The More You Know...About Syracuse

Ryan Kantor said:

...In previewing the game, we discussed how poorly Syracuse’s pass defense had been all year. Since Bryant didn’t look good passing the ball against Wake Forest (aside from the first two drives), this matchup offered a good opportunity to have Bryant attack a defense through the air. Syracuse’s pass rush had been weak all year (only six total team sacks heading into the game) so starting Bryant, even if we was hobbled, didn’t seem ludicrous.

That’s where Baber’s game plan changed things. Likely anticipating Bryant to be immobilized by injury, they dialed up the blitzes. They stacked the box and didn’t respect him as a runner either. The aggression led to a pair of big runs by Feaster and Etienne, but largely stifled the offense and led to four sacks...

...Syracuse’s uptempo passing attack was vicious and by the end of the game tired out the defense. That allowed them to pick up yards on the ground to close out the game. I do not believe the defense was tired because they substitute often in other games. That’s an assertion I’ve seen floating around Clemson twitter, but it’s a silly one. Conditioning comes in the hours upon hours of practice, not just the games. Offenses that play with great pace will do that. It was weird to see Clemson play so and their opponent tire out our defense. It wasn’t fun.

The bigger problem though was the play of Clemson’s DBs, who have been so impressive this season. They simply lost matchups against ‘Cuse wide receivers. There’s no way around it. QB Eric Dungey passed for 278 yards and three touchdowns. He also broke off a 45-yard run. Excluding Lamar Jackson, Dungey is the best QB Clemson will see during the season...

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Coker made several changes this week. He benched Berlin, tightend Kellen Winslow and center Joel Rodriguez. He also vowed to get Moss more playing time.

It worked, barely.

Miami trailed 10-7 in the fourth quarter before scoring 10
straight points to stay in the hunt for the conference title and a
berth in a Bowl Championship Series game. If the Hurricanes beat
Rutgers and No. 16 Pittsburgh, they will win the conference title
and earn a BCS berth, probably in the Orange Bowl.

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### Golden told WQAM’s Joe Rose: “We would never drive past a local kid to fly out of state” to recruit, but that it’s difficult to fill some needs locally.

“There’s not a lot of tight ends down here, 250 pounds and can run like Clive Walford. So we had to go up to Atlanta to get Chris Herndon. Hopefully, we’ll find that kid down here next year. We will always [look] down here first to exhaust whatever position it is before going out of state."

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