Positives from Clemson

FLTech

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I thought we looked very disciplined in terms of penalties. Honestly folks, I think we have a bright future ahead of us. That dropped punt we had after the 3 and out was simply nerves in that environment.
 

Vespidie

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Exactly. We got little to no pressure on the QB all night. Got some holding calls out of it, but Lawrence won’t have to launder his uniform after not really hitting the ground.
Wut? I would think most offenses would love to start the series inside the 5.
We definitely have to figure out a way to consistently get a yard when we need it.. Not converting the 4th and 1's were killers. We also can't give teams extra possessions in lieu of our own. We come out of the gate and the D stops 'em and forces a punt only to give it back with a short field. The defense played a heck of a game, and I'm looking forward to next weeks game. The improvement between last night and next Saturday should be very noticeable. Support the team folks, it's only going to get better.
 

ramblin57

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I too believe CGC will have good defenses eventually at GT, I saw things that indicate that to me. He had them at MSU and FL.
 

Vespidie

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Yeah, as the DC said: with Clemson you can't take away everything. We didn't plan or expect Lawrence to run the way he did. Lawrence said that was a focus of his off season improvement and it seems like it really paid off.

I think his runs loosened up the defense and contributed to some of the other long runs; not an excuse.
The stride length of a lanky 6'6" dude can make up a lot of ground after a mistake.
 

GoGATech

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I thought we looked very disciplined in terms of penalties. Honestly folks, I think we have a bright future ahead of us. That dropped punt we had after the 3 and out was simply nerves in that environment.
I also think that should've been a penalty. I found this looking up the fair catch interference rule for NCAA:

NCAA RULE 6 – KICKS

SECTION 4. Opportunity to Catch a Kick

ARTICLE 1. Interference with Opportunity


If an inbounds player of the receiving team is located where he could catch a free kick or a scrimmage kick that has crossed the neutral zone, and if he is attempting to do so, must be given an unimpeded opportunity to catch the kick (A.R. 6-3-1:III) (A.R. 6-4-1:V, VI and IX).

It is an interference foul if, before the receiver touches the ball, a Team A player enters the area defined by the width of the receiver’s shoulders and extending one yard in front of him. When in question it is a foul. (A.R. 6-4-1:X-XIII)
That dude running straight at Juanyeh sure looked to be within one yard. Hell he almost hit him.
 

Vespidie

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It's just one loss, and one that we realistically had little or no chance of avoiding this year. We got film from a real game to study for correcting mistakes and helping decide who should be starters going forward. Our real season starts in 8 days.
Very good point. I'd much rather play an opener against a perceived 'better' opponent in order to get a "true" representation of actual standing, as opposed to kicking a patsy's behind because you were supposed to due to better athletes. Looking forward to the improvement in execution in week 2.
 

GT65_UGA89

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Despite the final score being what it was, in considering my last four trips to Clemson, I thought we looked better both offensively and defensively than in the previous three trips. Sure, there are some talent/roster issues that will take some time to clean up, but defensively we did get some stops and created some turnovers, and offensively we averaged just under five yards per play.

Next Saturday brings a new day and a new opportunity to see what we can do against a team not stacked two-deep with 4 and 5 stars.
 

coit

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Ok so I will admit I wasn't all too happy last night thinking we should've made a better showing for ourselves. After letting it settle some and thinking back to some of the positives, I decided to go against my own judgement and compare stats from last year. While none of the stats look really "good", I was pleasantly surprised at what I saw. Here are some stats I compiled comparing to last year's game against Clemson:

Capture.JPG


Despite the ridiculous amount of yards we gave up, our defense actually played better than last year IMO. The yards per play given up by our D was up but let's not also forget how skewed those numbers are when you add in the 3 big plays of 90, 62, and 48 yards. That's 200 yards of offense on only 3 plays. Just taking away that one long run drops that yard per play number down a whole point. Another stat I forgot to include was points per possession. Last year Clemson averaged 4.1 ppp and this year that number dropped to 3.3.

