By any measure, this was a solid game for the defense. Without their strong performance, this very well could have been a loss. 5 sacks, 3 TOs, less than 200 yards, and a bunch of 3 and outs is a good result. If any of you feel better grouping Jax St in with the rest of FCS in your mind, in order to further a certain narrative, go for it. Whatever. In my estimation they are the equivalent of a solid non power 5 FBS team or a middling power 5 team in terms of personnel and overall talent. I can't really comment on the depth of their roster, but the guys they had on the field were pretty darned good. I feel as good about this win as I did beating VANDY or UVA last year. We didn't play great today in all phases, but we stepped up and gutted out a good win under difficult circumstances.
I was very nervous heading into yesterday's game and expected it to be very difficult. The obvious stuff, like short week etc, was in my brain, but it wasn't just about physical recovery. I was also worried that they would defend us in a very different way than TENN did and without time to prepare adequately, we could suffer, especially considering the inexperience at QB and BB. It turns out, my fears were confirmed. TENN lined up off the LOS in an attempt to defeat cut blocks and rely on their athletes to make enough plays to get us off the field. They played the safe defense that some teams choose, trying to force us to go the long field without taking chances. They didn't blitz a ton of gaps and get right up on top of us at the line. Consequently, we had time to make reads and get plays started without being rushed much. JAX did more of the VT (disrupt the mesh and second read as much as possible and speed us up)defense in which utilized a ton of shifts and timed blitzes of the A gap etc. They lined up right under our nose as far as I could see. I haven't watched the replay and my seats are EZ perspective. Against the Vowels our BBs could afford to dance a little and pick a direction to go. That wasn't going to fly yesterday.