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College Football 2008: ACC Preview By Ron Jumper With the ACC, Clemson is obviously the most talented and highly regarded team going into the season. After that, it becomes very hard to determine who else is going to establish themselves as an elite team. With most of the ACC, it seems to be the same song with a different band. The program is “on the way up” or “the future is bright” and so on. However, it is a much taller order deciding which team will be good this year. There really are just so many questions: -Will Florida State and Miami get back to dominance? -Can Virginia Tech reload? -How much will losing Matt Ryan hurt Boston College? Ditto for Virginia after losing Chris Long. -Has Wake Forest become a mainstay in the ACC? -Which of the 3-5 clubs (North Carolina, Maryland, and NC State) will get over the hump? -Can Clemson really make a BCS Title run? -What should we expect from Georgia Tech’s offense? -Is Duke going to be relevant again in the near future? 1. Will Florida State and Miami get back to dominance? Starting with Florida State, I still see issues on that offense. Drew Weatherford is fine at quarterback, but don’t expect him to make the offense explosive enough to make a lot of big plays against ACC competition. Weatherford has gotten a lot better and has handled the criticism well over the years, even though the problems with the Seminole offense go much deeper than any shortcomings with Weatherford. The offense needs more gamebreakers at running back and wide receiver. Antoine Smith is a steady, undersized back but, after that, it is all newcomers on the depth chart. The wide receivers are very talented but have been inconsistent for the most part. If Greg Carr and Preston Parker can bring it every week and a newcomer can solidify himself as the backup RB, then this offense might just be explosive again. The offensive line has a lot of holes to fill and has no juniors or seniors in the rotation. Depth and continuity are a big problem. The defense will be loaded with talent as usual, but the offense will probably sputter once again. The Miami Hurricanes have the talent as usual, it is just unproven. It starts up top with the quarterback, which I believe will be redshirt freshman Robert Marve. There is just as much youth at wide receiver. If Marve can solidify himself as the starter and some young wideouts become productive, it will help out the running game mightily. Javarris James and Graig Cooper are a nice RB tandem so the running game is the least of their concerns. The defense lost its 3 main playmakers in Calais Campbell, Kenny Phillips, and Tavarres Gooden so a new influx of talent is going to have to emerge. Miami is a perfect example of a team with a bright future, but that future may be realized in more like 2010 than now. 2. Can Virginia Tech reload? I really think this could be the year Virginia Tech starts to lose its strangle hold on the ACC. The Hokies have been 28-6 in their 4 years thus far in the ACC. However, I think that will end this season. The defense just simply can’t restock that quickly and expect to remain elite. They lost Xavier Adibi, Brandon Flowers, and 5 other starters off that defense. Top running back Brandon Ore was dismissed from the team because of off-the-field problems, so running back is a major concern. I’m not convinced they have a good quarterback, whether Sean Glennon or Tyrod Taylor wins the starting job. I see them struggling to put up points and the defense not being capable of coming to the rescue as it has in year’s past. I wouldn’t be surprised at all if they struggled against East Carolina in their opener, just as they did last season. 3. How much will losing Matt Ryan hurt Boston College? Ditto for Virginia after losing Chris Long. For Boston College, they seem to be more worried about finding running backs than they are replacing Matt Ryan. Fifth-year senior Chris Crane is going to be just fine, as he would have been starting all along at most other schools but has patiently waited for his opportunity now that Ryan is gone. As for solving the running back dilemma, they will have to depend a lot on freshman to have depth there. Chris Long is impossible to replace. He was so important to their success because of the big plays he made in all those close, low-scoring wins the Cavaliers enjoyed last season. If they are in those close games again this season, I don’t know who it will be that makes the big plays this time around. Virginia also lost QB Jameel Sewell and OG Brandon Albert, leaving the talent pool much more shallow. I expect Virginia to return to the realm of mediocrity for the time being. 4. Has Wake Forest become a mainstay in the ACC? Yes, the Demon Deacons have finally reached the point heach coach Jim Grobe has been striving for. He has always wanted to be able to have a system in place, and enough talent, so that when guys graduate every year there is a new cast of players ready to step in. In my mind, he now has that. At Wake Forest, because they don’t get a lot of blue chip recruits, virtually every freshman redshirts. So, most of the time, there are redshirt juniors or seniors ready to step in when their number is called. They rarely have to rely on a lot of youth at very many key areas. Looking at this season’s team, they are set at QB with Riley Skinner and the defense is just going to be sick. They return 9 starters on defense, 7 of which are seniors, so they expect to be even more dominant on defense, which is led by DB Alphonso Smith. They even have the best all-around kicker in the ACC with Sam Swank. 