My Expectations For Next Year and Why?

[purplehorse]

The lowest they have been in a long long time.

Why?-Our offense was so bad this year and we showed no signs of improvement during the season. Hard to win many games if we don’t get better on offense.

Time will tell.

Any objective reasons to have much realistic hope?

[apaladin]

First time in 50 years watching FU football that my expectations are this low. There has always been hope for some reason or another but this is the first time I have ever see a FU team get worse as the season progressed and that is the reason for the low expectations. The only reason I can come up with is the hopefully once in a lifetime season but that is grabbing at straws. Like purplehorse, anyone that can talk us off the ledge, please do.

[Sad Din]

Expectation for next year is:

A little humble pie.
Quit saying the Team is capable of being very good and
Quit praising players because they show certain good aspects
Quit relying on coaches and schemes that arent working

[Furmanoid]

Our defense is good. Our competition isn’t. The team to beat is a bunch of guys who wanted DI scholarships so bad they were willing to dress up like soldiers and march around in the freezing middle of nowhere in VA (at least Cit has a beach house and CofC girls). We could very well run the table with a little luck. Or we might lose to everybody (but WCU). I doubt we’ll be much better in September, but we don’t need to be much better. As long as we don’t get too much worse we are in the hunt.

[fufanatic]

Our defense is good. Our competition isn’t. The team to beat is a bunch of guys who wanted DI scholarships so bad they were willing to dress up like soldiers and march around in the freezing middle of nowhere in VA (at least Cit has a beach house and CofC girls). We could very well run the table with a little luck. Or we might lose to everybody (but WCU). I doubt we’ll be much better in September, but we don’t need to be much better. As long as we don’t get too much worse we are in the hunt.

Agreed. The defense is solid and the league is garbage (although VMI performed admirably at JMU). There's always a shot with those two conditions still in play.

[The Jackal]

Our defense is good. Our competition isn’t. The team to beat is a bunch of guys who wanted DI scholarships so bad they were willing to dress up like soldiers and march around in the freezing middle of nowhere in VA (at least Cit has a beach house and CofC girls). We could very well run the table with a little luck. Or we might lose to everybody (but WCU). I doubt we’ll be much better in September, but we don’t need to be much better. As long as we don’t get too much worse we are in the hunt.

Agreed. The defense is solid and the league is garbage (although VMI performed admirably at JMU). There's always a shot with those two conditions still in play.

I realize it's en vogue to dump on the SoCon.

VMI played a 7 point game against the No. 1 team in the country on the road last Saturday.

Had Furman spent the season in the top 15 and played a one score game on the road against James Madison, we'd be patting ourselves on the back talking about how close we were to getting over the hump.

[Furmanoid]

Maybe I was a little mean to VMI, but really, how are they supposed to recruit a good team? They are making the SoCon look bad. If they had really almost beat the best FCS team it would just make the FCS look bad.

But it really wasn’t that close.

[The Jackal]

Maybe I was a little mean to VMI, but really, how are they supposed to recruit a good team? They are making the SoCon look bad. If they had really almost beat the best FCS team it would just make the FCS look bad.

But it really wasn’t that close.

I just don't think you can look at VMI and say "well, they've historically sucked and so they should suck now."

VMI has a stingy defense with a Buchanan Award finalist. They've developed a series of good quarterbacks (Morgan, Udinski, and Cobb before them). Their WR Herres has been a handful for just about everyone they've played, putting up nearly 1,000 yards in 8 games.

Objectively, they were a good team this year. They had a tough draw in the first round against the nation's top team, but my guess is VMI would have beaten a lot of the other playoff teams.

That's not to say Furman should be satisfied. That's only to say I don't really buy the argument that VMI was terrible. They clearly were not.

[Furmanoid]

VMI isn’t terrible. But if you are facing a season with a good defense and not much hope of a decent offense, would you rather be in a SoCon with App State or Ga Southern as the front runner or a SoCon with VMI as the front runner? Maybe it’s just me, but I think the 2021 SoCon gives us a better chance.

