 8-5. They were 7-6 the year before that, 8-5 the year before that and 7-6 the year before that. No 10-3s but a record of consistency we can admire.
Dave Clawsons, (Dino Babers’ predecessor at Bowling Green), “has forged a reputation as one of the top program builders in the country” (Athlon) He’ll have to use those skills this year as he’s lost his “quarterback, his leading rusher and receiver, three starters from the line, his tight end, his best linebacker and two starting cornerbacks. Oh and depth has been his programs biggest issue.” Sam Hartman, a former starter, has the inside track on the QB spot. He’s not the running threat Jamie Newman was. Receiver Sage Surratt is returning from a shoulder injury. He already had 66 catches for 1,001 yards and 11TDs. Donavan Greene had 172s receiving against us. “The Deacons have high hopes for (RB) Christian Beal-Smith, who was suspended for part of last season” and also have Kenneth Walker who averaged 5.9 yards per carry. Like seemingly everyone else, they have a grad transfer from a power conference school, Terrance Davis of Maryland.
Per Athlon, Wake “hasn’t been good on defense since 2016” and have “covered up defensive issues with record-setting offensive numbers”. Injuries “wiped them out” last year and now they have to replace that linebacker and those two cornerbacks. The well-named Carlos Basham, a 6-5 275 end was second in the conference in sacks and TFLs and looks to be playing on Sundays after this year. The other two linebackers are back and safeties Cody Davis and Nasir Greer are “primed to be standouts”. Kicker Nick Sciba made an NCAA record 34 straight field goals over two years and kicked for 119 points. They were 122th in defending kick-off returns and 129th vs. punt returns. As you can imagine they have a new special teams coach.
Update: Kendrell Flowers and Sage Surratt have opted out of the 2020 season due to Covid 19 concerns.
Scoring Offense: 31.8 (5, 42) Defense: 29.1 (8, 76)
Rushing Offense: 175.7 (6, 50) Defense: 163.7 (9, 74)
Passing Offense: 288.3 (2, 24) Defense: 252.8 (10, 101)
Total Offense: 464.0 (3, 15) Defense: 416.5 (9, 84
TO Margin +8 (3, 19) Average field position: 29.5-28.1 = +1.4 (6, 49)