The fact we have people who are saying lose the Carolinas games and win the SBC is better shock me with how little they understand college football and how you move up.appgrad95&97 wrote: ↑Mon Feb 18, 2019 3:46 pmLet's say we go 10-2:
Would you rather loose the games against UNC and USC but run the table in the SunBelt
Or
Beat the Carolinas and loose two conference games (and not play for the title)?
Do you guys saying this forget what beating Michigan did for us? Winning the 3 FCS titles helped us in recruiting against FCS programs but Michigan put us on a national stage. I would have gladly sacrificed the FCS title that year to beat Michigan.
This is the same thing. Nobody cares who wins the SBC but if we beat 2 P5 programs in one year, especially one of them being from the SEC, it is breaking ground that we have not been able to claim. We have yet to beat a P5 since moving up and I want to end this drought.
Someone asked how beating them helps us more than the other? Do you think any 4-star recruits will give us a stronger look if we beat Lafayette and Georgia Southern again or if we beat the SEC and ACC? We really need some P5 wins to take that next step as a program.
With that said, I want to win them all. The talent is there and anyone on here who is saying we should go 8-4 or 9-3 is insane. That is not the expectation and it should not be. 9-3 or 8-4 would be a failure of a season.
Look at the talent we have.
Offense- We have arguably the best QB in the SBC and by far the best RB stable in the league. Evans is a beast and then Williams is a heck of a player while Peoples showed in the bowl game that he is a monster who has SEC talent. Up front on the OL we have 4 starters back and 2 of them are likely to be 1st team All-SBC. LT Victor Johnson, like Evans, are probably going to play in the NFL for a while. Noah Hannon is the best center in the SBC and it is not even close. We only lost 1 starter on offense with it being the RT but I expect his replacement to be better. This offense should be the best we have ever had. If Drink does not get 35-40 points every week out of this group I will be disappointed. At WR we have a beast in Corey Sutton. He is a big, strong, fast target who can make any play you ask him to. He, like those other two mentioned, is a definite NFL player. At TE we have 2 All-SBC players and one of them, Pearson, is a freak. Reed is a very sound player who can catch and block while Pearson is a bigger, faster version of Reed who is a little bit better at both.
The only major nitpicks I have on this group is the fact our OL is not averaging 300 yet but they are close. We need someone else to step up at WR to take some focus off Sutton so he won't be double and triple teamed regularly. The backup QBs need to be ready because we can't see the offense fall apart like we did against GSU last year. We also need to be more consistent as we did sputter at times and were shut down for a quarter here and there in 2018 but if they can just take that next step we will be scary good on offense.
In closing though we have so much speed and depth in some areas that I think we should give an SEC and ACC defense some fits. We have enough speed to make UNC and SC think they are facing a P5 caliber offense.
Defense- We are not quite as stacked here in terms of we do have some questions but we also have some studs returning that should help that. Fehr and Gaither at LB are the best duo in the league. Noel Cook also showed to be a star as well. Same can be said for Thomas and Franklin at safety. The DL should be solid as Earle by all accounts is going to be a star and we return the DEs with a lot of speed.
The issues here are we do lose both corners but Jean-Charles, Jones, Jolly, and some of the guys we just signed will make for a fast, talented group of replacements to choose from. We do need a couple of those young LBs (Cobb, Doublin, Bird, etc) who played last year to take that next step like Fehr did for us in 2018. We have a couple candidates who could easily do that. We are still undersized up front on the DL but could make up for it with our speed and the fact that we have several bodies who can play.
Special Teams- Howell is a great punter who is still young but has a bright future. Staton showed he can be a good one and did so in a way that he sent a player who once started out of the program. We also signed some good return candidates as well as return Evans and have others on the team who can as well.
If you look at the All-SBC teams and our depth chart we return a lot of talent and have more returning All-SBC players than anyone else. The fact we have folks willing to accept 8-9 wins is beyond me. This team has the talent, and I believe coaching, that we should sweep the SBC and beat UNC with the SC game being 50/50. I honestly think our toughest game should be South Carolina with Troy being a close second because they return a lot of talent and should win double digit games as well. Troy is another team to keep an eye on because they play Missouri on the road and I would say they could make that very close. They should also expect 10 wins in the regular season. I'm sure they would be happy to split with us and GSU and a loss to Missouri as their only losses.
Could we lose 3-4 games? It is possible but it is not acceptable because that would likely mean we don't win the division or SBC title and then we probably are swept by the P5s. Troy is going to be so good that I don't expect a loss in the SBC will allow us to win the East again.
The Penn State game being much closer along with the fact the SBC West being down made me feel that our chances are much strong. We should only have two real threats in the SBC to challenge us and we showed that we have some electric talent that truly belongs in the P5. I have high expectations on this team for the first time and not just because of the talent but look at the experience of the new coaches. We also have a coach from South Carolina so we now have their playbook. I will be very disappointed if we don't have a historic season in Boone.