SWC75
Bored Historian
- Joined
- Aug 26, 2011
- Messages
- 34,056
- Like
- 65,779
- I got to the Dome and found a coating of tomato sauce on my seat. (It looked like someone had dropped a pizza slice on it.) It was dry so I tried sitting on it but my body warmed it up enough to make it sticky so I went over to the usher and asked that it be cleaned up. In the second quarter a guy showed up with a towel and a spray cleaner and managed to get about half of it off. He then said he was going to get “the scrubber”. The scrubber must be in Alaska because I never saw him again. At halftime I pointed out to the usher that it hadn’t been fully cleaned. She called about it again and in the third quarter another guy showed up, looked at it and said “OK” and then joined his colleague in Alaska. The rest of the gunk is still there.
- After the game there were huge lines – even greater than usual - to get on the busses. They had us stand 2-3 abreast along the road and almost back to the quad. And that was the Manley (Lally) line. Skytop was twice as long as that. Once I joined the queue it took at over a half hour to get on a bus. Fortunately, it was a mild night. What if it had been January and 10 below? It seemed Lally was being served by, at most 2-3 buses. Most of the time there was just one loading and that was it. Eventually, we got a second and finally a third. And these were old school buses. Adults had to walk sideways down the aisles and there was only one exit. What happened to the roomy CENTRO buses with their two doors you could exit through? This and the experience with the seat problem, above, combined with the lousy sound system and WiFi problems, the depressing game and state of the team to create an air of shabbiness, certainly not of a ‘rising program’. Where’s all the ACC money going?
- The game was close and we have several chances to win it but at not time did I ever think that was going to happen. Too many opportunities were wasted. The team just didn’t have the look of a winner. We kept up with the plodding Boston College offense for three quarters, (exactly: the yardage was 220-220), but did it in spurts while they were grinding it out and dominating time of possession, (a ridiculous 17:44-42:16 gap). In every down series, BC would have a 6-7-8 yard play to make it inevitable that they’d get the first down or have short yardage to do so and we stopped them in that situation only once that I can recall. They had 28 first downs to our 10, even though we actually had more rushing yardage, 209-185 because our short bursts gained so much.
- That wore us down. At the beginning of the fourth quarter the lights were dimmed and everybody turned on their cellphone lights. Many held four fingers in the air. It was all very impressive. Then we got out-gained 26-130 in the decisive quarter and gave up the winning touchdown.
- We had no passing game at all. With Garrett Shrader on the shelf, we had to go to Carlos Del Rio Wilson, like Shrader a 4 star recruit and a transfer from an SEC school, (as is Braden Davis, the third string guy). But Shrader has played so much and practiced so much with the first teamers that Wilson had no sense of coordination with his receivers. He also telegraphed his throws and under-threw many of them, even though he’s famous for his strong arm. The result was just 37 yards passing and 4 interceptions, which just destroyed our chances to win this game.
- Also unhelpful was 9 penalties, (compared to 2 for BC). The most predictable thing this evening was that we would jump offside when we were lined up to go for it on fourth and 1 inch. One possession started out with two false starts and then a clip. Our lack of discipline is killing us.
- Also killing us it the play calling, which often makes no sense at all. Our wonderful new weapon, tight end Dan Villari, caught 3 passes for 14 yards. When we finally got a big break early in the second quarter recording a botched handoff at the BC 47 early in the second period, I wanted us to throw deep on the first play. That was almost always done in the old days: while they’re in a state of shock over the turnover, sting ‘em again. Instead we got a two yard run up the middle, leading to a three and out. That eliminated any momentum we had. Then we punted in their territory. With 15 seconds left in the half from the BC 38 we ran a sweep with Allen that lost a yard, giving Brady Denaburg the opportunity to miss another 57 yard field goal. In the fourth quarter, on 3rd and 18 from our 12, they gave the ball to Allen, who ran for 9 yards. Then we punted it back to BC, who was grinding up the clock.
- The biggest concern now is that this team is getting totally beat up. Several players had to be helped off the field, including James Bradford, Chris Bleich and Caleb Okechukwu. But the big thing is that Del Rio Wilson was clearly hobbled at the end of the game but still in there. The next step is to go to Braden Davis, who has run a couple plays at the one of one of our early season blow outs, our walk-on Luke McPhail or maybe the ex-QB, Villari. Remember Zach Maloney, the walk on from junior college who led us to near upsets of LSU and Clemson in 2015 and threw 5 touchdown passes against Pitt the next year? That was Dino’s first year. This game continued a trend: only once in the last 11 season have we not had a back-up QB start a game. That was in 2018, when we went 10-3. With the back-up being so important, why can’t we get one of our four stars enough experience and enough practice time to perform like Zach?