[Roundball]

VMI isn’t terrible. But if you are facing a season with a good defense and not much hope of a decent offense, would you rather be in a SoCon with App State or Ga Southern as the front runner or a SoCon with VMI as the front runner? Maybe it’s just me, but I think the 2021 SoCon gives us a better chance.

I love great completion and fun games with big crowds. Give me Appalachian State and Georgia Southern over any other team in the SoCon. I miss those exciting games.

[Affirm]

VMI isn’t terrible. But if you are facing a season with a good defense and not much hope of a decent offense, would you rather be in a SoCon with App State or Ga Southern as the front runner or a SoCon with VMI as the front runner? Maybe it’s just me, but I think the 2021 SoCon gives us a better chance.

I love great completion and fun games with big crowds. Give me Appalachian State and Georgia Southern over any other team in the SoCon. I miss those exciting games.

NCA&TSU (Big South) on 9/4/2021 IS our biggest OOC home game in quite a while.
The Aggies’ last 5 seasons (they totally skipped 2020-21), I believe their records were (going back):
9-3
10-2
12-0
9-3
10-3.
They have 3 FBS wins, 1 each in 3 of those 5 seasons.
The last time they played was a post-season win, 64-44 in the Celebration Bowl (Atlanta), where they won in 3 of the 5 seasons.
Regular season wins in the 5 seasons have included these examples of scores:
37-0, 58-19, 64-6, 54-0, 45-6, 45-0, 45-3, 56-0, 44-3, 62-0, 35-0, 61-7,
65-14.
The week after us, the Aggies go to Duke.
(Exactly 1 year after that, they go to NDSU on 9/10/2022. Maybe a good time weather-wise for people from the South to go to Fargo?!)
I know their fans will travel well to Durham (“right down the street”) on 9/11/2021,; and expect their fans will travel well to Greenville on 9/4/2021 (Labor Day weekend) for NCA&TSU’s first game in 20.5 months.
** I do not know what, if any, bigger OOC regular season home game(s) Furman has had in the last 7 (seven) years. Perhaps someone will be kind enough to say on here what and when they have been, if any, and the outcome(s). **
(Also, for a reminder of “our status [Furman Football]”, take a look back at the first 3 posts in this present thread, if you have forgotten.)

[apaladin]

Very excited about the NC A&T game for no other reason than the large crowd I expect them to bring, They have a very good program but lets not pretend they are Alabama. Their last season included a 3 point win over Elon and a 6 point win over Chaleston Southern which was 2 weeks after FU beat CSU by 32. With that said if we don’t see vast improvement come September this game will be over by halftime. Would have loved for NC A&T to have joined the SoCon instead of the Big South.

[Affirm]

130 days to kickoff

[Affirm]

Very excited about the NC A&T game for no other reason than the large crowd I expect them to bring, They have a very good program but lets not pretend they are Alabama. Their last season included a 3 point win over Elon and a 6 point win over Chaleston Southern which was 2 weeks after FU beat CSU by 32. With that said if we don’t see vast improvement come September this game will be over by halftime. Would have loved for NC A&T to have joined the SoCon instead of the Big South.

Waiting to see your nominee(s) for bigger OOC regular season home games we’ve had since 2013.
No they are not Alabama.
When did we play Alabama at home or away?

[The Jackal]

Very excited about the NC A&T game for no other reason than the large crowd I expect them to bring, They have a very good program but lets not pretend they are Alabama. Their last season included a 3 point win over Elon and a 6 point win over Chaleston Southern which was 2 weeks after FU beat CSU by 32. With that said if we don’t see vast improvement come September this game will be over by halftime. Would have loved for NC A&T to have joined the SoCon instead of the Big South.

Waiting to see your nominee(s) for bigger OOC regular season home games we’ve had since 2013.
No they are not Alabama.
When did we play Alabama at home or away?

If you were expecting apaladin to make a comment that did not also include a slight to Furman's football program, you've come to the wrong forum.