Breaking down the advanced stats from a wild win over Wake Forest – a poor performance from the defense that isn’t as bad without garbage time, an uncharacteristic struggle in the red zone, and a look ahead at an enormous showdown in Miami this weekend.
The Basics
This game is a perfect summary of why advanced stats are so much more helpful than counting stats. Post-game there was a lot of reaction, both good and bad, to the gaudy yardage totals put up by both teams. The Irish tied a school record for total yardage! How did we give up that many yards and points to Wake freaking Forest? Depending on how you wanted to interpret the result you could use the raw numbers to develop a compelling argument that everything was fine or that Miami is going to put up 600 yards on us next week.
By the advanced stats though, this was not as much of an abnormality, either offensively or defensively. Both offenses piled up yardage and points in garbage time, and with Wake Forest running a high tempo offense that meant many opportunities. Where to begin/end garbage time can be subjective – if you go by looking strictly at point differentials by quarter, which is how most systems define it, this game would have gone in and out of garbage time several times. But I’ll count garbage time beginning when the Irish went up 34-10 in the 3rd quarter, which leaves 41% of plays in garbage time.
Explosiveness
Don’t get me wrong, I’m all for celebration, and 700+ yards is incredible. But from the team’s post-game comments, it doesn’t sound like the Irish offense was all that impressed with their own accomplishments against Wake Forest. Before garbage time the Irish YPP mark of 8.05 was only their 4th best of 2017, and garbage time actually aided their total yardage (10.4! YPP in garbage time).
In terms of explosive play percentage, this was actually Notre Dame’s best performance of the season, but it was coupled with so-so efficiency and one of the poorer performances of the season in terms of converting scoring opportunities. The Irish had scoring opportunities (first downs inside the Wake 40-yard line) on eight of the first nine drives, but uncharacteristically came up short on a few of those drives with a missed field goal and failed fourth down conversion.
Defensively, 5.83 YPP allowed pre-garbage time was the 3rd biggest mark allowed, behind Miami (OH) (a weird one), and Michigan State. Post garbage-time, when no defense was really stopping anyone, that number spikes to 7.43 YPP allowed to the Demon Deacons offense. At the end of 40 minutes Wake accumulated 342 garbage time yards, and maybe that isn’t a good reason not to panic about Mike Elko’s unit. While an imperfect analogy, I’d also call the 2nd half defense’s effort level much more “LeBron in the second game of a back to back in January in Sacramento” than “LeBron in the NBA Finals”.
Efficiency
Despite losing #33Trucking early in this game, the Irish rushing attack continues to roll without bias toward the ball carrier and care for the opponent. Brandon Wimbush looked excellent in almost every part of the game – I say almost only because he could have done without taking a few hits and he did put the ball on the ground. But through the air he was very impressive, with a pass success rate that was Notre Dame’s second best this season against a Wake Forest defense that is very decent overall and top-20 in Passing S&P+.
While the completion percentage again wasn’t pretty, 9.3 yards per attempt marks a season-high for Wimbush. It was also a career day for Chase Claypool, who took advantage of a whopping 13 targets to compile 9 receptions for 180 yards. That line (13.8 yards/target) stood in stark contrast to Equanimeous St. Brown (2 for 36 yards on 8 targets, 4.5 yards/target) and it doesn’t feel premature to wonder if there may be an ongoing changing on the guard in terms of the number one receiver on this team.
By defensive percentile performance (think standardized tests) this was very easily the worst defensive performance of the season. The Irish graded out with a 25th percentile defensive performance (not excluding garbage time, but still) when the previous low was a 61st percentile effort at Michigan State (another high garbage time game, but also one where the opponent moved the ball very well). If the pessimistic argument is that the ND defense looked like trash in garbage time and should still be better, I have no arguments for you.
However, the numbers in regular time were far from disastrous, and it’s worth acknowledging that John Wolford and Wake Forest executed extremely well and successfully unveiled some new wrinkles. The Demon Deacons are a top 40 offense per S&P+, and they were below average nationally in efficiency and average in explosiveness in the first half. The Irish are still 7th nationally in opponent success rate, and I wouldn’t anchor too heavily on efficiency allowed in the 3rd (61% success rate) or 4th (54%) quarters.
Finishing Scoring Opportunities, Field Position, & Turnovers
This was just the second time in 2017 that Notre Dame had fewer point per scoring opportunity than an opponent, the other coming in the Georgia loss. The Irish bogged down a little bit on a few scoring threats, and I wonder if Adams’ absence may have made a difference there. Still, 4.8 points per scoring opportunity is still above average nationally. Convert opportunities the way the Irish had all season and a 60-point game was well within reach.
