A few thoughts about the forest

although I philosophically disagree about the value of the ACC, but that’s really not relevant.

Maybe it’s just positive spin I’ve been telling myself, but if Ponder was putting up a Herculean season, and we went 10-2, you’d have to be nervous about the immediate future (not to degrade EJ at all).

But ask yourself this, do you have any real reservations about EJ being able to equal Ponder’s output next year? I did when Ponder was playing at a Heisman level, not so much any more. And that’s not a slam on Ponder at all, I think we undervalued last year’s receiving corp a bit, or maybe overestimated how soon these guys would emerge this year. And also, stats wise, we haven’t been in the type of barnburner, “last one with the ball wins” shootouts, thank God.

Running out the clock on our last drive against BC was huge. In the past, and I’m not talking about just last year, I mean for most of recent memory, we would have come out throwing the ball around, trying to put the game away by scoring another touchdown. Because we didn’t have the kind of running game and mental and physical fortitude to close out the clock against a touch defense. But sure enough, we imposed ourselves on a tough defense and killed out the clock. It was beautiful.

I only worry that people adjust expectations too much. Going into the season, I thought 10-2 was an extreme long shot, now it seems almost likely. We need to remember that a lot of our tougher games are ahead of us, and a 9-3 season is still an on-track performance this year.

12 minutes ago, prior to the class starting I had to listen to two guys talk about how Ponder is making dumb moves, his injury is an excuse, and we should start EJ because “he always has average games or great games, never bad ones”

I didn’t bother entering the conversation.

I agree with your 1 or two more losses hypothesis. After the Oklahoma game (or maybe it was WF, whenever we found out NCST was pretty good) I was telling my friends that we need to win two out of the three tough games (miami, UNC, and NCst) for us to be in great shape for the ACC title (also accounting for one letdown loss against maryland or BC). Since we beat Miami we can afford to drop one to UNC or NCSt.

Its nice being this good already.

When our program reaches its full potential we should be the perennial favorite in the ACC every year and be a threat every year for a national championship or top 5-top 7 type of seasons.

is the ability to throw the deep pass. I think when we play UNC and Clemson, we’ll see them stack the box and make Ponder beat them over the top.

Are Down, because we aren’t in any more shootout games, where we constantly have to play from behind….I will take Wins, and mediocre stats over Losses and Great stats any day

is out of town this week too. Just have to play good husband or go fishing. Wonder which will win out.

is a successful season. That would mean the Process is working. Everything after 8 wins is gravy.

6-1, and I’m happy. Ponder’s been floating the ball for at least a few weeks now. I expected the interceptions to happen against Miami, but it was this week, which is a good thing. He’s a great competitor and leader though. I don’t think anyone is giving credit to BC’s defense, which played great. I think we were outcoached in this one. In watching the replay of the game, I thought the defense looked even better than it did in person though. They did a tremendous job. That Smith challenge is hard to understand as it wasn’t very close, but what’s even harder to understand after reading the posts above – is that the coaches in the booths do not have replay available to advise Jimbo. That’s just unbelievable to me. NC State on a Thursday night will be a challenge. One game at a time!

Way to show up Seminole Nation…looking forward to a cool/cold night game vs UNC, Clem, UF at home…Doak will be rocking!

Legal. With the changes made and the results thus far, JF is obviously no fool. Also obvious is CP7 is not close to where he was last year throwing the ball. The "looking into his eyes thingy is excellent coachspeak, but with CP7 himself saying he had no confidence we would win untill Berts run, I say there is no question SOMETHING must be wrong with E.J.
 If i’m wrong and he is 100%, then PLEASE give him some action and see if he can throw long to give the remainder of our opponets something to look at.
  also, congrats to the players and staff for being where we are right now!
 GO NOLES!

I haven’t been to that many games but I thought the crowd was great and there wasn’t many visible empty seats, even on TV – after everyone arrived that is. Why does everyone arrive so late??