Deleted member 2897
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Could be worse...we could be Syracuse. The NC State game was about the third game I have seen them play where they could have pulled out a win but just did not make the plays in crunch time. College football, other than for the elite factories, is a tough business with the difference between a win and a loss for most teams is razor thin. This is a team we beat pretty good last year but they are much better this year on both sides of the ball with the possible exception of running the ball. They are not a very good running team this year which we may be able to take advantage of this week.
Yup. The big difference when we played them is that we gave them 5 turnovers. If you go back and look up the play-by-play, we had 10 possessions where we didn't hand them the ball and they had 15 where they didn't hand us the ball. If each team on those possessions averages 3 points per drive, that's 15 more points for them. Moreover, 1 of those takeaways didn't result in a possession for them, it was a defensive TD, so you're talking a 3 score difference due to that turnover margin...roughly speaking. Its hard to even beat a Syracuse if you spot them 21 points. And it was nearly the exact same dynamic with Boston College (we handed them 21 points early) and UCF (we handed them 21 points late). As many have said, that's been our calling card this year - if we stick to around 2 turnovers or less, we'll be in the game and have a good chance to win. If we have more than that, we're probably behind 15-20 points. Plus, we are handicapped about 2-3 points a game because we can't kick field goals.