Usually after a 24 hour cooling down period, I feel differently about the game from the day before. Not so much this time. I do feel a little better about the performance of the defense after being reminded that all of the touchdowns came after we were already up 38-0, but they did allow the Eagles to venture within our ten yard line two other times on long sustained drives before the INT and the missed field goal. We were just not nearly as dominant on D as I thought we should be. The good news is that I don't think the guys on defense were real happy with that outcome, either...look for them to tighten up next week.
Other than that, this was one of those games where we jumped out early and then seemed to lose interest a little. I would have preferred to see the team keep their foot on the gas emotionally, even with the reserves out there, but I'll take 1-0...only 13 more to go!
Looks like Owens is definitely out for the year...we need to get Weston back as soon as possible. Until then our two deep is Atkins, Irvin, and...who? Tyson? Wood? Crawford? Even when Weston does come back, we will most likely be counting on a true freshman in the 4-man rotation, unless Wood or Crawford steps up what have been pretty nondescript performances up to this date. Certainly not a death blow...most teams DON'T have top-tier quality among their top 4 DT. But this team did, until yesterday.
How about Bama last night? That was some good old fashioned, line up and hit you in the mouth, SEC football...and Clemson was NOT equipped to handle it. Halfway through the 2nd quarter, that Tiger team wanted nothing else but to get OUT of that dome as quickly as possible. Very poor job by the Clemson coaching staff, I thought. I mean, Bowden said going into the locker room at the half that they were being outworked, and that the Bama players were hungrier...so they came back out in the second half and played EXACTLY the same. What exactly did they talk about in there at the half? Not that it would have necessarily made much of a difference, but I would have expected to see at least a little more fire out of that team in the 2nd half.
It was nice to see the supposed best team in the ACC being dismantled by maybe the 5th best team in the SEC. Is it too late to take the automatic bid away?
Most impressive team to me yesterday was USC. Let's get on a plane, fly all the way across the country, take the field in what is really an early game for us (noon PST), and COMPLETELY destroy a team that actually was a bowl team last year. That sounds like fun. But then again, what conference was that bowl-level competition from? Oh yeah, that's right...
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