Three Up, Three Down: Boston College

The Ups

This is Getting Redundant, But Jamie Newman. I’m sorry, but if a guy goes off for 21/33, 243 yards, 2 touchdowns, and one pick, plus 102 on the ground including a long of 50, and that’s probably his worst game of the season? Holy moly. Jamie Newman is really freaking good, y’all. I wouldn’t call him the best QB we’ve had since Skinner necessarily, but he might be the best weapon if that makes sense. John Wolford was an absolute monster but Jamie is so strong, and at the QB position, that’s something I can’t ever remember Wake having. Am I out of my mind?

Clutch Offense. Time and time again, Wake’s offense was put into difficult positions, and time and time again they delivered. 17-24 on third down is really, REALLY good, and that’s with our percentage getting a bit worse towards the end of the game. Scotty Washington and Sage Surratt each had absolutely disgusting touchdown catches in high pressure situations as well. Kendall Hinton proved he should be a bigger part of the offense, as did Jack Frudenthal, who did his best Cam Serigne. I said it before and I’ll say it again; if we work on diversifying the passing game a little more and do more to work the middle of the field (like we did late here), Wake’s offense would be, if not unguardable, extremely versatile.

Dominating Time Of Possession. This ties into the above point, but Wake held the ball for almost a full 12 minutes more than Boston College. I love that, especially against a team whose offensive identity is predicated on grinding down opponents.

The Downs

Big Plays For Everyone! Honestly, the defense was pretty solid on a good percentage of the downs. Two picks, 2-12 on 3rd down for Boston College, and a lot of swarming group tackles on the absolutely bruising pair of AJ Dillon and David Bailey. However, eight players through the air and three on the ground (with some duplicates in terms of names) had long plays of at least 10 yards, and as many as 33 on a pop. That’s disgusting. I don’t know what the deal was with our edge contain, but it was brutally bad this game.

Not Finishing Defensive Plays. At least two or three times, the defense had Boston College dead to rights, Anthony Brown in particular, and they repeatedly let guys elude tackles and make a huge play. Absolutely infuriating.

Not Working The Middle Of The Field More. Kendall Hinton and Jack Frudenthal were open all freaking day, and when we got it to them, they put in work. But we really need to run more slant routes and similar, rather than having Jamie bomb it so much. It works really well, and we absolutely have the personnel for it. And the playbook for that matter, because we eventually did it to great success!

The Bottom Line

5-0. A top 25 ranking (I’m assuming; #25 Kansas State got pretty much housed at Oklahoma State and #21 USC will likely drop out of the rankings after losing again, albeit to a higher ranked team, not to mention #18 Virginia will likely drop some after getting housed by Notre Dame. Oh and #15 Cal lost, too.) and a bye week followed by a three game home stand. There is only one game the entire season I’m writing off as a loss outright, and that’s @Clemson. Do I think we go 11-1? Of course not, I’m not insane. But we only need one more win to get to bowl eligibility and it is overall an extremely favorable schedule. I’m starting to think this Dave Clawson fellow might have a future in this whole coaching lark. Seriously though, please never leave us.

I’m so happy right now. Hoping to write two pieces this week (yes, on a bye week) including potentially debuting a new feature that’s a bit more general and not wholly Wake focused and meant to be more like a peek into my brain about the sports landscape at large, I guess. Would you guys be cool with and/or interested in the experimentation? Obviously if it sucked I’d drop it, but I want to do more than one piece a week and want to get a little more creative with some (emphasis on some) of my pieces. Sound off in the comments, please. After all, I do this for you guys.

On to the bye. Go Deacs.

—SF