Onto the TECH-mo Bowl!

[Thwg777]

I'm inclined to take the 8.5 points and win back what I lost on the ND game. It should indeed be a close one.

Just my opinion, when we’re an underdog, it’s money line or bust.

Outside of the u(sic)ga games, we tend to not get many moral defeats… by that I mean we tend to either win outright as an underdog or not cover the line at all. Thinking 2022 Pitt and UNCheat, 2023 Miami and UNCheat, and 2024 F$U. Those MLs would raise blood pressures but the paydays would be worth it.

 

[slugboy]

Here's our offense against their defense:

GT	Defense		Offense	VT
#114	0.13	EPA/Pass	0.06	#59
#23	-0.11	EPA/Rush	0.10	#40
#79	45.0%	Available Yards %	45.7%	#81
#10	Own 25	Starting FP	Own 30	#28
#72	-0.01	Early Downs EPA/Play	-0.01	#86
#39	37.5%	3rd Down Success	52.4%	#13
#20	7.91	Avg 3rd Down Distance	6.16	#14

Our defense is good against the run, and terrible against the pass. VT is mid on both fronts. I would expect VT to have a weakness to exploit in our passing defense. We make mid passing attacks look like Air Coryell.

Technically, VT leans a little more on

They're mid in passing:

When Passing	Value
Plays	166
Plays/Game	28 #104
Total EPA	9.55 #64
EPA/Play	0.06 #59
EPA/Game	1.59 #64
Success Rate	41.6% #80

If we're lucky, Pry is stupid and keeps trying to run the ball:

When Rushing	Value
Plays	204
Plays/Game	34 T-#60
Total EPA	19.73 #39
EPA/Play	0.10 #40
EPA/Game	3.29 #40
Success Rate	40.7% #79

Drones is a rusher at QB. He's got to be contained and sacked.

Rushing stats

	Carries	Yds	TD	Fum	Yds/rush	EPA/rush	EPA	SR
Bhayshul Tuten	106	613	9	3	5.78	0.12	13.15	37%
Kyron Drones	57	332	3	1	5.82	0.15	8.33	53%
Malachi Thomas	17	58	0	0	3.41	-0.12	-1.97	29%
Jeremiah Coney	7	22	0	0	3.14	-0.47	-3.27	14%

 

[bobongo]

Just my opinion, when we’re an underdog, it’s money line or bust.

Outside of the u(sic)ga games, we tend to not get many moral defeats… by that I mean we tend to either win outright as an underdog or not cover the line at all. Thinking 2022 Pitt and UNCheat, 2023 Miami and UNCheat, and 2024 F$U. Those MLs would raise blood pressures but the paydays would be worth it.

Sometimes I like to combine them, as I did with FSU. Ran out of luck yesterday, though. I liked the 14 points. I thought we'd keep it close but still probably lose. Didn't keep it quite close enough.

 

[slugboy]

Here's our offense against their defense. Good news ( )-> They ain't that good at stopping the run. We'll have to coach well (no more 12 men in the huddle).

GT	Offense		Defense	VT
#12	0.28	EPA/Pass	-0.16	#22
#20	0.16	EPA/Rush	0.03	#79
#17	59.0%	Available Yards %	42.1%	#59
#75	Own 28	Starting Field Position	Own 30	#101
#12	0.21	Early Downs EPA/Play	-0.13	#25
#43	47.9%	3rd/4th Down Success	46.2%	#98
#9	5.85	Avg 3rd Down Distance	7.16	#76

Here's their defense. They give up big plays:

And our offense:

 

[slugboy]

The VT coaching staff cost VT the game against Rutgers. Rutgers got 3 points on a long FG after they had punted but VT had 2 guys on the field with the same number moving the FG try up 5 yards!

Out of all the games we played, I feel like we got outcoached at Syracuse. This may be our chance to outcoach someone else.

 

[JacketOff]

Just my opinion, when we’re an underdog, it’s money line or bust.

Outside of the u(sic)ga games, we tend to not get many moral defeats… by that I mean we tend to either win outright as an underdog or not cover the line at all. Thinking 2022 Pitt and UNCheat, 2023 Miami and UNCheat, and 2024 F$U. Those MLs would raise blood pressures but the paydays would be worth it.

