Drag Days

Box Score

I try to take the perspective that the only thing I can reasonably expect on a weekly basis is that they play hard. But then they go do something like rally from a 14-point 4th quarter deficit to tie a game late and I'm reminded just how flimsy my forced emotional detachment is, and I'm sucked in again.

South Florida and Boston College have made the recipe for steamrolling the Wolfpack defense painfully clear, and the question now is how can we counter? When you make Chris Crane look that good, it's time to start mixing up the scheme a bit, and I'm confident we will. Whether it makes any difference, well, I have doubts. A smart plan of attack can only go so far.

A look at the ugliness:

                  BC Total Offense
.              Plays    Yds   Yds/Play
vs. Kent St.     65     336     5.2
vs. GT           77     262     3.4
vs. UCF          77     411     5.3
vs. URI          49     316     6.4
at NCSU          81     578     7.1

Chris Crane:

                Comp    Att    Yds   Yds/Att   Comp%
vs. Kent St.     12     18     106     5.9     66.7
vs. GT           18     35     142     4.1     51.4
vs. UCF          16     34     207     6.1     47.1
vs. URI          1       4       6     1.5     25.0
at NCSU          34     51     428     8.4     66.7

Notes:

-- State's offense managed 253 total yards, averaging 4.6 yds/play; unfortunate numbers when considered in a vacuum, but encouraging considering the opposing defense, and considering that we're averaging 4.4 yards/play for the season. Russell Wilson continues to make progress--he's averaged better than 6.5 yards per attempt in each of his last two starts, and while those figures are modest, it's a big improvement over the production we've grown used to in the last two seasons. He's thrown one interception in 90 attempts.

-- Good stuff from Grayson Currin.

-- There was plenty of leg room in the Boston College section: