#5 William & Mary Tribe (5-1, 2-1) vs. JMU Dukes (2-4, 0-3)
Oct. 24, 2009 - 12:05pm - Williamsburg, VA
Televised on Comcast SportsNet
Weather Report
| Tailgating | 8am | 68° | 40% (precip) |
| Mid-tailgate | 10am | 71° | 50% |
| Getting into the stadium | 11am | 74° | 50% |
| Kickoff | 12:05pm | 77° | 50% |
| Game over | 3pm | 80° | 50% |
Line for the game
William & Mary by 11.5
Injuries
WR Kerby Long will miss another 2-4 weeks. CB Mike Allen is still out as far as I've seen. QB Drew Dudzik is out for the season healing his broken foot. LB Jamie Veney (knee) out for season. CB Taveion Cuffee (ankle) will miss 2-3 weeks. TB Corwin Acker (strained quad) will miss tomorrow's game.
I haven't heard of any major injuries for William & Mary.
The Numbers (game averages)
Sagarin Strength of Schedule: 59.60 (136)
JMU Rushing Offense: 182 yds - W&M Rushing Defense: 90 yds
JMU Passing Offense: 149 yds - W&M Passing Defense: 248 yds
JMU Total Offense: 331 yds - W&M Total Defense: 338 yds
JMU Scoring Offense: 23 - W&M Scoring Defense: 16
Sacks: 2.17 - Sacks allowed: 1.67
Sagarin Strength of Schedule: 60.54 (128)
W&M Rushing Offense: 164 yds - JMU Rushing Defense: 146 yds
W&M Passing Offense: 223 yds - JMU Passing Defense: 143 yds
W&M Total Offense: 387 yds - JMU Total Defense: 289 yds
W&M Scoring Offense: 28 - JMU Scoring Defense: 23
Sacks: 3.33 - Sacks allowed: 1.33
What to watch
What happened last week? All-around offensive fail. Villanova was putting 8 guys in the box every play and it was just overwhelming our offensive line. Thorpe fumbled the ball twice. This defense stopped our running offense and put pressure on Thorpe that any average freshman QB couldn't handle. He overthrew a lot of passes, and under threw others. Add to that our receivers were dropping passes that came to them and we couldn't get a decent passing game going. This meant that Villanova was content to keep all everyone in the box and shut down the run. Our defense on the other hand played very well. The held an outstanding Villanova offense to 27 points even after 2 turnovers.
JMU's main job: hold onto the ball. Don't make it any harder on yourselves. If it's determined Thorpe isn't ready to run with the ball every other play, don't let him...either pass it, throw it away, or hand it off. Sullivan and Noble are going to have to step it up tomorrow. Thorpe's next assignment, set your feet on every pass. Don't jump pass or throw off your back foot on every play. If W&M watched the video from last week, they're going to force Thorpe to pass. He's either going to have to start making those passes, or it's going to be another long day.
Honestly, if Thorpe isn't getting it down in the first half, I wouldn't be surprised to see Kavon Seaton at QB. He's a true freshman from California and is supposedly the best QB on the team (never heard that before...). Of course, if we do bring him in, he will lose this year as a redshirt year. If Dudzik ends up coming back next year (he is graduating, so he'll have the option of using his fourth year of eligibility), Kavon could use his redshirt next year as long as nothing bad happens again. Noble did this a couple years ago because of our lack of healthy tailbacks, but then used his redshirt last year when we had Holloman back and a few other good RB's in the mix. Just saying...don't be surprised if this happens.
William & Mary has a good QB in Archer. He is a true passing QB and doesn't seem to be too much of a threat with the run. He has gained 172 yards on the ground after six games. 63 of those came against Central Connecticut St. and 20 against Northeastern. Grimes is the Tribe's primary TB and is averaging 80 yards per game on the ground. Riggins and Marriner also have 30 and 28 yards per game, respectively. Our defense's main job will be to put pressure on Archer, which will be hard with W&M's great offensive line. We are going to be down a CB and LB this week, so our defensive line is going to have to play even harder.
There are a lot of things going against JMU in this game. First, it's William and Mary's Homecoming. Just in case you missed the article on their Homecoming t-shirt...check it out...please...it will make you happy... Next, William & Mary is coming off a bye week, so not only are they rested, they've had two weeks to prepare for us. Guess what...the forecast is calling for rain...again. Maryland - threat of rain, Liberty - downpour, Hofstra - rain, Richmond - threat of rain, Villanova - yeah, rain...seems to be a theme to this year. This makes it harder for us to pass even though it will most likely be our only way to move down the field if William and Mary sells out against the run.
The Series
JMU leads the series 17-14. The Dukes have won the past 5 meetings all the way back to the 2004 semifinals on our National Championship run. The last time the Tribe won was in the 2004 regular season game where they pulled ahead on a last second field goal. Last year, JMU won beat down the Tribe, 48-24.
My Thoughts
Three losses in a row. We're going up against a very good team. Our offense is lacking. We NEED to win the turnover battle to give us a short field a couple times. This just doesn't look good for us right now. I'm not saying it can't happen, just saying that unless we don't turn it over and we've learned how to pass more accurately (and catch the ball) and run more effectively, it could turn out bad. W&M has wanted us for a long time and I'm afraid this year they'll get it.
Windbreaker prediction: JMU - 24, W&M - 23 (pleeeeeeeeease JMU)
(but if you strictly take the median of offenses vs. defenses, rounding advantageously...JMU - 20, W&M 25)
Game Notes
JMU Game Notes
Score Updates
To get score updates on Twitter, subscribe to @JMUWindbreaker. I'll be posting scores at the end of each quarter and any major action that happens.
And as always...
No comments:
Post a Comment