My Take

[kirbivore]

We played a bend don’t break defense and still gave up a ton of points. Think scheme has to be considered.

The D Coordinator's job needs to be considered

 

[swish7]

Thank you, was that a legitimate "illegal shift" call?

I didn't see it, nor seemingly did the announcers...(which begs a question)

Not sure of the rules.The slot was moving when the ball was snapped thats all I recall. Either way, there was no advantage gained so it seemed petty at the time.

 

[Dmcnabbrules]

Not sure of the rules.The slot was moving when the ball was snapped thats all I recall. Either way, there was no advantage gained so it seemed petty at the time.

I think Cook was still moving towards the line of scrimmage when the ball was snapped. He was a half second from coming set. Very cheep penalty.

 

[23Zone]

I know the Tennessee game was scheduled around 5 years ago, but having said that my take is that it is absolutely ridiculous to schedule the first game of the year against an SEC team. We are not there yet. Better off scheduling a very winnable game, see where your weaknesses are, and adapt for week two.

 

[PhatOrange]

As someone else mentioned we miss LaQuint in blitz pickup. Willis is a beast but he needs to work on his protection. There were two plays I remember that he was out of position that led to Angeli getting hit or sacked. With his size if he stays in position it will give Angeli more time to make the play.

People keep saying this and I'll have to rewatch, but my recollection is a few well timed or delayed blitzes where we did not keep the back home, and some of the pressure was just a 4 man rush with stunting.

I don't recall thinking at all during the game that a back missed a block or didn't pick up a blitz he should have.

 

[PhatOrange]

McDonald didnt stop the TD pass when the QB was really out of options and just lobbed it up.
He also was in the hole on the short TD run where he got run over

one thing Tenn did much better was win the 1-1 tackling to limit our rushing game.

McDonald was all over the kid who caught the pass. That was the least of his problems. I'd be embarrassed about getting run over at the goal line though.

 

[Tibbsworth]

People keep saying this and I'll have to rewatch, but my recollection is a few well timed or delayed blitzes where we did not keep the back home, and some of the pressure was just a 4 man rush with stunting.

I don't recall thinking the back missed the block or didn't pick up a blitz he should have.

Pretty sure back missed the block on deflected interception. He makes block on blitz incomplete pass instead of turnover.

 

[2B20Again]

This defensive scheme and missed attention to detail has a real chance of derailing what Fran is trying to build.

The offense was so good last year that it helped mask the shortcomings of the defense and special teams.

It’s not just missed tackles or the lack of pressure. The whole scheme is constantly on its heels because it lacks an identity and strength. I really don’t think the coach who can fix it is on this staff. It’s not like Fran was a successful DC who could assume the role. They need to figure it out until he can replace the DC with someone who is qualified to lead it.

The biggest mistake Fran has made so far (and there haven’t been many) is putting his friends in key roles like DC.

 

[2B20Again]

The DC was DC A&M, interim H/C at A&M. I’m not sure it’s the scheme or personnel. Lots of new pieces this year. Very good players but individuals need to jell as a team. It is my feeling that they will come together just take a little time. Again, I don’t pretend to be that knowledgeable or that smart either, but it appears to me that lack of a great edge rusher, or a dominant D line may be the issue. Just my thoughts

 

[Archbold44]

I know the Tennessee game was scheduled around 5 years ago, but having said that my take is that it is absolutely ridiculous to schedule the first game of the year against an SEC team. We are not there yet. Better off scheduling a very winnable game, see where your weaknesses are, and adapt for week two.

I could not agree more. We do not need to be Indiana and schedule the dregs of college football... whomever was just raised up from FCS, etc... but where is the benefit here? Much less Week 1? Plus, when we have ND already on the schedule.

 

[blust2i3d4]

I think this team could finish 7-5 especially UNC is so bad.

 

[upperdeck]

We play 4 teams that might have really good D

Tenn
Clem
ND
Miami

We play some teams that might have solid D

Duke
SMU
Pitt

Teams that we dont know much yet GT/BC/Uconn/

UNC needs to improve
Colgate

Clem played LSU who may be a good D and struggled to 250 yds
ND play Miami who may have a good and gained 300 yds
Miami played ND who may have a good D and gained 300 yds

SU played Tenn and gained 400.

Lets hope that means something for our offense

But our D has issues.

 

[tbonezone]

absolutely ridiculous to schedule the first game of the year against an SEC team.

U have to swallow the bitter medicine before u get better.

 

[Doc5120]

I could not agree more. We do not need to be Indiana and schedule the dregs of college football... whomever was just raised up from FCS, etc... but where is the benefit here? Much less Week 1? Plus, when we have ND already on the schedule.

$$$$ - that's where.

 

[Dmcnabbrules]

We play 4 teams that might have really good D

Tenn
Clem
ND
Miami

We play some teams that might have solid D

Duke
SMU
Pitt

Teams that we dont know much yet GT/BC/Uconn/

UNC needs to improve
Colgate

Clem played LSU who may be a good D and struggled to 250 yds
ND play Miami who may have a good and gained 300 yds
Miami played ND who may have a good D and gained 300 yds

SU played Tenn and gained 400.