That’s not even close to true lol. Also, moral victories (or defeats? What is a moral defeat?) are not real. You either win the game or you don’t. But Tech has pretty consistently surpassed expectations when playing as an underdog under CBK. Anybody who’s even paid a little bit of attention to the team over the last 2.5 seasons would know that

 

[Thwg777]

That’s not even close to true lol. Also, moral victories (or defeats? What is a moral defeat?) are not real. You either win the game or you don’t. But Tech has pretty consistently surpassed expectations when playing as an underdog under CBK. Anybody who’s even paid a little bit of attention to the team over the last 2.5 seasons would know that

Rather inflamatory response since we’re saying the same thing… Did you comprehend what I wrote? As an underdog, we’ve only lost whilst covering the spread thrice… 2023 UL and 2022 and 2023 u(sic)ga. I even defined that as a ‘moral defeat’ for betting purposes. Hence I started off outside of the u(sic)ga games, taking the ML is much more lucrative than taking the points.

 

[cpf2001]

And our offense:


View attachment 17054

This is a telling chart. While overall we’re good at running this year IMO being bad in terms of stuff rate and line yards tells the real story - we are either real good at it or real bad at it depending on if your D is competent against our line.

So I will continue to beat the throw-to-open-up-the-run drum.

 

[leatherneckjacket]

They will always be VPISU to me.

 

[slugboy]

This is a telling chart. While overall we’re good at running this year IMO being bad in terms of stuff rate and line yards tells the real story - we are either real good at it or real bad at it depending on if your D is competent against our line.

So I will continue to beat the throw-to-open-up-the-run drum.

I posted this in another thread:

I don’t know if our offense is designed around the run, but…

Against FSU we threw 16 passes for 146 yards and won. We ran for 36 rushes for 190 yards. Win

Ga State: 29 passes for 274 yards, 32 rushes for 274 yards. Win

Syracuse: 40 passes for 266 yards, 25 rushes for 112 yards. Loss

Louisville: 32 passes for 312 yards, 35 rushes for 105 yards. Loss

Duke: 32 passes for 167 yards, 48 rushes for 247 yards. Win

UNC: 23 passes for 134 yards, 48 rushes for 385 yards. Win

Notre Dame: 39 passes for 247 yards, 29 rushes for 64 yards. Loss

I think the Syracuse game showed a recipe: stifle the run and we lose. If we get 150 yards on the ground or thereabouts, we have a good shot at winning. It could be a coincidence, but I don’t think we have a backup plan for when the run isn’t working—at least, not in any games this year.

I’m not critical of Faulkner’s play calling—he seems to call a good game. I do think our passing offense needs to be strong enough to carry the offense, and it doesn’t seem to be.

Once the run got shut down, and it got shut down cold, Pyron was in a tough spot.

Overall, his numbers were pretty good. I think he would have needed a Doug Flutie game to win without a rushing attack.

It’s an offseason problem, but it looks like Faulkner needs to build up the passing game to the point it can carry the team, or make sure the run game is near impossible to shut down

Defense and special teams aren’t winning the game for us either, but that’s another story

Also, we aren’t a high tempo offense. When we win, we limit possessions and burn a ton of clock. We don’t score as much as an air raid team

 

[cpf2001]

I think the Syracuse game showed a recipe: stifle the run and we lose. If we get 150 yards on the ground or thereabouts, we have a good shot at winning. It could be a coincidence, but I don’t think we have a backup plan for when the run isn’t working—at least, not in any games this year.

I think we COULD though - how many of the passing yards against Syracuse came late in must-pass time? IMO is our defense had done better and gotten off the field more in that game we would’ve kept running for longer, like against Louisville. Where we kept at it even though the pass was working much better.

IMO the ND game was the first time we went away from the run fast enough, but their defense was just too good for it to be enough.

But if we had gotten ourselves a lot more passing reps in games where we “didn’t need to” (and of course if not a first start of the year for Pyron)… could we have done better? Basically same as you say - build up the passing game in the offseason- just I’m also confused by the game philosophy this year of being run-first without top-10 talent. Perhaps a big part is the FSU game being misleading re: their DL.

 

[roadkill]

Here's our offense against their defense:

GT	Defense		Offense	VT
#114	0.13	EPA/Pass	0.06	#59
#23	-0.11	EPA/Rush	0.10	#40
#79	45.0%	Available Yards %	45.7%	#81
#10	Own 25	Starting FP	Own 30	#28
#72	-0.01	Early Downs EPA/Play	-0.01	#86
#39	37.5%	3rd Down Success	52.4%	#13
#20	7.91	Avg 3rd Down Distance	6.16	#14

Our defense is good against the run, and terrible against the pass. VT is mid on both fronts. I would expect VT to have a weakness to exploit in our passing defense. We make mid passing attacks look like Air Coryell.