The defense failed to tighten up on scoring opportunities for the first time this year – the previous worst points per trip inside the 40 allowed was 4.67 against USC. Seven scoring opportunities allowed was also a season high, but the numbers pre and post garbage time show an expected disconnect. Before garbage time, and excluding a one-play end of half possession, the Deacs had two scoring opportunities in eight possessions. In those two scoring chances they settled for a field goal and had one touchdown (easy math – 3.5 points per opportunity). In garbage time, Wake Forest had scoring chances in each of their five drives and converted four into touchdowns (5.4 PPD).
It won’t make any headlines, but this was one of Notre Dame’s better games in terms of starting field position. It made little difference, especially since Wake put together long garbage-y drives, but a seven yard advantage in average starting field position would be extremely valuable moving forward – please continue the good kickoff coverage.
The Irish again benefitted from some turnover luck in this game, with fumble recoveries continuing to bounce in Notre Dame’s favor. Julian Love continues to put his hands on a lot of passes, and hopefully that continues against a Miami team that likes to throw the ball up for grabs multiple times a game.
On to Miami
Keys when Miami has the ball:
#1) Prevent the explosive plays
There’s a lot that’s scary about the Canes – they’re balanced (18th in Offensive S&P+, 27th in Defensive S&P+), athletic, and well coached. Their formula on offense is also unlike any of the recent offenses the Irish have faced that were high-efficiency – Miami is pretty average in offensive success rate but relies on a very explosive attack (6th in IsoPPP).
Miami has a wealth of skill position talent – definitely the most dangerous receiving corps the Irish will see in the regular season. Braxton Berrios (13.3 YPC, 71% catch rate) and tight end Chris Herndon (12.3 YPC, 68% catch rate) are the reliable efficiency options while Ahmmon Richards (19.4 YPC, 47% catch rate), (20.7 YPC, 50% catch rate) and Jeff Thomas (22.6 YPC, 58% catch rate) are explosive downfield threats. That stats of that last trio are telling- Malik Rosier takes a lot of downfield shots, is inconsistent, but has a lot of guys who can win one on one.
Notre Dame, meanwhile, has given up only one pass of 40+ yards this year (tied for second nationally with Alabama). If there’s any place the Irish have shown some weakness, it’s with jump-ball passes, and the field is likely the be in rough shape at Hard Rock Stadium. If the Irish can prevent the big chunk plays, I don’t think the Hurricanes are consistently efficient enough to put together several long, sustained drives.
#2) Win the battle in the trenches
It’s always easy to compare unknown future opponents to ones the Irish have already played. If we were to build Miami out of a Frankenstein of past opponents, it seems like it would be something like the USC offense with better receivers and a less consistent QB, then with a defense a little less athletic than UGA’s and a little better than NC State’s. So in trying to limit an opposing offense that has talent pretty close to the Trojans, it will again be critical for the ND defensive line to win up front.
The Hurricanes are 44th in adjusted line yards, and 79th in opponent stuff rate. The offensive line has been fine but not spectacular run blocking, and really poor in power run success rate (42.9%, 130th in FBS aka dead last). The Hurricanes are also 55th in adjusted sack rate – they’ve been better on passing downs, but poor protecting Rosier on standard downs (86th). The Irish can neutralize some of the Canes skill position talent (and an explosive back in Travis Homer) if they can again win with the defensive line.
#3) Keep Rosier in check and uncomfortable
The challenge in containing the U’s offense includes the threat of Rosier running with the ball. He can extend plays with his legs and is a threat on read option plays (and even had two passes thrown to him on trick plays against the Hokies). Rosier has good but not great speed, kind of similar to John Wolford of Wake Forest – their stats on the year (5.5 and 6.0 YPC) are very close.
The more uncomfortable the Irish can make Rosier, the better – whether that comes through pressures, sacks, or pass deflections that keep him off balance. The first-year starter already has three games this season with a completion percentage below 50%, and if Notre Dame can add a fourth they have a great shot to win.
Keys when Notre Dame has the ball:
#1: Feed the running machine
After the big win over the Hokies there was a good deal of praise for the Miami defense, who had a strong performance and didn’t allow a run of more than 15 yards against VT. Missing from statistic was the context that Virginia Tech entered ranked 125th in Rushing Explosiveness (IsoPPP). Even after that performance, the Canes are 65th in Rushing IsoPPP and 82nd in Rushing S&P+ overall.
