#69 R.P.I. Virginia Tech @ #117 R.P.I. Boston College:

WAR B.C. wimminz!!!

TV coverage:
The A.c.c. Network, or ESPN3, 12:29pm kick

Announcers:
PbyP: Tim Brandt,
Color: Dave Archer
Sidelines: Mike Hogewood

Vegas Lines:
VT is a 9.5 point favorite
o/u=50.5 points
$-Line: VT-35o, BC+290
Bet $3.5 on VT to win $1, or bet $1 on BC to win $2.9

All I’m getting is a quiet week of practice.

Don’t know if that’s buckled down and focused on the Bowl Streak quiet? Or just non-plus quiet at 4-6?

I do know that I am catching a whole lotta frustration. From Staff and player alike — and sometimes it is aimed at each other. “They need to…………(whatever).” Not hearing any “We need to…….”

This tells me that this is a very frustrated football team. However, frustration can erupt in a very aggressive and therefore very good way. EITHER, we hit the Flying Eagles. up hard-n-fast early on, and work them while taking some O&M frustrations out on them good and hard. Then we roll into france feeling a bit cleansed and maybe even a bit confident that we could have played that Boston College well all along.

(OR end up in a dogfight; get frustrated by a very narrow Boston College victory; lockeroom/plane all erupt and suddenly france has already won) Because do note that you can not spell quiet without the q, u, i, t. Could that happen to a well kicked 4-6 Virginia Tech football team?

i.e. this is a 2-for-1 deal………..don’t know which way?
Though I do sense something is about to give….

Pro 2 or 3-wide Boston College offense (10 back)

• Only one Rb is north of 147 yards rushing (though ‘dre Williams is not 1/2-bad, if/when he can recover from his abdominal injury)
• Lottsa short to intermediary passing
• Lottsa screen action even closer to the LOS (line-of-scrimmage) than ^that^
• Will 1/2-roll or move the pocket, including reverse or Veer funded rolls either way
• 93^rd best in pass protection is not helping any of that — might even ‘splain the need for so much in the way of short-passing in fact
• some Bart Simpson or Butterfingers work at Wideout on this B.C. team as well, not exactly hands made of glue
• Sloppy looking offense, more bumbling, stumbling than rumbling on film
  

  2/11 or an 18% offense:

     The Flying Eagle offense is pass heavy, 59% pass heavy in fact and that’s about as much of a passing tilt to the run:pass mix as you will see in Atlantic Coast terms. That said, there really was not a whole lot to this Boston College offense on film. They have two quality players –three if Dre Williams can go at Tb- and that’s about that. Put your best man-to-man cover-Cb on #83 Alex Amidon no matter where he lines up, and double him if you must. Or in other words make the other 8 or 9 offensive Flying Eagles beat you.#11 Chase Rettig has put up good enough numbers at Pivot for the Flying Eagles to make you wonder what he might be able to do on a real football team. 58% and 16:9 passing ratio for what he has to work with really ain’t half-bad. Boston College has one decent enough senior year Ot (Emmett Cleary), a starting G (Harris Williams) out for the year and not a whole lot to write about after that upfront. This is a good sized offensive-line that is actually short on good. Beyond Amidon at Wideout you have a disappointing Te who many had tabbed as all-A.c.c. pre-season; and a buncha guys who can not hold onto the rock besides Alex (who is good to be sure). In fact Wr production drops –if you will pardon the pun- by over 240% when you compare any other Boston College pass catcher to Alex. See what I meant above? This rather pedestrian Boston College offense is quite limited beyond its top-2 or possibly top-3 players. Some would have me say extremely limited in point of fact.

As Boston College only have one scoring throw beyond 49 yards and one scoring run beyond 24. Again; see what I mean? This is just not a explosive Boston College offense, it is quite inert and therefore quite defensible in the final analysis.

4-3 Boston College defense (7 return)

• deeper Lb on or off-Gap stacks (about 5 yards) with an overplay or over-shift to the wide or Will Linebacker side at times
• very even looking and symmetrical defense the rest of the time, 3 distinct layers with a nearly perfectly linear stagger as you move off the line-of-scrimmage (LOS)
• more middle-field zone looks with semi-variable man over on the edges (press to medium mostly)
• will morph into an even sixty-two look at times when run-fighting is more desirable; did slant a bit to the shortside here which suggests some wideside counter action(s) to me or our Jet-Sweep to a VT Se or Fl
• not a bad tacking defense, some physicality to be found here, though a stiff looking or robotic defense at times; (THINK: a less talented version of Vitali Klitschko, the heavyweight champion of the world)
• very beat-up looking front-line or front-4 (including one OLb on top of all of that)
• willing to double-cover your primary or best Wideout (don’t see this much anymore)
• extremely inside-out defense that tries to make the sideline the 12th defender at all times
• susceptible to play-action fakes as they are so porous in terms of fighting the run
• most cost-cutter basic Vanilla defense I’ve studied in a long long time, total umbrella action all times, just keep everything in front of you, no matter how many yards everything gets!
• will edge or slot blitz a bit; though patience is the key here; as there may not be that many big-plays to be had; however there are bucu yards to be gobbled right on up if you take your time and do not press.
  

