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apatriot1776

apatriot1776

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alagold said:
When was the last time we had 47k (and not playing uga)?
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Looks like the last time we topped this attendance number in BDS outside of COFH is against Miami in 2018 with 48,217.

A side note, it's a high number, but if we can attract 43,513 this Thursday we would average 40k at home for the season. That's a huge improvement considering since 2020 we've only topped 40k against UGA and Ole Miss. And three of those five games are against Georgia State, VMI, and Duke. The fans are coming back, we just need to stay the course.
 
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RamblinRed

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This is a game that I would put in the 'should win' category for us given how the season has played out, but Miami was a 'should win' game for them, so you have to see what happens on the field.

It is funny how quickly fanbases feelings change. Before last Saturday NC St fans were pretty high on their team for the rest of the season after blasting Stanford 59-28. After losing to Duke they have done a 180 and are now convinced they won't win again this season. GT was basically the opposite, with back to back losses and an unsettled QB situation, with the upset over Miami GT fans are back on the hype train.

What gives me the biggest pause is our record under Key after wins. We are currently 4-10 after a win the previous game. That is the next step for this program, stringing winning streaks together rather than mostly trading wins and losses. 2 game winning streak is out longest under Key (within 1 season, 3 if you include the bowl game and then the 1st two games of this season). Of course the longest losing streak has also been 2 games, so that is good.

2nd item to improve at is winning against Top 25 non-ACC opponents. Key is 6-1 vs ACC Top 25 ranked teams, but 0-4 against OOC Top 25 teams (2 losses to UGA, 1 to Ole Miss, 1 to ND).
 
GCdaJuiceMan

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stinger78 said:
Key has played 11 games against Top 25 teams in his 31 games as HBC at GT. His record is 6-5.

Let that sink in. He’s played ranked teams about 35% of the time and has a winning record against them.
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Its refreshing knowing that going into big games we have better than just a slight chance and he is getting the team prepared. Now, if we up the 55%(11-9) record against non top 25 teams just a little we'd really be cooking with peanut oil. Thursday seems like a good time to start!
 
4shotB

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stinger78 said:
Key has played 11 games against Top 25 teams in his 31 games as HBC at GT. His record is 6-5.

Let that sink in. He’s played ranked teams about 35% of the time and has a winning record against them.
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Interesting, if Key is 6-5 here that is approx. 55%. He is 17 - 14 overall (55%). Thus he is 11 - 9 against teams outside of the top 25 (55%). that level of consistency is impressive imo. Of course, we would like to see the numbers improve but this is eye catching imo.
 

CEB

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slugboy said:
Jamal is the kind of back who could tear up NCST
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Fresh off of a rigorous film session consisting of a couple of NCST condensed games, my novice to intermediate football mind would submit their Wake game as exhibit A. Wake runs a lot of similar concepts to us offensively and Claiborne is a J Haynes doppelgänger. Lots of East / West and outside zone and Claiborne had several one on one opportunities with nothing but green grass after making one guy miss. Pack front over pursued and got washed out several times giving huge cutback lanes and wake sprinkled in a lot of short passing. H King should be a bigger threat to run than Wake had too. Heck, even their unis that day helped visualize how our offense can go against the pack.

The Duke game is a better indicator of pack offense. Wake game is where they lost McCall, so I didn’t worry much about O (although they blocked well and didn’t look bad). Oddly, in the Duke game I didn’t think either O line blocked well. Pack and Duke defenses were in backfields all day. Big difference is that Duke QB made a couple of downfield throws catching state in blitz and one on one cover. Offensively, Pack QB is quick and elusive. Unlike Ward, when pocket breaks, he is getting upfield, not buying time to throw. We need to keep him in pocket. Their WR are slippery outside. We have to tackle in space, which we have done poorly at times this season (ND comes to mind)
 
stinger78

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Techster said:
Haven't gone through this thread, so someone else might have already pointed it out: If GT beats NC State, we will be unbeaten at home this year. GT has not finished a season unbeaten at home since 1999.
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Every other year that has been UGAg who spoiled that record. Yes, we haven’t beaten them at BDS since 1999. The curse of Jasper Thanks.
 

