ACC Recap, Weekend of October 12, 2013
Well, another interesting week in the Atlantic Coast Conference comes and goes. The team that needed to win the most to help the conference’s standing–Clemson–pulled off the win. Narrowly. But let’s take a look across the ACC.
THE GOOD:
Clemson got to 6-0, setting up the matchup of the undefeateds with Florida State on October 19th. But, oh, did it look ugly. Much like Boston College gave Florida State a scare, the Eagles made the already fragile Clemson fanbase that much more antsy, leading in the 3rd quarter. The best part of the game for the ACC was avoiding this upset. By the way, Boston College’s losses have come to Clemson, Florida State, and on the road at USC. Think UConn fans are wishing the school could have a do over with respect to hiring Steve Addazio, instead of already-fired Paul Pasqualoni? You betcha.
Don’t look now, but Virginia Tech is 6-1 and bowl eligible. The Hokies are atop the Coastal Division at 3-0. A nice win over Pittsburgh suggests that this is truly a bounce back season for Beamer’s team.
Syracuse earned its first win as an ACC team, defeating North Carolina State on the road, 24-10. True to form, the Orange rushed for well over 300 yards, even though the Wolfpack had been stout against the run this year. Look for a great matchup between Syracuse’s decent run defense and Georgia Tech‘s run schemes.
Maryland improved to 5-1 defeating Virginia and Duke improved to 4-2 with a win over Navy.
THE BAD:
Look, this was debated in the comment section this past week, but Louisville needed to convince voters that it was a legitimate power to earn its way to a BCS game. Louisville got the win over Rutgers, but it was not by a margin that non-watchers of the game will appreciate it. It is rare for a team to win and lose ground, but that is essentially what has happened here. Rutgers, with a win over Arkansas, is still a good opponent. But is there any doubt that Oregon and Alabama would throttle Rutgers? No. And Louisville failed to do so–even with extra time to prepare. Sorry, Louisville, but sometimes a win is just not good enough.
Virginia lost to Maryland, as noted above. But this makes Virginia 2-4 in what could be the end of the road for Mike London. With games against Duke, UNC, Georgia Tech, Miami, Florida State, and Virginia Tech remaining, it is hard to find 4 more wins to get to bowl eligibility.
THE UGLY:
Although Virginia is struggling, it beat Brigham Young in the season opener. Georgia Tech got walloped by the Cougars, 38-20. This drops the Yellow Jackets to 3-3 on the season and makes them losers of three straight. With Virginia and Alabama A&M on the schedule, getting to 5 wins is easy enough. But with Clemson and Georgia remaining, it looks like Georgia Tech will need to beat one of Syracuse or Pitt to get that 6th win. Sure, a sweep is far from impossible. The sense of urgency is now there. If Syracuse jumps out on Georgia Tech this week, look out. The Confidential expects that Paul Johnson will have his team ready. He has to.
The Confidential 
The American Conference still gets the old Big East auto BCS bid, UL would earn this bid by winning the conference. UL is ranked #8 in the new poll & was #9 in the Confidential poll. This is fair & shows that they are currently holding thier ground & not losing it. Why all the hate for the Cards? UL being in the top ten is actually goid for the ACC going into next year.
Hate? Not at all. I wanted to see the Cards destroy Rutgers. Instead, they won by a score that will not (and did not) impress pollsters. And that is bad. Sorry.
Not sure why MCaffrey has so much ire for Louisville, but I am just talking about the reality. Florida State beat Maryland 63-0. Louisville, at home, against Rutgers on short rest, with a far more experienced QB, did not rise to the occasion. In contrast, Clemson narrowly escaped a bad NC State team before beating up on Wake Forest and Syracuse. Narrowly beating Boston College at home has the same adverse effect for Clemson. To keep up with Oregon and Alabama, you’ve got to win convincingly at home.
Yeah they left about twenty-one points out there against Rutgers, that was disappointing. Its disturbing that they didnt have anyone step up in the red zone to replace Parker. Our WR havent lived up to tlhe hype so far, they need to find their focus in their routes. They have played their way out of the title conversation & Heisman hunt.
It’s not about hate for Louisville, it’s about trying to accurately rank teams based on a more comprehensive look at the teams – not just a quick glance at their win/loss column or going based on talent/potential. Part of that analysis is looking at who they’ve played, how they played, and how everyone else has done.
The fact that teams with one-loss are leapfrogging a team that is undefeated, and teams that didn’t even play this weekend (Florida St.) improved their rankings – again ahead of Louisville. That should tell you something. The rankings are correcting themselves.
They have been ranked between 9th & 6th through out the season, thats fair. With their schedule & how their offense has sputtered in a few games, its fair for those one loss teams to move ahead of them. If they do go undefeated, I expect them to finish somewhere between 14th & 6th dependung on how they play. So far their ranking is fair. I just dont think its fair to say a team is weak because they have a weak schedule, other factors shoild be counted in. Defense matters as well, a dominating defensive performance should count as well & not just putting up 70 points or whatever. I’m hoping that UL finaly starts playing up to their potential on offense to match their defense. They need to start capitalizing on their scoring oppertunities.
I don’t think they are OVERrated. If there were rated higher, they might then be overrated.