Defense

[Stonewall]

Watching the replay....They were holding on their fourth down conversion, which the commentator pointed out, as well as one of their break away TD runs. I'm sure there were others , and on both sides.The fourth down was potentially a game changer.

[BeauFoster]

I have always tried to not bitch about calls and to use a "bad call" as an excuse. No referees or sets of officials do anything to help a team win. Those who say or think that are crazy. I try to believe that calls tend to equal out. Fans bitch and moan about the bad call that didn't go their way but don't recall the ones that did go their way. Human error is just part of the deal. I'm sure we might have gotten away with a hold or some other penalty that didn't get called. Gotta overcome it.

Back in the 1990's and 2000's there was an ACC football Ref from my hometown, big joke was he was the biggest UNC fan in town too. Everyone wondered how he could be impartial.

Is that how Mack ended up with a resume to get hired at Texas??

[bigdaddyg]

I was thinking during game, what happened to us in 2nd qtr? However I did go back and watch some of the 2nd qtr on replay and I did NOT see any material change in our offensive game plan. The 4th possession we went down and kicked a field goal (missed from 51 yrds) but had chance for score. On the next possession is when we got the 15 yrd penalty as mention above. We did call two running plays on 1st and 2nd down with 1st and 25. At time I thought both were not the right call. Because both ended up getting us nothing it is easy to second guess but if they worked to get us 10 yrds each because defense expected passes then Barbay looks like a hero. The point is when you are sitting 1st and 25, the stats are not in your favor at all. In retrospect we got screwed on the call but sometimes those things happen so you have to overcome them.

Point is, I think the penalty got us into trouble and the resulting play calling didn't work in the moment and then they scored before half. That hurt bad. It was a momentum changing moment in the game.

I didn't see a trend of bad play calling in the 2nd quarter. I will watch 3rd qtr later.

I went back to that late second quarter play where we got the 15 yard blocking below the waist penalty. That was a back breaker. We would have had 2nd and 2 instead of 1st and 25. Who knows, we were starting to roll up to that point. What stinks is that it was away from the play. The penalty was definitely there and should always be called because of player safety concerns. I trust our coaches have corrected that.

I agree. That might have been the biggest momentum killing play that swung the game. I believe had we not gotten that penalty we would have probably scored again. They were "on their heels" and the penalty gave them breathing room.

[AEB4AE]

ODU not a good team, nor is VT.. OD only scored 1 offensive TD after a third and long 'gift' PI call . Other TD on a bad snap by VT that OD took to the house. We scored 9 TD vs UNC. OD wont score 9 offensive TD in September.