Lets hope that means something for our offense

But our D has issues.

I think Duke will end up being one of the better defensive teams SU plays.

 

[Archbold44]

$$$$ - that's where.

Is that really true though? What was our travel expense compared to a home game? If we scheduled a home game against Buffalo, how much would we have made? And then there is the issue of network assignments. The better your record, the more likely to be assigned a higher tier of network, which impacts brand/revenue.

Getting relegated to the distant channels hurts viewership, which directly impacts ACC revenue. In fairness, the TN game might give us more viewers than if we hosted East Tennessee Tech and won. So we might have backdoored some extra revenue from this game.

P4 Openers since Coach P was hired:
1991: Vanderbilt (W)
1994: Oklahoma (L)
1995: NC (W)
1996: NC (L)
1997: Wisconsin (W)
1998: Tennessee (L)
2001: Ga Tech (L)
2002: BYU (P4 now) (L)
2003: NC (W)
2004: Purdue (L)
2005: WV (L)
2006: Wake Forest (L)
2007: Washington (L)
2008: Wake Forest (L)
2009: Minnesota (L)
2011: Wake Forest (W)
2012: Northwestern (L)
2013: Penn State (L)
2020: NC (L)*
2022: Louisville (W)
2025: Tennessee (L)
Record: 6-15. Edit: Half of those wins were by NFL drafted-QBs in McNabb and Nassib. One more for Graves, one of the best Syracuse QBs ever. The other two were by Schrader (with help from Sean Tucker) and RJ Anderson (helped by Walter Reyes and Johnny Morant in 3OT win).

Other Games: 14-0.

 

[23Zone]

U have to swallow the bitter medicine before u get better.

Not sure I agree with that, especially with the first game of the season. It's literally shooting yourself in the foot. In my opinion, a better strategy is to pace yourself for an entire season, not start off with a punch to the face.

 

[Chip]

Is that really true though? What was our travel expense compared to a home game? If we scheduled a home game against Buffalo, how much would we have made? And then there is the issue of network assignments. The better your record, the more likely to be assigned a higher tier of network, which impacts brand/revenue.

Getting relegated to the distant channels hurts viewership, which directly impacts ACC revenue. In fairness, the TN game might give us more viewers than if we hosted East Tennessee Tech and won. So we might have backdoored some extra revenue from this game.

P4 Openers since Coach P was hired:
1991: Vanderbilt (W)
1994: Oklahoma (L)
1995: NC (W)
1996: NC (L)
1997: Wisconsin (W)
1998: Tennessee (L)
2001: Ga Tech (L)
2002: BYU (P4 now) (L)
2003: NC (W)
2004: Purdue (L)
2005: WV (L)
2006: Wake Forest (L)
2007: Washington (L)
2008: Wake Forest (L)
2009: Minnesota (L)
2011: Wake Forest (W)
2012: Northwestern (L)
2013: Penn State (L)
2020: NC (L)*
2022: Louisville (W)
2025: Tennessee (L)
Record: 6-15. Edit: Half of those wins were by NFL drafted-QBs in McNabb and Nassib. One more for Graves, one of the best Syracuse QBs ever. The other two were by Schrader (with help from Sean Tucker) and RJ Anderson (helped by Walter Reyes and Johnny Morant in 3OT win).

Other Games: 14-0.

They keep these neutral site agreements under wraps, but I think the team is paid an amount that includes their travel expenses.

I trust that we made out well on this and that's why we did it. That money gets invested back into the program.

 

[JRHEETER]

I could not agree more. We do not need to be Indiana and schedule the dregs of college football... whomever was just raised up from FCS, etc... but where is the benefit here? Much less Week 1? Plus, when we have ND already on the schedule.

Uhhhhh the benefit was the $$$$$$$ we took to the bank for that game

 

[JRHEETER]

Is that really true though? What was our travel expense compared to a home game? If we scheduled a home game against Buffalo, how much would we have made? And then there is the issue of network assignments. The better your record, the more likely to be assigned a higher tier of network, which impacts brand/revenue.

Getting relegated to the distant channels hurts viewership, which directly impacts ACC revenue. In fairness, the TN game might give us more viewers than if we hosted East Tennessee Tech and won. So we might have backdoored some extra revenue from this game.

P4 Openers since Coach P was hired:
1991: Vanderbilt (W)
1994: Oklahoma (L)
1995: NC (W)
1996: NC (L)
1997: Wisconsin (W)
1998: Tennessee (L)
2001: Ga Tech (L)
2002: BYU (P4 now) (L)
2003: NC (W)
2004: Purdue (L)
2005: WV (L)
2006: Wake Forest (L)
2007: Washington (L)
2008: Wake Forest (L)
2009: Minnesota (L)
2011: Wake Forest (W)
2012: Northwestern (L)
2013: Penn State (L)
2020: NC (L)*
2022: Louisville (W)
2025: Tennessee (L)
Record: 6-15. Edit: Half of those wins were by NFL drafted-QBs in McNabb and Nassib. One more for Graves, one of the best Syracuse QBs ever. The other two were by Schrader (with help from Sean Tucker) and RJ Anderson (helped by Walter Reyes and Johnny Morant in 3OT win).

