• Thoughts On The Season

 #60674  by FurmAlum
 Sat Nov 19, 2022 6:47 pm
* The Justin Roper and Tommy Spangler hires were a super success.
* Moving Anderson to slot/wideout was a great decision.
* Who woulda thought 9-2? I know a few people did forecast that. Now's the time for those to speak up and be
congratulated. I think I picked 8-3 and happy to be wrong.
*How in the heck did T. Huff not get much PT at Pres? What a player!
*We might have defensive linemen and wide receivers make All-SoCon. When was the last time that happened?
*The coaches did a great job on the transfers-in.

It's been a fun season and I hope the best is yet to come.
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 #60675  by FurmanFan23
 Sat Nov 19, 2022 6:50 pm
Spangler deserves so much credit. In all of my years of watching Furman I have never seen this much turnaround on a unit before in such a short time. Special teams has been a huge success and I attribute most of it to Coach Spangler!
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 #60677  by The Jackal
 Sat Nov 19, 2022 6:56 pm
I work closely with a guy that played football at Presbyterian under Bobby Bentley.

He is well familiar with what Tyler Huff is doing and some of the dumb coaching decisions made at PC.
 #60685  by The Cats
 Sat Nov 19, 2022 7:38 pm
Congratulations to your football team and to the Paladin fans for one heck of a good season. 9 wins should assure your team a place in the playoff field. I'm sure I speak for the Catamount fans when I wish the Paladins the best of luck in the playoffs and hope for a deep run for your team.

Another NC would be nice for the SoCon, it could be the Paladins year!!!
Bootie, apaladin, FUwolfpacker and 8 others liked this
 #60686  by The Jackal
 Sat Nov 19, 2022 7:46 pm
The Cats wrote:
Sat Nov 19, 2022 7:38 pm
Congratulations to your football team and to the Paladin fans for one heck of a good season. 9 wins should assure your team a place in the playoff field. I'm sure I speak for the Catamount fans when I wish the Paladins the best of luck in the playoffs and hope for a deep run for your team.

Another NC would be nice for the SoCon, it could be the Paladins year!!!
Cats pulled off a surprising win this afternoon, but a 6-5 season is definitely a move in the right direction.
QCGlue liked this
 #60689  by The Jackal
 Sat Nov 19, 2022 7:50 pm
FurmAlum wrote:
Sat Nov 19, 2022 6:47 pm
* The Justin Roper and Tommy Spangler hires were a super success.
* Moving Anderson to slot/wideout was a great decision.
* Who woulda thought 9-2? I know a few people did forecast that. Now's the time for those to speak up and be
congratulated. I think I picked 8-3 and happy to be wrong.
*How in the heck did T. Huff not get much PT at Pres? What a player!
*We might have defensive linemen and wide receivers make All-SoCon. When was the last time that happened?
*The coaches did a great job on the transfers-in.

It's been a fun season and I hope the best is yet to come.
1. QB in complete control of the offense. Makes good decisions, can run when he wants to, and is tough as nails.

2. Joshua Harris has stepped onto the stage as one of the upper echelon of wide receivers in the league, and will continue to get better.

3. Great continuity on the offensive line and, largely, kept everyone healthy and playing.

4. We had two interior DTs that no team could do anything with. If those two guys were in the game, you can forget about running the football.

5. Tons of depth on defense. Constant rotation and fresh legs. You could see that pay dividends late in games.

6. Strength and conditioning. We've been in better shape than pretty much every team we've played. They got more tired as the game wore on, we got stronger.

7. We have clearly the best special teams unit in the SoCon, and it's not even close. We win special teams every single game.
FurmAlum, dornb, FUBeAR and 1 others liked this
 #60690  by FurmAlum
 Sat Nov 19, 2022 8:01 pm
The Jackal wrote:
Sat Nov 19, 2022 6:59 pm
In post-game, Barton notes that the field goal block unit is coached by Coach Lewis.
Then add Coach Lewis to that list of good hires. He's done a great job with the D Line and the Field Goal Team. Has to be the best in the FCS.
dornb, FUBeAR, gman84 and 1 others liked this
 #60711  by purplehorse
 Sat Nov 19, 2022 9:51 pm
I never imagined we would go 9-2 because over the last two years we found ways to lose. We had heard that we were bigger, faster, stronger yet we did not play good sound fundamental Furman football. The two COVID seasons we underperformed. And then we had the very bad taste in our mouths of the 2019 Austin Peay playoff loss (42-6).