The really surprising stats to me were the offensive production stats. As bad as I thought we looked, we looked better in game 1 of a new regime against the #1 team that we did last year. All this also with 4 turnovers. This Clemson team is different than last year to me too. Last year they were still figuring out exactly who they were at the point we played them. This year they came into the game knowing they were the best team in the nation and were out to prove it. I am looking forward to seeing this team continue to improve and as long as we can keep up the momentum in the recruiting game, I'm excited for the future.

As regards our performance, keep in mind that they probably had their starters in longer last year than this year. Last year I think Lawrence completed a TD pass with about 4 minutes to go.
 

GoGATech

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As regards our performance, keep in mind that they probably had their starters in longer last year than this year. Last year I think Lawrence completed a TD pass with about 4 minutes to go.
No they didn't. Remember last year they started Kelly Bryant for the first 2 or 3 drives and went nowhere. Then they put Lawrence in. Took him back out after the first drive of 3rd quarter when they went up 35-7. They played Kelly Bryant and Chase Brice after that and only put Lawrence back for another scoring drive after we cut the lead to 21.

EDIT: Lawrence didn't come in last year until 11:27 to go in Q2, then played just one possession in the 3rd quarter and one in the 4th. That's barely more than a full quarter of play. This year they replaced him with Chase Brice with 6:12 to go in the 3rd quarter. Technically Lawrence's last play ended with 8:08 in Q3. Still 2 and half quarters this year compared to slightly over 1 last year.
 
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Jdm22

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He should have at least cut back in and dropped the shoulder to lay a hit on Lawrence that would make him regret trying to make the tackle. That would have been the only contact on Lawrence all game.
This is exactly what I was cheering for...perfect chance to lay the wood to him. Ahhh well.
 

GoGATech

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This is exactly what I was cheering for...perfect chance to lay the wood to him. Ahhh well.
Tre Swilling is 6'-200lb, Trevor Lawrence is 6'6"-220lb. Not sure how much wood there was to be laid...
 

beej67

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Not sure if anyone has covered this or not, but I'd be interested to see the total plays run in this game vs our average last year.

That's a potential systemic advantage because it means more in game experience.
 

GoGATech

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Not sure if anyone has covered this or not, but I'd be interested to see the total plays run in this game vs our average last year.

That's a potential systemic advantage because it means more in game experience.
Last year there were a total of 1675 plays over 13 games for an average of 128.8 plays/game. Last night there were 145 plays. 12.6% increase in plays.

EDIT: But we averaged 67 offensive/62 defensive plays last year per game. last night was 65 offensive/80 defensive.
 

gtleviathan

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I also think that should've been a penalty. I found this looking up the fair catch interference rule for NCAA:



That dude running straight at Juanyeh sure looked to be within one yard. Hell he almost hit him.
Juanyeh tried to run around him and came up short to where the ball landed. He should have gone straight for the ball, taking the contact. Would have been a better chance at drawing the penalty.
 

NotTomNotPhilButGCollins

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  • Tackling was much better.
Yes!

Tackling was better

However Carpenter & Thomas at Safety both had a poor game and took poor angles on Etienne's longer runs, they played against him last yr, shoulda been more prepared to take good angles to mitigate his speed

Played him like they've never seen the guy before
 

NotTomNotPhilButGCollins

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We definitely have to figure out a way to consistently get a yard when we need it.. Not converting the 4th and 1's were killers. We also can't give teams extra possessions in lieu of our own. We come out of the gate and the D stops 'em and forces a punt only to give it back with a short field. The defense played a heck of a game, and I'm looking forward to next weeks game. The improvement between last night and next Saturday should be very noticeable. Support the team folks, it's only going to get better.
You're right

I was kinda ticked that we didn't use a TE or 2 as extra blockers in those situations to get that yard
 
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