Coffee, please
posted by LW, Friday, September 11, 2009
Driving back from the ATL after last night's game didn't sound so bad in theory.
Game ends at 10:30 or 11. Finish working at 12:45 or so. Hit the road at 1. Head hits pillow at 3.
Sometimes things don't go according to plan, as Clemson could easily attest after last night's fiasco of a first half.
Reality went more like this:
Finish working at 1:30. Make mile walk to car. Figure out how to get onto I-85. Hit road after 2. Head hits pillow at 4:30.
And for some silly reason, the part about "Kids wake up at 6:30" didn't make it into the pre-trip planning, either.
A bit akin to Dabo Swinney's omission of "communication of proper pooch punt" and "watch for the fake field goal" heading into last night's game.
OK, enough of the small talk...
Bart Wright says there's a lot to like about last night's comeback. I'm guessing he thinks his boy Tommy Bowden wouldn't have been able to summon that kind of comeback.
But I'm also wondering whether Bowden's team would've collapsed that spectacularly in the first half. Not saying it wouldn't have happened like that under his watch. But it's definitely something to ponder.
Ron Morris sings pretty much the same tune as Wright.
“There’s a lot of football teams, when it’s 24 to nothing or 24 to 7, they fold up the tent and go to the house,” Kevin Steele said. “There’s a lot of them that do that. So obviously there’s some unbelievable character in that room.”
Steele pointed toward the Clemson locker room, where one by one the players dressed and departed the stadium. They walked upright and with a sense of pride. They hardly looked the part of a team that was deflated or beaten.
And Gene Sapakoff says the Tigers made lots of improvement from last year's meeting with Georgia Tech to this one.
Impressively, a coaching staff one Middle Tennessee game into its real game bonding, made excellent halftime adjustments on all sides of the ball.
Clemson after halftime was the smarter, more physical team.
After almost flunking the take-home test, they almost pulled an upset for the ages. If the lessons learned late Thursday night stick, the Tigers are probably favorites for an ACC championship game appearance.
After all, have you seen the rest of the teams in the Atlantic Division?
Good line here from Mark Schlabach in his description of the first half:
After Blair kicked a 24-yard field goal to give the Yellow Jackets a 24-0 lead with 10:29 to play in the second quarter, it seemed like Johnson might be guilty of indecent exposure. He was pulling down Clemson coach Dabo Swinney's pants on national TV, and the Tigers didn't seem to have an answer for anything Georgia Tech tried.
More good lines from Jeff Schultz of the AJC.
The Jackets did nearly everything right. And then nearly everything wrong. They watched a 24-0 lead explode like the Sherwin Williams factory that must have exploded on the Clemson team, because that’s the only explanation for the Tigers showing up for a nationally televised game wearing all purple uniforms and orange helmets. (Nobody told them it wasn’t a costume party.)
And more...
Clemson looked overmatched for a while against the triple-option offense. Anthony Allen, generally considered Tech’s third-best running back, ran 82 yards for a touchdown on the Jackets’ second play from scrimmage. For the next seven minutes, the Jackets looked the part of a top-10 team. The Tigers didn’t even look top 10 in South Carolina. The Tigers tried a fake field goal. But a quick kick backfired when the Clemson kicker booted it right to Jerrard Tarrant, who returned it 85 yards for a touchdown.
That was followed by a Clemson interception, which was followed by Tech’s fake field goal that resulted in a 34-yard touchdown pass from Blair to Thomas, which was soon followed by a 24-0 Tech lead that had Tigers coach Dabo Swinney looking like a wildebeest staring at an uncoming Winnebago.
Can't think of many good lines to contribute to this blog other than flism-flasm fkjdlekelle, dfkdfjdkerlejktlkerk.
Paul Strelow of The State notes the eerie similarities between last night's game and Dabo's first game as a coach.
More on deja-vu in the Independent-Mail.
Sports writer/photo blogger/music critic Travis Sawchik was impressed with Kyle Parker's lasers. He wasn't the only one.
And not very impressed with the OL. He wasn't the only one.
This story says Georgia Tech's DL firmed up last night.
Seems like a lot of opposing defensive lines firm up when facing the Tigers.
LW
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Driving back from the ATL after last night's game didn't sound so bad in theory.
Game ends at 10:30 or 11. Finish working at 12:45 or so. Hit the road at 1. Head hits pillow at 3.
Sometimes things don't go according to plan, as Clemson could easily attest after last night's fiasco of a first half.