- We had about five more dropped interceptions, two of which would have been pick-sixes. We surely would lead the country if that were a stat.
- After the game there were huge lines – even greater than usual - to get on the busses. They had us stand 2-3 abreast along the road and almost back to the quad. And that was the Manley (Lally) line. Skytop was twice as long as that. Once I joined the queue it took at over a half hour to get on a bus. Fortunately, it was a mild night. What if it had been January and 10 below? It seemed Lally was being served by, at most 2-3 buses. Most of the time there was just one loading and that was it. Eventually, we got a second and finally a third. And these were old school buses. Adults had to walk sideways down the aisles and there was only one exit. What happened to the roomy CENTRO buses with their two doors you could exit through? This and the experience with the seat problem, above, combined with the lousy sound system and WiFi problems, the depressing game and state of the team to create an air of shabbiness, certainly not of a ‘rising program’. Where’s all the ACC money going?
- The game was close and we have several chances to win it but at not time did I ever think that was going to happen. Too many opportunities were wasted. The team just didn’t have the look of a winner. We kept up with the plodding Boston College offense for three quarters, (exactly: the yardage was 220-220), but did it in spurts while they were grinding it out and dominating time of possession, (a ridiculous 17:44-42:16 gap). In every down series, BC would have a 6-7-8 yard play to make it inevitable that they’d get the first down or have short yardage to do so and we stopped them in that situation only once that I can recall. They had 28 first downs to our 10, even though we actually had more rushing yardage, 209-185 because our short bursts gained so much.
- That wore us down. At the beginning of the fourth quarter the lights were dimmed and everybody turned on their cellphone lights. Many held four fingers in the air. It was all very impressive. Then we got out-gained 26-130 in the decisive quarter and gave up the winning touchdown.
- We had no passing game at all. With Garrett Shrader on the shelf, we had to go to Carlos Del Rio Wilson, like Shrader a 4 star recruit and a transfer from an SEC school, (as is Braden Davis, the third string guy). But Shrader has played so much and practiced so much with the first teamers that Wilson had no sense of coordination with his receivers. He also telegraphed his throws and under-threw many of them, even though he’s famous for his strong arm. The result was just 37 yards passing and 4 interceptions, which just destroyed our chances to win this game.
- Also unhelpful was 9 penalties, (compared to 2 for BC). The most predictable thing this evening was that we would jump offside when we were lined up to go for it on fourth and 1 inch. One possession started out with two false starts and then a clip. Our lack of discipline is killing us.
- Also killing us it the play calling, which often makes no sense at all. Our wonderful new weapon, tight end Dan Villari, caught 3 passes for 14 yards. When we finally got a big break early in the second quarter recording a botched handoff at the BC 47 early in the second period, I wanted us to throw deep on the first play. That was almost always done in the old days: while they’re in a state of shock over the turnover, sting ‘em again. Instead we got a two yard run up the middle, leading to a three and out. That eliminated any momentum we had. Then we punted in their territory. With 15 seconds left in the half from the BC 38 we ran a sweep with Allen that lost a yard, giving Brady Denaburg the opportunity to miss another 57 yard field goal. In the fourth quarter, on 3rd and 18 from our 12, they gave the ball to Allen, who ran for 9 yards. Then we punted it back to BC, who was grinding up the clock.
- The biggest concern now is that this team is getting totally beat up. Several players had to be helped off the field, including James Bradford, Chris Bleich and Caleb Okechukwu. But the big thing is that Del Rio Wilson was clearly hobbled at the end of the game but still in there. The next step is to go to Braden Davis, who has run a couple plays at the one of one of our early season blow outs, our walk-on Luke McPhail or maybe the ex-QB, Villari. Remember Zach Maloney, the walk on from junior college who led us to near upsets of LSU and Clemson in 2015 and threw 5 touchdown passes against Pitt the next year? That was Dino’s first year. This game continued a trend: only once in the last 11 season have we not had a back-up QB start a game. That was in 2018, when we went 10-3. With the back-up being so important, why can’t we get one of our four stars enough experience and enough practice time to perform like Zach?
- We had about five more dropped interceptions, two of which would have been pick-sixes. We surely would lead the country if that were a stat.