  K.P.L. (Kevin Propulsion Laboratory)

     Boston College has a very bland looking defense on film. Not a whole lot going on here and that is what happens when you field such a beat-up looking stop unit in the first place. This has left the 2012 Flying Eagle defense deploying a whopping 63% underclassman line-up. That means youth and youth inexperience and inexperience means mistakes. As right now Boston College is likely without their best dLineman (Kaleb Ramsey) and their best Linebacker (#24, Kevin Pierre-Louis). That’s not helping when your forward-7 was forecast to be the strength of your stop-unit in twenty-twelve. Then we come to the fact that this Boston College defense basically just lays back and enjoys it. They do not attack a whole lot, they are extremely vanilla, linear and symmetrical. It almost reminded me of the first day of Pee-Wee football practice where you are just trying to get everyone lined-up correctly and in the right place and whereby spacing is what counts the most. This is an umbrella oriented defensive attack that attempts to keep anything and everything in font of it all day long. That may not quite yield yardage in chucks, though it does slowly yet surely yield first-downs in bunches. Hence Boston College is a lowly 114^th best in TOP (or Time of Possession) as this Flying Eagle stop-unit just can not get off the field at times this season. Notice as well that opponents have converted 88 3^rd down conversion attempts vs. this Boston College defense –whereas the Flying Eagle offense has only tallied 43. That’s almost precisely 2:1 to the bad for Boston College and you can see it on film. As Boston College’s leader in TFL (tackles for a loss) only has 4 and their leader in sacks only has 2 (and he, Mr. Pierre-Lewis, is listed as: “QUESTIONABLE” for this one).

Early on in the game, this is a relatively fundamentally sound defense that at least knocks you around a little bit while being a tad stiff and robotic. Later on in the game they are basically only stiff and robotic. Fatigue is an issue here, youth/inexperience is a problem and lack of stop-unit health has gone Dr. Guoittine and decapitated the whole shebang.

Boston College special-teams: (K returns)
Bee.Cee is #1 in the nation in Punt Returns thanks to the services of Spiffy Evans, who averages 32 yards per punt return. Although he has only brought back 7 kicks this season and Boston College has only fielded 9 punts on the whole. So much for that and Boston College is a likewise 115^th best in KO returns as Spiffy handles that as well though he is not quite so spiffy at such even if he has caught 23 passes for the Flying Eagles on offense. So I suppose there is that. At Punter Boston College has Gerald Levano. Gerald is already in grad-school and he is also the holder for the Eagles P.A.T.and F.G.A.’s. He was a basketball and baseball star in high school and he has never missed on a fake-punt conversion attempt. He is a 42 yard punter on average this year and that makes him a solid punter at this stage of his 5-senior career and he has suffered no blocked kicks. Nate Freese kicks for Boston College and he kicks pretty well having made 35 out of his 37 kicks this season. Perfect on P.A.T.’s and 14 of 16 on F.G.A.’s does not suck. Neither does no blocks again for Nate. Even though Nate does have range out-beyond the 50, Boston College tends to punt and go for field position rather than attempt long field-goal tries. Boston College is 59^th in punt coverage and 27^th in KO defense. (Boston College overall special-teams letter grade: this is not a bad special teams unit, it is well coached and it does not make mistakes or wet-the-bed despite not making that many big big plays; that’s what I call “solid” and that is worthy of a very solid flat-B)

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Illation, conclusion(s), and OPT Digits:
The way I see this one is simple enough…

1. First up we have the fact that Boston College is just not a very good Atlantic Coast football team. They are 12^th in a race of 12 –and yah; I do know that Virginia Tech is only one A.c.c. game removed from 12^th place. Still yet, the talent gap is noticeable, the Hokies are healthier and much more experienced at this stage –especially on defense- Boston College is downright inert no matter where you look and does not know the meaning of the world catalyst, and Coach Spaz’ is said to be a very lame-duck. Who wants to put out for a soon to R.I.P. quack-attack? And you have to expect that Boston College left something out on the field vs. #3 Notre Dame last week.
2. On the other hand I am convinced that Virginia Tech is simply due to play a good football game and Virginia Tech is a very very frustrated football team right about now –and therefore looking to vent said frustrations. Yes again, it is true, frustration is the ultimate double-edged sword. It can indeed cut both ways and blow up right in your face. All the more so when you are 4-6 and fighting for your 19 year bowl streak lives. And yet if not for bad luck this 2012 Virginia Tech football team would have no luck at all. And for the VERY first time all year long, it is Virginia Tech who is scrumming on extra rest after what many –not named me- conceded to be Virginia Tech’s best game of the season last week in a L effort vs. Florida State.
   

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   Coach Spaz’: T.Mags just called, he wants his ‘stache back!

     Our trusty friend the so-called Forum Guide of Graham Houston authorship likes to stick its neck out and (re)appears this time of year. When I went back and looked at common opponents between Virginia Tech and Boston College, a few things really leapt out at me. First up would be the fact that aggregate rushing favored Vah.Tech by a back-breaking 216 yards per game on average! That’s simply borderline umpossible folks. Likewise collective passing which favored Virginia Tech by a mere 155 yards per contest on average. That’s a never seen before Forum Guide official number crunching record of a predicted Total Yardage margin of 371 yards all in favor of Virginia Tech! IF Virginia Tech goes out and out-gains Boston College by 371 yards and gets beat in this football game I will eat my computer in one single bite. That type of margin is just plain nutz folks, General McAuliffe at Bastogne nutz if truth be told –as that effectively works out to a 37.1 point Virginia Tech victory more and more. Now, to be fair, that does seem a little high, even to me, so I went in and studied the recent 3-game trends; and here is what they had to say…

In the last three football games that these two A.c.c. foes have contested, Virginia Tech has been the better football team; just not as better as predicted above. In the most recent three weeks of actual play, the Virginia Tech offense is 85 yards more dynamic per game and the Virginia Tech defense is 62 yards stiffer per game. That’s 147 total yards or about a fourteen point Virginia Tech margin victory.

***

Accordingly, I’ll side right in the middle –more and less- and call for a 25 point Virginia Tech win which inordinately enough; is precisely the set of OPT digits that I hand in mind, to the very number, all along. You scared yet? Yah; me three!

Virginia Tech=25, Boston College=o

“LETS GO!“

“hokies“

bourbonstreet**