Tech beats NC St 29-21, WOW!!!!

Well, talk about no faith on our part. Tech pulls out a great win against NC ST, continuing our ability to dominate NC St. in Hotlanta. Here are my thoughts:

- Reggie Ball has his best game of the year, with good completion percentage, 2 touchdowns throwing & 1 running, no interceptions. I think he finished with 283 yards passing. You could clearly see his passes were more crisp and his mechanics were better.
- Running game again inconsistent, but PJ Daniels did break through at some important times. He ended up with over 100 yards for the 3rd time this year. However, it took a 50 yard run in the last 3 minutes to get there.
- Offensive line played an overall good game, but did have some critical letdowns. I hope All-American candidate Nat Dorsey is ok. It was reported that he bruised his back during the game and did not play much of the 4th quarter. Ball did get sacked a few times.
- Defensively we yet again crushed the run. NC St managed less than 20 yards rushing as a team. Impressive even though Maclendon was out & did not play.
- Defensively against the pass I was on the edge of my seat the whole game. They did a good job of preventing too many big plays, but I just felt that Rivers could have his way with us at any time. There were many dropped passes by St. receivers. I was really surprised at the number of short passes they attempted. They did not often try to pump it downfield. If this is how Rivers plays, no wonder he has a 77% competion percentage. And with the talent of the St. receivers you can see they probably are used to getting most of their yards after the catch. We just did not let them consistently get those yards. Rivers actually ended up 31-of-46 for 344 yards, not a shabby total.
- Special teams was a roller-coaster ride. A missed 38 yard field goal then making a 48 yarder. Missed an extra point (1st miss since 1998). Fumbled 2 punt returns and lost one of those. True freshman Kenny Scott did dazzle with a 90 yard kick-off return. He should have taken it to the house but got so excited he got ahead of himself and stumbled, allowing the kicker to catch-up and trip up his feet. Our kick-off return coverage needs much improvement. I get scared everytime we kick it deep. Punting also really struggled, with Higgins averaging 26 yards on 4 kicks.

Overall you have to congratulate the team. The gutted it out and play the full 60 minutes. They deserved a W and got it. Just makes you scratch your head even more and say "what happened with Clemson"? We beat one of the best passing teams in the country today and yet got clobbered by another passing team 2 weeks ago. I guess you can say it is a young team, a developing team, and a team that needs to avoid believing their own hype. Please guys, avoid reading the papers and the internet this week. Why - because there will be many GOOD things said about the team. GO JACKETS!!!!!!!