Manny Diaz is an aggressive defensive coordinator with a lot of talent to work with, and this translates into a lot of disruption (like NC State and Wake Forest, who have high TFL numbers as well). The Hurricanes look a lot like the Wolfpack statistically – high stuff rates and high havoc rates with the DL (4th and 5th nationally). But S&P+ doesn’t like either that much in terms of run defense, and Diaz’s aggression can leave things exposed for long gains when runners break through the first level.
As with NC State, you will hear a lot about Miami’s defense against the Irish run. The Canes definitely have the athletes to pose Georgia-like problems – but their track record hasn’t really shown that. Holding the Hokies to 3.26 YPC was a season best, but Syracuse (106th in Rushing S&P+) averaged 6.17, FSU (62nd) went for 6 yards a carry, and Duke (47th) hit 5.32. The Irish have to be efficient enough to hit some long plays, but there aren’t real signs before last week of Miami being able to slow an offense like this down.
*Sidenote: Who is the best offense Miami has faced this season? According to S&P+, it’s the Toledo Rockets at 13th in the offensive rankings! The top power five team they’ve faced in Georgia Tech (50th), with just three opponents in the top 70 of Offensive S&P+ (Syracuse nicely makes that cut at 69th).
#2: Don’t be the one whose turnover luck runs out first
Both teams have strong turnover margins (5th and 6th nationally in margin per game), and that’s a result of both performance and luck. The Irish have benefitted from about 3.42 points per game of turnover luck according to advanced stat profiles, and Miami 4.32. What’s going into that measure? Notre Dame has recovered 10 of 13 opponent fumbles (77%), which you’d expect to be a coin flip proposition, while also losing just 3 of their 8 fumbles (37.5%).
The Hurricanes have had similar fortune smile upon them – they’ve lost just two of their seven fumbles and recovered 58% of opponent fumbles. In addition, they’ve been pretty lucky with pass deflections resulting in interceptions for Miami and not as often for other teams. Someone is likely to start having the ball bounce the other way this weekend, and the best way to minimize that impact is not the put the ball on the ground or in dangerous spots.
#3 Finishing Drives
Despite an off week against Wake and a few kneel downs, the Irish are still a top-10 offense in converting scoring opportunities (10th nationally). They will meet a top-10 defense in preventing scoring chances in Miami (9th in FBS), and something has to give. In the loss to the Bulldogs, the Irish actually had more scoring opportunities (6 to 5) but did slightly worse in those chances, resulting in a one point loss. In what should be another close game – S&P+ projects a result of Miami 30, ND 29 – the Irish need to continue their red zone excellence.
Nice, the sky is not falling on the defense and the offense is still good. Absolutely missed Adams, as I think he takes a couple of those Dexter/McIntosh runs to the house, eliminating any need for red-zone efficiency.
When you say Miami has the best group of receivers we will see, are you going strictly based off of production? Seems like USC and Georgia have significantly more talent at the position.
I do think we matchup pretty well here with Elko’s defense. I don’t think Rosier has the wheels or accuracy to consistently keep our defense on the field. Their stud RB Walton being out definitely doesn’t help their cause.
I don’t think they can stop our running game either as you pointed out. They will get the occasional stuff but it seems like we will be able to get 5-10 yard runs the rest of the time.
It just feels a year or two too early for the U. I think their luck runs out here (heck without over 4 pts/game in turnover luck, they would theoretically have 2 losses).
On the receivers, I think it’s a combo of talent and production. USC and UGA may have higher recruiting rankings but UGA’s production is not great and USC is Burnett and a potpourri of other ok guys (Vaughns is really talented but young).
For Miami, they’ve got less heralded guys like Berrios who have the production to back it up (he’s likely all-ACC) and Herndon as a jumbo WR / TE threat. Richards went for almost 1,000 yards last year as a freshman and was a top-150 type talent. Thomas is a true freshman but was a top-50 high 4*. They just have a lot of depth in terms of guys to throw to, really solid production (even with Rosier sometimes having accuracy issues), and talented burners in Thomas and Richards.
Great to have your breakdowns again! Thank you!
Where do the turnover luck numbers come from? I have a friend who’s been looking for those for a while.
Finally, in my experience, despite all its adjustments, the S&P seems to overrate teams with weaker schedules. But that’s based on the eyeball test. What do you think of that claim?