The best thing about the season is we seem to have gotten over the “finding ways to lose”. We developed into a good football team with giving up long pass plays possibly being our only Achilles’ tendon. We seem to be a talented group.

The importance of a solid quarterback cannot be overstated. Huff has been great. The QB position has really hurt us over the last few years. We also have talented players in the skill positions.

So, a very very successful season despite barely being runner-up in the conference.

Now, for icing on the cake, it would be nice to win at least two playoff games. Our last playoff win was first round against Elon in 2017 (28-27).
We have only two playoffs wins in the last 16 years (Elon 2017 and SC State 2013 (30-20).

Since the semifinal loss in 2005 at App State (29-23) we are 2-4 in the playoffs with the losses by 18, 31, 18 and 36 respectively (loss at Montana State in 2006 31-13, at North Dakota State 38-7 in 2013, at Wofford 28-10 in 2017 and Austin Peay in 2019 42-6).

It is time to start winning in the playoffs. CCH is 1-2 as head coach in the playoffs. We were not ready to play against AP in 2019. The opportunity is in front of us and I believe we will seize it.

9-2 was phenomenal. Now time for icing on the cake to make it even sweeter.
Affirm, FUBeAR, bj93 liked this
 #60734  by MidlandsPaladin
 Sun Nov 20, 2022 7:57 am
purplehorse wrote:
Sat Nov 19, 2022 9:51 pm
The importance of a solid quarterback cannot be overstated. Huff has been great. The QB position has really hurt us over the last few years. We also have talented players in the skill positions.
THIS. For as long as I have been following Furman, when we have good QB play we have a good season. When we don’t, we don’t. Excited to see how far TH can take us - the rest of this year and next. He is more than a great QB - you can tell he is a great team leader.
gman84, dornb liked this
 #60741  by The Jackal
 Sun Nov 20, 2022 8:44 am
MidlandsPaladin wrote:
Sun Nov 20, 2022 7:57 am
purplehorse wrote:
Sat Nov 19, 2022 9:51 pm
The importance of a solid quarterback cannot be overstated. Huff has been great. The QB position has really hurt us over the last few years. We also have talented players in the skill positions.
THIS. For as long as I have been following Furman, when we have good QB play we have a good season. When we don’t, we don’t. Excited to see how far TH can take us - the rest of this year and next. He is more than a great QB - you can tell he is a great team leader.

Not a commentary on the subject, but the SoCon's top 5 teams (Samford, Furman, UTC, Mercer, and Western Carolina) all had transfer players at QB.
 #60755  by The Jackal
 Sun Nov 20, 2022 9:57 am
These are the type throws that for the past 5 or so seasons we had trouble completing - those mid-yardage throws of 10-15 yards to the sideline against zone coverage. With Dean, Shiflett, Harris and Miller, we can attack both sidelines.



Wofford puts 7 guys up on the line. If they are going to stack up on you, you have to be able to attack the edges in the passing game.

During Hendrix's tenure, our QB carousel has struggled to get defenses off our run game. This sort of thing gets defenses off your run game and forces them to play back a little bit.
 #60877  by gofurman
 Sun Nov 20, 2022 11:42 pm
The Jackal wrote:
Sat Nov 19, 2022 6:56 pm
I work closely with a guy that played football at Presbyterian under Bobby Bentley.

He is well familiar with what Tyler Huff is doing and some of the dumb coaching decisions made at PC.
But wait. I’m always told by so many people that coaches know what they are doing and fans don’t !!!!!! LOL Riiiiiiight. Yet ANOTHER example of this (“coaches know what they are doing”) being incorrect.

In any case …. we missed a great contributor in our list of our season. Has Ryan Miller been mentioned in this entire thread??? The guy who leads Furman in TD receptions EVER???