With its win over FSU yesterday, North Carolina has now won four straight since losing to Georgia in the opener. The real eye-catcher is Mitch Trubisky’s passer ratings in those five games:
- Georgia: 92.76
- Illinois: 199.42
- JMU: 259.96
- Pitt: 194.68
- FSU: 197.16
Ahem, one of those numbers is not like the others.
For the season, Trubisky’s passer rating is 182.65, good enough for sixth nationally. Kinda makes you understand why Fedora wouldn’t abandon the passing game against Georgia, even when UNC was doing well running the ball.
Maybe there is a little hope for the pass defense now that the class of quarterbacks it’ll be facing drops off a little.
One other thing about this — at Sanford yesterday, they put up some live action from FSU-UNC during a game break and I couldn’t help feeling jealous over how much time Trubisky’s line gave him to throw. “Can you imagine,” I said to myself, “what Eason could do with a little more time?” I guess I found out on Georgia’s last drive.
Get The Picture 
Even though yesterday was a loss (and I believe Georgia should have won but the refs stole the game) I saw dramatic improvement. I am backing away from the ledge and I take back my recent negative comments about this coaching staff. Yes, Smart and the staff made some end-of-game mistakes particularly on the final play. But the team was well coached for the most part with a solid game plan in place, Chaney called a good game on O, and the D played reasonably well. Plus the team played hard. I also like how physical the team played. Maybe we can get to where we really can play that “knock ’em back” brand of football Kirby says he wants–if not totally this season but by next year and in future years.
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UNC reminded me yet again that the transitive property doesn’t apply to CFB. We beat UNC, who beat FSU, who rolled Ole Miss in the second half, who stomped us into the dirt.
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I realize how easy it is to fall into that trap Russ, Lord knows how many times I have fallen into that trap. And we do so despite every single weekend there being dozens of proof sources that demonstrate amazing variability of performance. Much of that seeming inconsistency in CFB is due to emotions driven by players 18-23 years of age, fan passion of rivalries, home field, etc., but most is the individual matchups of units’ strengths and weaknesses. It is why Ole Miss was a fairly predictable blowout for UGA, and TN looked like, and was, a four quarter competition that could go either way. LSU’s blowout of Mizzou was an example of emotions distorting the difference between two teams. The unpredictable swings are we all enjoy the “show” CFB puts on every Saturday. Not a great sports for heart patients or this close to an emotional edge themselves.
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Eason had plenty of time the end zone to at least throw the ball away, but he chose to make one of the worst plays I’ve seen of our QBs make since Joe Cox saw the SC LB right there and threw it anyway.
As they say… a freshman giveth and a freshman taketh away.
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Amen Brother.
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In the words of Forrest Gump to the man trying to sell T-shirts… It happens.
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And in spite of that, UGA is “92nd in opposing passer rating, after finishing 7th in the land last year.
Sometimes good QBs have head scratchers against bad Ds. We’ve seen our good QBs do it over the years, now we’re on the other end.
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Links are not easy on this blog: http://www.cfbstats.com/2016/leader/national/team/defense/split01/category02/sort02.html
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He’s faced some lousy pass defenses.
JMU (10th in the FCS Colonial Conference), Georgia (92nd in the FBS), Illinois (98th in the FBS), Pittsburgh (110th the FBS), and FSU (115th in the FBS).
Let’s see how he does when he faces some good ones.
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Their next 2 games are against VT and Miami, ranked 7th and 11th overall on D by Connelly’s metrics, 2nd and 4th in passing defense.
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Jesus, FSU at 115th, even knowing what they’ve faced, is startling. They were the #1 defense in the nation by a mile in Pruitt’s last year.
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I’ll ask again: who did we beat in 2015 that’s better than UNC this year? Hell, I’m tempted to roll 2014 in there too.
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And who has any ranked team in the history of college football ever lost to that was worse than Nicholl’s State? We were on FG away from that title. Individual games are of limited utility.
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Ok. Whatever you want to think. 2015 beat no one. Georgia Southern and a 7-5 Penn State. UNC was a quality win that’s going to look better when they win their division.
Our own fans are now Dawggrading.
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UNC not winning their division.
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Ok. We’ll see.
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I couldn’t think so either but they were dominating FSU in Tally yesterday before needing a Hail Mary field goal to win. They are surprising me must admit.
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Our own fans have always Dawggraded.
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Tenn obviously very lucky yesterday and against App State, (refs, both games), think they get beat by both A&M and Bama.
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Don’t rule out Mizzou
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the criminal justice system!
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Karma. It’s a bitch.
It simply gives Alabama the chance to beat the pants off of them twice and I hope Gary Danielson is announcing.
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