They have an updated formula, think called S&P resume +. It looks back at accomplishments vs the predictive nature of S&P. That has Nd as 2nd most accomplished team, Miami not in top 10
https://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2017/11/3/16556844/college-football-strength-of-schedule-rankings-2017-sos
The % of fumbles recovered (from opponents or of your own fumbles) are from CFBstats.com (team index here: http://www.cfbstats.com/2017/national/index.html has fumbles recovered / lost). There’s not a good source I’ve found that has pass deflection and interceptions in one place, but that’s the other piece – it’s usually a ratio of like 5 pass deflections per INT, and if you are much higher /lower than the norm on either side of the ball that’s considered positive TO luck.
Your second question is more complicated. S&P+ does incorporate opponent adjustments, but it’s tricky since teams can fluctuate so much week to week (mostly a result of small sample size). This year has the added difficulty of pretty extreme parity – there’s not much separating teams 20-50 in the ratings and even top teams like Bama and OSU aren’t so hot (for example, Bill C mentioned on his podcast that Ohio State, who is currently #2 somehow, would be #8 in last year’s ratings with their numbers). That’s resulting in a lot of criticism as of late, but what’s the point of advanced stats if they only agree with conventional wisdom and our personal biases?
So in this year in particular I think it can overrate teams with weaker schedules, because all you can do is play the team’s on your schedule and if you are dominating them consistently – like UCF – S&P+ will reward that. If you then play a tough opponent and it’s clear you are outclassed, well that will then adjust, but consistent dominance is hard to do. I also think “weak schedules” is subjective – this year a lot of SEC schools are TERRIBLE and ranked in the 90+ area of S&P+. So G5 teams have schedules that to our eyes look terrible (because we assume G5 teams are all bad) but aren’t all that far off from some P5 teams.
FWIW other systems may adjust for opponents more heavily than S&P+ as well (like FEI). There’s pros and cons of each approach. FEI will index really heavily on playing the best teams close (like Texas) and reward heavily top wins (Iowa State was #8 last week before losing to WVU, which seems high). So you teams that pull a kind of random upset (hello, Arizona State) will be rated more highly even though the rest of their sample shows they aren’t good.
And apologies for length, but the link to Resume S&P+ below is really awesome to read for those who haven’t. To summarize, Resume S&P+ is a new stat that is trying to do what the committee is doing in terms of evaluating best accomplishments based on SOS difficulty as well as the margin of victory relative to what is expected of a top team. S&P+ still is attempting to objectively measure who the current best teams are, without caring as much about SOS and who you have beaten (although opponent adjustments still figure in prominently). Different objectives.
Thank you for the in-depth reply! I’m going to read it again tonight to make sure I digest all the details.
I’ll be honest, haven’t watched much Miami this year but did watch first half of the unc game and a good amount of va tech last week. Watching the unc game i thought we would boat race them, if Carolina could have converted in red zone they would have won. Then i watched va tech last week and Miami looked really good. I was hoping the advanced stats would put my mind to ease but this is gonna be a real test. Really hope to see the run game take over and minimize the mistakes
I watched most of the GT game and came away with the same impression. You should have seen some of the running holes that GT was able to open against MIA. I have a feeling those will all still be there and ND will dominate this game.
Agreed. If one were to watch only the ND-Wake & Miami-VT games, one would guess Miami by 14-20. If one were to watch only the ND-NCST & Miami-UNC games, one would guess ND by 28-35.
Weird.
My ideal, (aside from ND winning by 50) is a good game, similar to the UGA game, but with an ND victory.
Every time I mess up in my personal or professional life I’m just gonna write it off as having happened during garbage time.
I often mess up during garbage time. They come so damn early that I can’t always get the can to the street soon enough.
You hit on it in your keys to the Miami game, but their offense really plays to our strengths. Our defense is really good at stopping explosive plays, and I don’t see Rosier having the consistency to put together numerous sustained scoring drives. Miami (OH) and Wake both marched on us with quick 3 step drop timing routes (the Redhawks also threw a bunch of jump balls to their giant, which we struggle against).
I’m not at all impressed by our LBs in coverage. Martini always looks a step slow to the ball (which is weird, because he’s been really good at filling the hole on runs this year), and Coney and Morgan both look like they’re kind of stiff in coverage. A team that can throw quick slants and out routes over and over can do work against us; fortunately, Miami doesn’t seem to be that type of team. I definitely think there’s a formula now for beating our defense, but there aren’t a ton of college QBs who can execute that formula. I certainly don’t think Miami or Stanford (or Navy) have the QB to do put together that kind of sustained success. Basically, with our defense, I’d almost (almost) rather face a Brandon Wimbush than an Ian Book.
