Elite front seven

[gofurman]

It occurred to me today how you could look at our scores and go back to the preseason poll on guys voted in the best of the D front 7:

http://www.soconsports.com/ViewArticle. ... =211807503

First team defense
DL Joseph Randolph II, Sr., The Citadel
DL Jason Maduafokwa, R-Sr., ETSU
DL Nasir Player, R-Sr., ETSU
DL Thad Mangum, Sr., Wofford - probably out for the yr.
LB Willie Eubanks III, Jr., The Citadel
LB Adrian Hope, R-So., Furman - way to go Hope !
LB Marshall Cooper, Sr., Chattanooga

This is not a "well, duh, good defenses are obviously going to give us more trouble" thing. It's when they can post 1/2 truly elite SoCon guys in the front 7 that we struggle as we are a running team that then passes based on our run. IE, elite CBs don't concern me as much.

Safeties that hit hard and help w run support yes. And ETSU has that too

you can draw a straight line from this listing to our SoCon scores. Sure, better defenses always will trouble us more than bad ones (captain obvious) it's just how absolutely directly correlated this was that struck me, Rarely have I seen it so exact as often these votes are from stats and SIDs etc. Good thing is we have been through the two toughest teams per this listing !!!

Mercer - Furman wins 45-10
ETSU - Furman wins 17-10
Samford - Furman wins 58-14
Citadel - Furman loses 10-27

[FUpaladin08]

Checks out to me. Got to think the coaches see this too and have got the hint. Don’t run directly into that, find an alternative route.

[gofurman]

Checks out to me. Got to think the coaches see this too and have got the hint. Don’t run directly into that, find an alternative route.

Yeah, a guy who has been with the players and watching since 80s said likewise. He noted that we need a little more option and eye candy. And obviously we need a little passin' success. We can push around most DLs but the elite DL/LBs ( best two or three SoCon teams in this regard ) we can't just say "we are running off tackle left". The CItadel showed they were fine with us trying that. And vs Ciatdel our WRs were WIDE OPEN we just didn't capitalize. We just need to improve passing success and diversification and we will be fine. We just can't be 100% basic run in between tackle plays. Gotta have the opposing D respect for some other possibilities. Man, Citadel put a lotta guys vs our basic runs and DARED us to throw

[apaladin]

Good points GF.