5. Which of the 3-5 clubs (North Carolina, Maryland, and NC State) will get over the hump? Maryland is kind of the Arkansas of the ACC, in that they never get any preseason love but always end up being respectable. I see this year being no different for the Terps. The difference is they are changing up their style on both offense and defense. Offensively, head coach Ralph Friedgen is handing over the reigns to James Franklin instead of calling the plays himself. Defensively, they are going to a 3-3-5 stack. Basically, it just depends how long it will take to transition into the new schemes when determining how far the Terps can go. Fortunately, they have 2 games to work out the kinks against Delaware and Middle Tennessee before they get Cal at home. As for UNC, they have a lot of talented freshman, redshirt freshman, and sophomores. That isn’t enough to be an ACC contender, but they can probably make it to a bowl game this season. UNC lost 4 games last season by less than 4 points, so projecting them to make a bowl this season isn’t really a stretch. In fact, losing those close games last year should help them improve this year. QB T.J. Yates and WR Hakeem Nicks could form a very dangerous combo, but the running game is very unproven and will rely mostly on youth. The defense is spotty at some positions, particularly DE and LB, but there is young talent. Overall, I see them being up and down en route to a 7-5 season. With NC State, I think they start to play Tom O’Brien football. That means they will never get a lot of preseason hype or be overly flashy, but they will win football games. O’Brien endured so many injuries last season and still almost made a bowl game. Now, if they can remain healthy, getting to .500 or better doesn’t seem so far fetched. It is going to be interesting to watch NC State and UNC battle both on the field and in recruiting over the years. I think both programs have the coach and recruiting talent pool to be successful, but I don’t know if they both can be a huge success. Don’t forget Wake Forest has performed admirably as well, South Carolina has no problem getting recruits in either of the Carolinas, and even East Carolina is on the upswing. All 5 can’t be successful, so it will be interesting to watch over the next 2 or 3 years. 6. Can Clemson really make a BCS Title run? Haven’t we heard this before? Can this time really be any different? The one difference I see is that Clemson is not just the favorite, but they have a substantial edge over any other team in the ACC. Virginia Tech or Wake Forest have a shot, but they don’t have near the talent. On offense, you’re looking at QB Cullen Harper, RB James Davis, RB C.J. Spiller, and WR Aaron Kelly. They have a lot of weapons. Defensively, they have questions at LB but the secondary is loaded with talent. With the ACC not having the same depth as other BCS conferences, Clemson does seem like a favorite to win the ACC. If they do that, they have a shot at the BCS title game. However, before everyone gets all excited, they could very easily lose the season opener to Alabama and disappoint us once again. 7. What should we expect from Georgia Tech’s offense? They don’t like to call it the triple-option, they like to think they are doing what everyone else does only they do it from under center instead of out of the shotgun. I can see the argument, but it is an old fashioned triple option offense. The question is will it work in the ACC? They have the B-Back, which is basically the fullback and short yardage back, and there are the A-Backs, who both line up in the slot, then the rest is the same. The key piece to this offense is the quarterback though, because he has to be versatile. He doesn’t have to be an all-world talent, but he does have to be fast and able to make enough plays in the passing game. That is opposite of the current QBs on campus now, so I think that could be the biggest hold up. 8. Is Duke going to be relevant again in the near future? David Cutcliffe is the right man for this job. Duke is never going to have the same athletes as the rest of the ACC, so how do you make up the difference? You do it by running the spread and making size less important. What is Cutcliffe famous for developing? Quarterbacks. He did sign 4-star QB Sean Renfree out of Arizona. If that guy turns into the next Cutcliffe QB success story, Duke can be relevant even if they don’t have the same athletes. If you have a great QB in a great passing system, wide receivers will want to play there. When that happens, you can put points on the board and win football games. Winning makes everyone’s life easier. Look at Boston College last season with Matt Ryan, and even Vandy has been relevant the last 2 seasons despite higher academic standards. August 8, 2008 |
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Be Careful What You Wish For
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Jumpology: My Bracket Jumpology: Scouting The Heavyweights Jumpology: Reviewing The Bracket
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