DG's Quick Takeaways After the NC State Annihilation

#55
#55
The thing that impressed me is that our offense really didn’t even play that well and still hung 44 on a decent ACC team, winning by 41.

Compare to ‘22 when we had to go to OT to beat Pitt.

Both sides of the ball have drastically improved.
 
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#56
#56
VOLINVONORE said:
I do not share any of the issues you seem to scared about. The two Freshmen will get open when they gets into games. Nico's two interceptions were both tipped and the Oline had breakdowns which forced him to have to scramble for his life. If factI think he handles it pretty well. The two TE offense will continue to destroy the 335 defense. Our running backs average about 6 yards a pop and are finding holes as they develop. Can not ask for much more from them.
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We won't be inept, but we won't be 2022 good. We will be better than 23.
I won't argue that the pick 6 wasn't really on him. He got hit while throwing. Guy pushed through double team and still got him. The first one was 100% on him. Tip or no tip. He threw into 5 guys pretty much covering 1 guy. The TE play is going to be our bread and butter this season. Those receivers aren't a threat to an SEC mid tier defense or better. Bru looks off. He might be physically healed but he isn't looking the same as last year.
Vol fans are drinking the media Kool aid about Nico being the second coming of Christ. He's better than good. His ceiling is higher than any QB we've ever had. Yes. I said that. But he needs time to reach that potential. I'm going to die on this hill until we beat OK. If we don't beat OK, I'll consider myself vindicated.
 
#57
#57
xpsyclonex2002 said:
We won't be inept, but we won't be 2022 good. We will be better than 23.
I won't argue that the pick 6 wasn't really on him. He got hit while throwing. Guy pushed through double team and still got him. The first one was 100% on him. Tip or no tip. He threw into 5 guys pretty much covering 1 guy. The TE play is going to be our bread and butter this season. Those receivers aren't a threat to an SEC mid tier defense or better. Bru looks off. He might be physically healed but he isn't looking the same as last year.
Vol fans are drinking the media Kool aid about Nico being the second coming of Christ. He's better than good. His ceiling is higher than any QB we've ever had. Yes. I said that. But he needs time to reach that potential. I'm going to die on this hill until we beat OK. If we don't beat OK, I'll consider myself vindicated.
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To me, if we do not beat OK, it is why did we lose to them? Willing to wait the 2 weeks and see what we have.
 
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#59
#59
DiderotsGhost said:
Been a long time since I posted but thought it was time to check in. That was an incredible win last night! It felt doubly good given that there was a bit 'trash-talk' by some NC State players and fans.

Just some quick notes:

Our defense outscored NC State's offense. Don't know if anyone has pointed this out yet, but out defense scored a touchdown on a pick-6 last night. Meanwhile, our defense effectively gave up 0 points. Yes, NC State technically scored 10, but 7 came off a pick-6 and the other 3 also came off a turnover that put NC State on our side of the field. Keeping them to 3 was a W there. So by my count, our defense scored 7 points and their offense scored 0 (or 3 if you want to count the FG off the offensive turnover). Either way, that's a crazy stat - you might expect to see that against a lower-division opponent, but not against a P5 school.

Best defense since the Fulmer years. I legitimately think this is our best D since the Fulmer years. The amount of depth and talent we have right now is insane. Take a look at the box score and see how many players had a tackle! It's unreal! And we had 13 TFLs! Some weaknesses and we have a young secondary, but that was one of the best defenses performances I can remember in my 3+ decades of watching Vol football.

Will Brooks Pick-6 a great moment. Always fun to see a walk-on earn time and make a huge play like that.

Sampson quietly may be one of the best offensive players in the SEC. Nico and some other players may get the headlines, but Sampson is quietly moving up the very deep list of all-time great Vols RBs. 20 carries for 132 yards last night against a pretty good defense. That was 6.6 ypc. You can gloss over the 124 yards on 12 carries he did against UTC, but this was a legit defense and Sampson looked great.

Nico's game was mixed. Tbf, NC State's defense was very focused on preventing the deep pass and containing Nico. But we saw 2 "Freshman mistakes" from Nico with the INTs. Both passes were deflected, but still poor awareness. That said, this was Nico's 3rd start and he's still very young. His scrambling and improvisation was incredible. He did connect on a few great passes to Squirrel and Kitselman. He'll improve as the season goes along.

Need a 2nd deep threat to emerge. I think Herbstreit may have said it, but I agree -- we really need someone else to emerge as a deep threat other than Squirrel. Thornton, Brazzell, McCoy ... but at some point, we're going to need another deep threat against some of these elite SEC defenses.

Playcalling was excellent. Very happy with the playcalling last night. It became apparent early on that NC State was going to go all-in on preventing the 'big passing play' as overloaded deep and the edges of the field. The 3-3-5 defense is very much designed to stop an offense like ours. Our coaching staff did a great job responding and attacking the middle of the field, using the running game, and using those shovel passes. We may have went 'to the well' one too many times on the shovel, but still ... that's a good example of 'keep doing it until they prove they can stop it'. As soon as NC State started adjusting, that's when we took the air. Overall, very good playcalling last night and I think it says a lot about Nico that he was able to command such a diverse offensive attack.