Reality went more like this:
Finish working at 1:30. Make mile walk to car. Figure out how to get onto I-85. Hit road after 2. Head hits pillow at 4:30.
And for some silly reason, the part about "Kids wake up at 6:30" didn't make it into the pre-trip planning, either.
A bit akin to Dabo Swinney's omission of "communication of proper pooch punt" and "watch for the fake field goal" heading into last night's game.
OK, enough of the small talk...
Bart Wright says there's a lot to like about last night's comeback. I'm guessing he thinks his boy Tommy Bowden wouldn't have been able to summon that kind of comeback.
But I'm also wondering whether Bowden's team would've collapsed that spectacularly in the first half. Not saying it wouldn't have happened like that under his watch. But it's definitely something to ponder.
Ron Morris sings pretty much the same tune as Wright.
“There’s a lot of football teams, when it’s 24 to nothing or 24 to 7, they fold up the tent and go to the house,” Kevin Steele said. “There’s a lot of them that do that. So obviously there’s some unbelievable character in that room.”
Steele pointed toward the Clemson locker room, where one by one the players dressed and departed the stadium. They walked upright and with a sense of pride. They hardly looked the part of a team that was deflated or beaten.
And Gene Sapakoff says the Tigers made lots of improvement from last year's meeting with Georgia Tech to this one.
Impressively, a coaching staff one Middle Tennessee game into its real game bonding, made excellent halftime adjustments on all sides of the ball.
Clemson after halftime was the smarter, more physical team.
After almost flunking the take-home test, they almost pulled an upset for the ages. If the lessons learned late Thursday night stick, the Tigers are probably favorites for an ACC championship game appearance.
After all, have you seen the rest of the teams in the Atlantic Division?
Good line here from Mark Schlabach in his description of the first half:
After Blair kicked a 24-yard field goal to give the Yellow Jackets a 24-0 lead with 10:29 to play in the second quarter, it seemed like Johnson might be guilty of indecent exposure. He was pulling down Clemson coach Dabo Swinney's pants on national TV, and the Tigers didn't seem to have an answer for anything Georgia Tech tried.
More good lines from Jeff Schultz of the AJC.
The Jackets did nearly everything right. And then nearly everything wrong. They watched a 24-0 lead explode like the Sherwin Williams factory that must have exploded on the Clemson team, because that’s the only explanation for the Tigers showing up for a nationally televised game wearing all purple uniforms and orange helmets. (Nobody told them it wasn’t a costume party.)
And more...
Clemson looked overmatched for a while against the triple-option offense. Anthony Allen, generally considered Tech’s third-best running back, ran 82 yards for a touchdown on the Jackets’ second play from scrimmage. For the next seven minutes, the Jackets looked the part of a top-10 team. The Tigers didn’t even look top 10 in South Carolina. The Tigers tried a fake field goal. But a quick kick backfired when the Clemson kicker booted it right to Jerrard Tarrant, who returned it 85 yards for a touchdown.
That was followed by a Clemson interception, which was followed by Tech’s fake field goal that resulted in a 34-yard touchdown pass from Blair to Thomas, which was soon followed by a 24-0 Tech lead that had Tigers coach Dabo Swinney looking like a wildebeest staring at an uncoming Winnebago.
Can't think of many good lines to contribute to this blog other than flism-flasm fkjdlekelle, dfkdfjdkerlejktlkerk.
Paul Strelow of The State notes the eerie similarities between last night's game and Dabo's first game as a coach.
More on deja-vu in the Independent-Mail.
Sports writer/photo blogger/music critic Travis Sawchik was impressed with Kyle Parker's lasers. He wasn't the only one.
And not very impressed with the OL. He wasn't the only one.
This story says Georgia Tech's DL firmed up last night.
Seems like a lot of opposing defensive lines firm up when facing the Tigers.
LW
For questions or comments on this blog entry, please visit The West Zone message board.
Link to this entry - Discuss this entry - Return to Blog Home
Donnie Patterson. Donnie Patterson is the founder of Patterson Tax Service, located in Easley, S.C. He has been active in tax preparation since 1970, and offers a full range of tax and bookkeeping services.
Larry Williams. Larry has covered the daily beat at Clemson since 2004. Williams, who worked for the Charleston Post & Courier from 2004-08, joined Tigerillustrated.com in November of 2008. He may be reached by email at ldubya08(at)gmail.com. Replace (at) with @.