SWC75
Bored Historian
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- When Dino Babers was asked to compare this game to the movies, he compared it to "They Died With Their Boots On", where Custer wished he was somewhere else and "Apollo 13", where they needed a Plan B to get home.
- I hate games like this. We’ll get little credit for beating this team but a loss will punch a hole in our reputation and our stay in the Top 25 will be a brief one. It might take weeks to overcome it. Road openers against non-power-five teams are particularly worrisome.
- This is their version of our Clemson game. For every dream we’ve had where we beat Clemson, they’ve had a dream of beginning their season by beating us. It’s a small stadium but it will be packed and raucous unless we can take the fans out of the game.
- They are a dangerous team. They averaged 33 points a game last year and have a 3,000 yard quarterback, a 1,000 receiver, a 1,000 yard rusher and a line with 96 starts back. I could see this game being like last year’s road opener against a non-power five team, Western Michigan. Everything went right for us in the first half as we took a 34-7 lead and the upset-minded Broncos and their fans must have bene discouraged. Then we relaxed at the beginning of the second half, gave them a fumble and they got the confidence they needed. The offense started to roll and they scored three TDs in a two and two more later in the half. Dungey had to go back in and led us to a 55-42 win that left us wondering what to think of our team. Liberty can do that, too.
- Hugh Freeze isn’t scared of us. He’s the guy that led Mississippi to consecutive wins over Nick Saban’s Alabama team. “Buckshot” Calvert had 21TDs and 18 interceptions last year but had 29 and 6 the year before. People are saying that freeze will get him back on track so expect to see the 29/6 guy, not the 21/18 guy.
- Frankie Hickson is their 1,000 yard rusher. They’ve added Maine transfer Josh Mack, who led FCS in rushing two years ago. Hickson is described as a “scatback” while Mack is more of a power runner. (Fortunately, football has ‘advanced’ to the point where they can’t play together.) Their veteran line averages 6-3 306. With the loss of Chris Slayton and all of our starting linebackers to graduation and Bear Williams to injury, we could be very vulnerable there and success in running the ball will open thing sup for the passing.
- We’ve got some big, athletic defensive backs but none of them are as big as 6-4 220 Antonio Gandy-Golden, who had 71 catches for 1,037 yards and 10 scores. He’ll be playing on Sunday next year but is playing on Saturday against us and he’ll be a problem, especially if the D-backs have to be run-conscious.
- Our injury list is a lot longer than theirs:
Syracuse at Liberty Box Score, August 31, 2019 | College Football at Sports-Reference.com
Syracuse at Liberty Box Score, August 31, 2019
www.sports-reference.com
- We want to be 2-0 going in against Clemson and to do that we’ve got to start 1-0. We’ve been 2-0 16 times in the last 75 years, 21% of the time. Something always happens…
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