Thanks for this. The stats are helpful in reviewing the defense’s performance. I wonder if the cutoff for garbage time is too soon. I also wonder if the team’s mental cutoff time for garbage time came too soon as well.
As has been mentioned in other places, this is one of the first times that a team has really kept fighting all the way to the end. Even USC and NCSt backed off somewhat when we put our backups in during the 2nd half. Perhaps the team was taken off guard by a team that kept trying to score. I don’t know. Either way, it didn’t look pretty.
Although they did a good job holding the score down, leading 34-10, 41-16 at times in the second half, I was already concerned with the way that Wake had success moving the ball against us throughout the game. Allowing longer drives, even if they didn’t result in points, seemed to have the defense pretty gassed at the end, which made the garbage time points easier to come by.
What was concerning to me is that the defense looked out of position and sloppy in tackling at many points through the game, not just at the end. Can we maybe have a film room segment this week to look at why that was? I, for one, am gun shy about 2014, and the differences between BVGs defense pre- and post-UNC. I’d love to have some knowledge dropped on me about why that isn’t the case this time around.
Well, the primary reason it isn’t the case is Elko isn’t BVG. Finis.
Digging in a bit, though… Our defense definitely put out a sub-par performance; guys were making mistakes they just haven’t made this year. Outside of a couple of steady presences – hello, Julian Love! – pretty much everyone seemed to be in a 60-minute collective brain fart. Given that Wake is better than people thought, and we just came off huge wins against USC and NC State, and we have Miami coming up, that’s understandable. Concerning, but understandable. So on that point, the question is whether you have confidence that this defense will regain its focus. Judging by what we’ve seen so far, I’d say yes.
The other really big part of it, for me, is that Wake was just executing at an extremely high level. They have a QB who has played in 43 games, and quite significantly, the first 80% of that experience came while practicing against a Mike Elko defense. That’s not exactly a repeatable formula for others.
As far as a more serious analysis of 2014 D vs. 2017 D, I think the 2014 UNC game exposed some fatal flaws in BVG’s scheme while the 2017 Wake game was a garden variety letdown performance. We have piles of recent evidence that Elko’s scheme is sound – he has put together highly-ranked defenses at three different FBS schools over the last 8+ seasons. VanGorder’s scheme was torched in his one year at Auburn and was clearly far too complicated for college players. Also, as the 2014 season unfolded we saw that some of that early success was fool’s gold, as teams we thought were decent turned out to stink. This year, Georgia and Michigan State were better than we thought and USC and NC State have proven to be just as good as we thought. The good performances against those offenses were legit.
Clearly the team’s mental cutoff time didn’t come too soon. So what if they let up 300 yds and unanswered 2 TDs in the 4th. This game was still never close. The team could have gone into garbage time mode 5 minutes earlier and it still wouldn’t have given Wake a chance to win.
They backdoor covered a 15.5 pt spread in the final minute. Garbage time means exactly that you don’t need to continue to play well to win. This is what happened and we won by 2 scores. That is why it is called garbage time, because it is meaningless regarding the outcome of the game.
Not to say the D was great, or even that good, the rest of the game. But AT LEAST the entire 4th quarter was unquestionably garbage time.
While I know we are not favored in S&P+, I think those stats may be a bit skewed: aside from Virginia Tech, their performances have been not-great since Mark Walton went out, which makes sense because he was probably their best offensive player. I think we’ll benefit significantly from only having to face one good back instead of two.
Additionally, I think it’s been very good that Troy Pride has been seeing the field a lot more the last couple weeks. I was worried about Ahmmon Richards against Nick Watkins, but Pride may be a better matchup as he can at least keep up with Richards. Berrios is good as well, but he’s a pretty OK matchup for Crawford.
While knocking furiously on wood, I feel pretty good about the Miami game. I think the Vegas line is probably fairer than the S&P+ line in this particular instance.
Mostly agree with you, but I think if Watkins is healthy I’d rather have him on Richards than Pride. While Pride has the athleticism and has improved his physicality, I think technically he’s still a little raw while Watkins is much more sound in terms of technique and also understanding the defense and his responsibilities. He’ll be at a speed disadvantage but can hang enough to force Rosier to make really good deep throw, which he doesn’t do all that consistently.