Root4GT

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RamblinRed said:
This is a game that I would put in the 'should win' category for us given how the season has played out, but Miami was a 'should win' game for them, so you have to see what happens on the field.

It is funny how quickly fanbases feelings change. Before last Saturday NC St fans were pretty high on their team for the rest of the season after blasting Stanford 59-28. After losing to Duke they have done a 180 and are now convinced they won't win again this season. GT was basically the opposite, with back to back losses and an unsettled QB situation, with the upset over Miami GT fans are back on the hype train.

What gives me the biggest pause is our record under Key after wins. We are currently 4-10 after a win the previous game. That is the next step for this program, stringing winning streaks together rather than mostly trading wins and losses. 2 game winning streak is out longest under Key (within 1 season, 3 if you include the bowl game and then the 1st two games of this season). Of course the longest losing streak has also been 2 games, so that is good.

2nd item to improve at is winning against Top 25 non-ACC opponents. Key is 6-1 vs ACC Top 25 ranked teams, but 0-4 against OOC Top 25 teams (2 losses to UGA, 1 to Ole Miss, 1 to ND).
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That last line is a reflection of the ACC more than anything else! Not in a good way either!
 
4shotB

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Root4GT said:
That last line is a reflection of the ACC more than anything else! Not in a good way either!
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There is a nugget of truth in this. It’s interesting that we beat #9 and #4 this year. Both are ACC teams. But the other factor is that in most years there seems to be a big drop off after the top 4 or 5 teams or so. In other words the #12 ranked team is closer to the 40th ranked team than they are to the #2 ranked team. Imo.
 

g0lftime

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CEB said:
Fresh off of a rigorous film session consisting of a couple of NCST condensed games, my novice to intermediate football mind would submit their Wake game as exhibit A. Wake runs a lot of similar concepts to us offensively and Claiborne is a J Haynes doppelgänger. Lots of East / West and outside zone and Claiborne had several one on one opportunities with nothing but green grass after making one guy miss. Pack front over pursued and got washed out several times giving huge cutback lanes and wake sprinkled in a lot of short passing. H King should be a bigger threat to run than Wake had too. Heck, even their unis that day helped visualize how our offense can go against the pack.

The Duke game is a better indicator of pack offense. Wake game is where they lost McCall, so I didn’t worry much about O (although they blocked well and didn’t look bad). Oddly, in the Duke game I didn’t think either O line blocked well. Pack and Duke defenses were in backfields all day. Big difference is that Duke QB made a couple of downfield throws catching state in blitz and one on one cover. Offensively, Pack QB is quick and elusive. Unlike Ward, when pocket breaks, he is getting upfield, not buying time to throw. We need to keep him in pocket. Their WR are slippery outside. We have to tackle in space, which we have done poorly at times this season (ND comes to mind)
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Well coached and they will be no pushover. HK will need to throw down field more this game. Concepcion is a very good WR for them.
 

CEB

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g0lftime said:
Well coached and they will be no pushover. HK will need to throw down field more this game. Concepcion is a very good WR for them.
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Agree.
Somewhat disagree
Agree.

On the somewhat disagree - Duke had success downfield against man cover. Duke OL picked up blitz and Murphy did a good job of getting rid of the ball to one on one receivers who made plays. Duke couldn’t run the ball to save their life. They made chunk plays in passing game though.

Wake had a lot of success running. They also had a lot of success with east west and underneath throws. They played just like we do; make them defend sideline to sideline and gash in the run game.

In short, looking at their season, the teams that run first had a lot of success running against them. NCST has padded their stats a bit with a lot of teams that are pass heavy.

Maybe we take some opportunistic shots but I don’t expect any real change to our plan. Lean on our run blocking, East / west passing and jet sweeps, and Haynes &Haynes chunk plays between the hashes - the cutbacks will be there
 
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