Other Games: 14-0.

You are aware when we travel to a game like that we are comped for all of our travel costs associated with the game right?

 

[JRHEETER]

They keep these neutral site agreements under wraps, but I think the team is paid an amount that includes their travel expenses.

I trust that we made out well on this and that's why we did it. That money gets invested back into the program.

Correct, it actually would have cost more to host East Tennessee or whatever else this poster is talking about.


I think people forget the costs of just OPENING the Dome. That does not account for all of the personnel etc to run the dome. Oh yeah and the few million we would have had to throw to East whatever to show up.

We got all of our travel expenses covered plus an appearance fee paid to us.

We also got a nationally broadcast game on tv noon which drew way more eyeballs than ACCNX.


Sometimes I just do not understand posters on here......

 

[NKR1978]

We were down two scores midway in the 4th and were inside the Tenn 20, but a batted ball stopped the potential score that could have closed it to 8 points. Not sure many figured we'd be in that situation given how the first quarter went. Wipe out the two defensive TDs for Tenn and it's tied (or close to it) in the fourth. I'm thinking there's more positive than negative out of this game.

The defense always gets criticized, and to be fair I don't think it's unfair or unhinged. Against Stanford the O was driving and Kyle threw a bad ball for a pick 6. Pitt wasn't the D's fault. And two of the UT scores really weren't on the defense. Things happen in football. The D has certainly made a few games closer than they needed to be (Cal, UConn) and give up WAY too many big plays.

Fran's teams have been great at bouncing back from losses. Let's see what happens saturday.

 

[JRHEETER]

The defense always gets criticized, and to be fair I don't think it's unfair or unhinged. Against Stanford the O was driving and Kyle threw a bad ball for a pick 6. Pitt wasn't the D's fault. And two of the UT scores really weren't on the defense. Things happen in football. The D has certainly made a few games closer than they needed to be (Cal, UConn) and give up WAY too many big plays.

Fran's teams have been great at bouncing back from losses. Let's see what happens saturday.

Its almost like people forget about Miami last year where our defense may have dug us a hole but then had to hold the line and get a few stops for us to get back into the game.

Has the defense been rough at times? Yes but it always seems to have more good than bad.

We are not an elite defense yet...

 

[sufan59]

Correct, it actually would have cost more to host East Tennessee or whatever else this poster is talking about.


I think people forget the costs of just OPENING the Dome. That does not account for all of the personnel etc to run the dome. Oh yeah and the few million we would have had to throw to East whatever to show up.

We got all of our travel expenses covered plus an appearance fee paid to us.

We also got a nationally broadcast game on tv noon which drew way more eyeballs than ACCNX.


Sometimes I just do not understand posters on here...

I don’t either. Life doesn’t work in a way that you can wait to be 100% ready to jump in the deep end. Because you don’t really know until you do it. We are in opportunistic mode, take every chance and opportunity we can get to grow our brand. Our brand is losing if we are too scared to play these type of games. This is more than ever a generate as much revenue as you can and reinvest it into the program game. We should have zero regrets and be happy as fans that our program is accepting challenges and aspire to be a LEGIT top college football program. It sucks to lose Saturday against a very good football program, what sucks more is when we aren’t even trying to be a legit program.

 

[Archbold44]

Correct, it actually would have cost more to host East Tennessee or whatever else this poster is talking about.


I think people forget the costs of just OPENING the Dome. That does not account for all of the personnel etc to run the dome. Oh yeah and the few million we would have had to throw to East whatever to show up.

We got all of our travel expenses covered plus an appearance fee paid to us.

We also got a nationally broadcast game on tv noon which drew way more eyeballs than ACCNX.


Sometimes I just do not understand posters on here...

Nothing to understand, where is the proof? Do you have insider information?

Clemson got $5M, with an incentive for more tickets sold last year. Clemson sold out its 25k tickets. Do you think we did? How many tickets do you think we sold? With attendance at less than 50k, nearly impossible. Would we have even guaranteed 10k tickets sold? If so, why would they pay $5M to us?

https://www.islandpacket.com/sports/college/acc/article291650445.html.

I cannot find anything suggesting travel expenses are paid. I am sure they work out something for hotels and in-city travel. But I am questioning whether they pay for airfare, etc. And if they did, for how many people? Just players and staff? Did the school have to pay for family of staff? And so on.

And then you have the fact that some people might travel to Atlanta at the expense of traveling to Syracuse later in the year for a home game. And then the broader community cost of not having a home game to generate hotel/restaurant revenue. I am sure that it nets an advantage at the end of the day or we would not have done it. But is it such a clear revenue boost that it outweighs every other consideration?