Technically, VT leans a little more on

View attachment 17051
View attachment 17052

They're mid in passing:

When Passing	Value
Plays	166
Plays/Game	28 #104
Total EPA	9.55 #64
EPA/Play	0.06 #59
EPA/Game	1.59 #64
Success Rate	41.6% #80

If we're lucky, Pry is stupid and keeps trying to run the ball:

When Rushing	Value
Plays	204
Plays/Game	34 T-#60
Total EPA	19.73 #39
EPA/Play	0.10 #40
EPA/Game	3.29 #40
Success Rate	40.7% #79

Drones is a rusher at QB. He's got to be contained and sacked.

Rushing stats

	Carries	Yds	TD	Fum	Yds/rush	EPA/rush	EPA	SR
Bhayshul Tuten	106	613	9	3	5.78	0.12	13.15	37%
Kyron Drones	57	332	3	1	5.82	0.15	8.33	53%
Malachi Thomas	17	58	0	0	3.41	-0.12	-1.97	29%
Jeremiah Coney	7	22	0	0	3.14	-0.47	-3.27	14%

Assume you meant our defense against their offense for this post.

I hope we get Efford back or our defense against the run will not look as good as the stats say it is.

 

[cpf2001]

Drones is concerning since our run D has felt better against up the middle “traditional” run attacks vs mobile QBs.


otherwise this looks VERY winnable

 

[roadkill]

I think the Syracuse game showed a recipe: stifle the run and we lose.

I think it's a bit more complex than that. We learned that when Jamal Haynes isn't near 100%, our run game suffers. He got healed up in the bye week and proceeded to go off in the next two games. I think with a healthy Jamal, we probably beat Syracuse and would have stood a better chance of beating Louisville (although to be fair, we probably still lose the Louisville game given how we shot ourselves in the foot several times).

I hope Jamal isn't banged up again. Someone mentioned in an earlier post that it appeared he wasn't taking all the yards potentially available. It's concerning that Alexander got twice the YPC that Jamal did yesterday. We need a healthy Jamal to beat VT.

 

[Towaliga]

it seems that GT is not very good; less of a team than VT and that NC state may be the only possible victory . So a 6-6 season at best. disappointing

The over/under for Tech wins was 5.5, so we would have exceeded the “expert’s” opinions.

 

[Ramble1885]

VT's RB looked incredible against BC. Drones can run and pass the ball as well. Our defense has its work cut out for them.

they remind me a lot of the RB and QB at BC who tore us up last year, and that's who they just beat.

 

[Ramble1885]

I think it's a bit more complex than that. We learned that when Jamal Haynes isn't near 100%, our run game suffers. He got healed up in the bye week and proceeded to go off in the next two games. I think with a healthy Jamal, we probably beat Syracuse and would have stood a better chance of beating Louisville (although to be fair, we probably still lose the Louisville game given how we shot ourselves in the foot several times).

I hope Jamal isn't banged up again. Someone mentioned in an earlier post that it appeared he wasn't taking all the yards potentially available. It's concerning that Alexander got twice the YPC that Jamal did yesterday. We need a healthy Jamal to beat VT.

I think if Jamal isn't healthy we should try feeding Chad a lot. He's a good talent and has a ton of potential.

 

[Bogey]

My take is King has not thrown mid field and deep passes well all season for whatever reason. So we lean heavily on the run and have been successful. ND was an outlier, our run game was non-existent against their D and we had to pass. I think we will be pretty well balanced against VT if Pyron is QB. If King plays, I think we will favor the run.

 

[GTJake]

it seems that GT is not very good; less of a team than VT and that NC state may be the only possible victory . So a 6-6 season at best. disappointing

At this point, subject to change, this looks right ...

 

[stinger78]

My take is King has not thrown mid field and deep passes well all season for whatever reason. So we lean heavily on the run and have been successful. ND was an outlier, our run game was non-existent against their D and we had to pass. I think we will be pretty well balanced against VT if Pyron is QB. If King plays, I think we will favor the run.

I agree, and I believe it is due to a conscious effort to limit INT’s. Given that our WR’s don’t get a lot of separation, those throws are especially dangerous. Yet, we know both King and Pyron can make them.

Just my $ .02 worth.