Darkhorse national title contender. This is the most optimistic I've been about a UT season pre / early season in a long time, but I feel like the national media is significantly underestimating the defense and the offense will get better as the year goes on. While I'm not a huge fan of the 12-team playoff, it does benefit a team like ours this year. I fully expect us to drop a game or two with our brutal schedule (Gerogia, Bama, Oklahoma), but we could be a legit top 5 team by the end of the season.

That's all I got for now. I'm just going to enjoy this season. It's great to see some of the fruits of Heupel's year of building the program back up.

GBO!
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Solid writeup and the upcoming Kent State game should give the whole roster a chance to perform as the starters should be on the bench resting after the first quarter.
 
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#60
#60
xpsyclonex2002 said:
What did I love?
Our secondary has definitely improved. And our defensive line are absolute monsters. Lot of attitude. Lot of stupid penalties on both sides of the ball but a lot of that was effort penalties. Shoving people out of bounds clear into the cheap seats? Completely stupid. But boy you got to love to see that nasty attitude. As long as it don't cost us games, bully them SOBs around.

What scares me?
1. I don't see a deep threat on our roster. Squirrel is quick. But he's small. He's not winning any jump balls. No one is open. No separation. No one else stands out. Our TE's are significantly better than the last several years. This year will be a good season but it won't look anything like 2022. I don't see us raining hellfire on anyone outside of a division two school.
2. Nico looks like a statue in the pocket. I think he's waiting too long for the play to break down before he does something. Run it or throw it away. That 335 defense really through cold water on a lot of our offense. Our receivers could not get open and Nico was standing there giving them the benefit of the doubt.
3. Our running backs do a lot of dancing around in the backfield before they charge the line. I don't see that working against a top tier team.
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A statue that has been sacked how many times ? And RBs dancing oh lord lol yeah the last 15 years did a number on you… Nico is likely the most elusive Qb that has ever played in Knoxville… he turns what could be negative plays into small gains, avoids the sacks, scores rushing tds.. JG was a statue Nico is no where close… that dancing you hate is called patience… we pull our OL a lot the rb can’t out run his blocks or he will get no yards… Sampson has elite patience and Vision that’s really uncoachable him and bishop both have it… if this was blue font disregard but if you are serious you need to relax lol
 
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#61
#61
It's all good fun and part of the new game..NC State was gonna be a task..last yr... Joe Milton 3 was a beast ...it's all headlines and leading u..Hooker was a QB ..Nico is a QB ..NC State..got manhandled by a high school team..there is truth out there..ya just have to work 2 find it now...
 
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#62
#62
KnoxToTheBoro93 said:
A statue that has been sacked how many times ? And RBs dancing oh lord lol yeah the last 15 years did a number on you… Nico is likely the most elusive Qb that has ever played in Knoxville… he turns what could be negative plays into small gains, avoids the sacks, scores rushing tds.. JG was a statue Nico is no where close… that dancing you hate is called patience… we pull our OL a lot the rb can’t out run his blocks or he will get no yards… Sampson has elite patience and Vision that’s really uncoachable him and bishop both have it… if this was blue font disregard but if you are serious you need to relax lol
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I hope you're right. We'll see. I just don't think that Nico is going to have the season this year that we are projecting. I'm not saying he's going to have a bad season. But I've spent way too much time over the last 6 months listening to the media talk about how he can walk on water. I understand that the guy has an extremely high ceiling. And I know that there are quarterbacks who step in day one and just look like they have been there their whole career. He did do that during the Iowa game. He looked completely comfortable and ready to go. But I just don't know about a whole season full of SEC opponents. I predict that we have three losses in regular season. I still think we're going to lose to Georgia, Alabama, and probably Oklahoma. Even if we be to Oklahoma there's always that damn curse against Florida. That's not just BVS. That's just being grounded. Next year Nico will probably have the season that we all fantasize about this year. Let's hope we can keep all the other elements of the team together. We always seem to be missing a piece. For the last 2 years our secondary has absolutely sucked.
 
#63
#63
xpsyclonex2002 said:
I hope you're right. We'll see. I just don't think that Nico is going to have the season this year that we are projecting. I'm not saying he's going to have a bad season. But I've spent way too much time over the last 6 months listening to the media talk about how he can walk on water. I understand that the guy has an extremely high ceiling. And I know that there are quarterbacks who step in day one and just look like they have been there their whole career. He did do that during the Iowa game. He looked completely comfortable and ready to go. But I just don't know about a whole season full of SEC opponents. I predict that we have three losses in regular season. I still think we're going to lose to Georgia, Alabama, and probably Oklahoma. Even if we be to Oklahoma there's always that damn curse against Florida. That's not just BVS. That's just being grounded. Next year Nico will probably have the season that we all fantasize about this year. Let's hope we can keep all the other elements of the team together. We always seem to be missing a piece. For the last 2 years our secondary has absolutely sucked.
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Uh oh...
 
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