There are some great statistical analysis on this site, but one of my favorite visualizations is the yards per play by opponent comparison. Of course there are variable that can effect a given game like strategy (FSUs conservative game vs Florida this year), weather (the debacle at Lousiville), or injuries (to either the offense or opposing defense), but I like that it gives you a quick view of how to put your performance in perspective. Since it's the offseason and we'll discuss the upcoming season ad nauseum, I thought I'd take a second and use that table to look at FSU's undefeated, wire-to-wire National Champion in 1999. My thoughts after the jump...

My memory made me expect this to be a dominating showing where we ran over defenses roughshod. While this was true for the first half of the season, FSU had a bit of a downturn in the middle of the season for a couple of games. Before going and looking, I assumed this was the two game stretch that Peter Warrick was suspended for. Turns out I was wrong about that, too. I should have remember Warrick was suspended for the Miami game! Without Warrick we went on and had a dominating performance against a heck of a Miami defense (just look at those numbers).

The other game that sticks out to me on the positive end was the Va Tech game. That was an outstanding defense led by Corey Moore that we played extremely well against. On a personal note that game is bitter-sweet for me. I was 19 at the time and convinced my dad to let me go down to New Orleans from Atlanta, but only if a friend came with me. The only buddy I could find would only go if I paid for his ticket. We had driven out to Tempe, AZ the year before and tickets were being given away against Tennessee, so I figured I'd have some success getting tickets for a reasonable amount. Well, that turned out not to be the case and, panicking, I ended up shelling out $150 a ticket an hour before game time (which was still well below the going rate). As I handed the lady my ticket and stepped into the Super Dome, I was stopped and informed that I had counterfeit tickets. Falling to my knees like I'd just been kicked in the sack, I was escorted out of the Dome and, 100% out of money, my buddy paid for us to see the game in the small arena next door on the bigscreen. I'm not a violent person, but I would have killed the man that sold me the tix had I found him.

Anyway, enjoy the stats (those with * I couldn't find game stats for). I'll do the FSU defense later on when I get time.