I would think garbage time is determined by the losing team. If the losing team is still playing to win a football game, then it’s a football game. If the losing team is just going through the motions and waiting on the clock to run out, then it would be garbage time. I definitely don’t think Wake’s offense was going through the motions. 23-48 around the beginning of the 4th quarter. But Wake was moving the ball fairly easily. To me, that’s not garbage time.
I know I’m not in agreement with most here, but it looked to me like ND’s defense wanted that game to be over a lot more than Wake’s offense. That definitely concerns me. Hopefully y’all are right, and I’m wrong.
This ties in with my comments above. I agree that it was a surprisingly subpar performance from the D, including but not limited to allowing 14 points in the 4th quarter
Bill Connelly, the guy behind S&P+, uses a 28 point lead in the first quarter, 24 in the second quarter, 21 in the third, and 16 in the fourth. Since he’s looking at all games nationally every week, it’s not feasible to judge which teams stopped trying when. And I think it’s more nuanced than that anyway; maybe Team A is still really trying, but Team B doesn’t care and has put in all its second stringers. Anyway, point being, it’s easier if there’s a fully objective cutoff for garbage time.
Connelly’s definition is usually what Mike uses, but the thing that made it tough on him when looking into this game is that we went in and out of formal garbage time several times in the second half. Mike just made a decision of convenience, probably because we don’t get paid for this. 🙂
Did they want the game to be over? I don’t know that I’d phrase it that way, but I definitely think they weren’t all locked in mentally, and they apparently got less locked in as the game went along. I’d expect the coaches to get that straightened out pretty quickly this week.
FWIW, BK just said in his presser today that when we got up 41-16 guys started looking at the scoreboard and losing their focus. I would imagine that will be a point of emphasis.
I for one am pleased to know that the D won’t lose focus when we go up 41-16 on Miami this weekend.
So the garbage time definition really isn’t supposedly to be about effort – although that definitely can change late in games. The real idea is that your objectives change in garbage time, on both sides, as the clock becomes of greater and greater importance. For the leading team, your objectives typically shift away from trying as hard as possible to score every time to also trying to drain the clock to ensure the other team has as little chance as possible to come back. The clock is your friend and you use it. Defensively, that also means you may go conservative, because forcing a long scoring drive that chews up clock is not so bad but allowing an explosive play go for a touchdown (that takes little off the clock) is worst case scenario.
Now, there’s plenty of other considerations about garbage time – how deep teams choose to go into their depth chart, effort, etc. – but the main reason to cut it out is that your strategic objective has changed, and most advanced stats systems trying to evaluate team quality want as pure a sample as possible when both units are single-mindedly focused on scoring points and preventing points regardless of the clock.
A general observation is that at least three top 10 teams underperformed on the Saturday after the first CFP poll. I think it’s possible that some of these kids, not just ours, read their own clippings a little too much and lost focus. Forunately our lost focus resulted in a back door cover instead of an upset loss like tOSU and PSU
Or their fat little girlfriends read the clippings. Then they said “OMG WTF are we doing reading clippings. It’s 2017 why are we using paper. Did we stay at a Hampton Inn and get free copies of USA Today or something? Even if so, why did we actually clip anything and where the hell did we even get scissors. If we’re at are hotel that means we’re travelling and you can’t get scissors on a plane unless you check a bag and who does that. I’m so F’ING confused are you kidding me. Why didn’t we just look at our twitter feeds.”
Re: the concern about the defense
Didnt someone report here that Kelly said that they veered from what they normally do schematically on defense because they were worried about WF knowing elko’s scheme?
Besides effort after getting up 41-16, wouldn’t this explain some of the performance?
I think he said before the game that they would change some things up to combat Wake’s familiarity with Elko. Not sure how much they actually changed, although I read somewhere that Elko brought fewer pressures in this game than he generally has.
I remember the d-tackle standing around as abspy of some sorts on several plays. I don’t remember seeing that play before.
Are you sure he wasn’t covering their fastest WR a la the vaunted BVG “defense”
Yeah WTF was that. Spying is ridiculous.
Look what came in today!
New glasses?
Prosthetic thumb, geeze
So, Clearwall, that’s what you look like!
And here I had always thought you were this dude I saw on the post office bulletin board holding up some numbers on a little plaque in front of you. 😉
Is that a knock off version not sold by the school?
What was the over/under on the use of the word grit? BK’s even using it to describe players on other teams. He has to be way over on that one.
Just popping out of my foxhole to remark that I love this photo.