ACC Championship - GT

First a note about the weather. When I have to travel to Yankee states from November through April, and see these poor saps walking around sad and miserable fighting ridiculous wind, cold and a variety of water-based precipitation (formerly my existence), I always feel bad because these folks may not have a choice as to where they reside. When I think of the ACC Championship game, I absolutely know that it is going to be in the 40's and best case rain, and more likely sleet. Three trips to Carolina for this mess, check, check, check. Why for all that is holy when 90% of the games that are played in this conference year round are in perfect conditions do you insist on conducting your championship in a wet sloggy mess. Well, ACC you can continue to lie about the attendance, but when a 65,000 seat stadium has a third of the sections covered with a tarp and in my club seats on the 40, I had an entire row ahead and behind me open, announcing 53,000 in the house is laughable. Move this damn game to Orlando permanently. Go ahead and canvas, ummm, every player in the league and ask if they have an issue coming to Mickey's playland in December.

This year we were "lucky"! The rain stopped an hour before the game and we got a balmy 48 degrees.  As if the precipitation Gods were mocking us, we got a wet blanket of fog that sat in the Stadium about 40 feet above the playing surface preventing the few fans in the upper decks from seeing the field, and adding an 1890's London mystery feel to the contest. Well, the brainiacs at the ACC could not live with this, so they decided to unload a gross ton of pyrotechnics pregame whose resultant smoke trapped under the fog comforter effectually stopped all of us from seeing who even came to the game with us. The teams entered the field and the bands did not even know it. Cue the fight song...I think. Well, eventually the game had to go on, and the only folks left in the fog were the defenses...

It is a good thing that Tech holds the ball so long, or we would have scored 80 on em. #5 emerged from his courtroom muck, and blistered this pitiful secondary all day long. If Bobo did not have clown hands, we may have scored on every single possession. This new OL configuration just demolished the undersized GT group. In the second half when they were blitzing ballboys, no one
touched Jameis or even made him move. He double pumped more than Sly Stallone as a barista. In the second series, we ran the exact same smash play to Dalvin four consecutive times. I mean same formation and same gap...touchdown. This team has played so many stout defenses this season (I know the SEC apologists refuse to believe that), that when they faced a less than average squad like
Saturday night, it is like a Panzer through Poland. The good news for us is that The Duck defense is not much better than Tech - if not markedly worse. One of the unsung heroes in this late season rushing bonanza is Ermon Lane. This kid can flat out block. On almost every long Dalvin dash, he could be credited with wiping out a DB, and even though he is still about 40 pounds away from a finished product, he does not hold. Many of us have wondered why Christian Green can't get back on the field, and this is why as Ermon is constantly channeling his inner-Dawsey.

I have to admit that when Eddie Goldman went down - yet another victim to this garbage offense - I thought we were in a wee bit of trouble. The Disneyesque joyride continued for the first three GT series as they marched 271 yards with Parisian resistance while Eddie was joined on the sideline by Matthew Thomas and Ronald Darby. While we were all counting possible possessions and envisioning a 49-49 OT, the miracle happened. Charles Kelly's magnificent defensive gameplan, interrupted by injuries forced Jalen to corner and re-introduced Trey Marshall to the playing field.This serious upgrade in physicality self-corrected the idiocy of playing 2 deep safeties against a team that runs it 80% of the time (more against us), and allowed some big plays on the edge. Trey's tackle from behind their QB forced 3rd down in a series we made a stop and may have saved a season. Jalen wiping out cheap WR blocks eliminated one side of the field, and PJ from his back made the stop of the year. Phew, so glad that Kelly had 7 years to study this Ramblin Wreck attack, or gosh knows how effective they would have been. I was especially impressed with the nickel look we showed with two deep safeties on all their runs inside the 5. God bless LaMarcus Brutus for recovering the onside kick or it may have become mutinous on that last drive.

The really good news. This defense was created specifically to stop one type of offense, and for the second time this year we will see it. Clemson has withered like the hopes of a fat guy in a strip club at 3 am two years in a row and now we get Oregon. Let's dust off the rust on the two pass rushing phenoms in Featherston and Pugh and get all of our LB corps healthy and I like our chances against a one read offense.

We take it for granted that Roberto is automatic, and he was. Not much room for error on this Saturday. If any of these shots had misfired, that 2 point win reverses. Although we allowed them to inexplicably go 97 yards in a minute, the fact that Cason under duress threw them back to the 3 with a lovely 58 degree job should also be noted.

So, let's pack up the truckster and head to Cali boys. I got hotel and airfare already booked for Dallas in January that needs to be filled. After this season of ridiculous national scrutiny, could another title ever feel as good?