Posted by Block-C Staff

This week the ACC blogger round table was hosted by BCInterruption.  You can find everyone’s answers posted below. The main points of discussion for consumption is fueled partially by the questions we presented last week.  The Atlantic Coast Conference versus the world and how we are faring in that battle. Chili with most of the opinion, Willy Mac with the dressings and editing.

From Old Virginia | Gobbler Country | Testudo Times | College Game Balls
Jim Young, ACC Sports Journal | From the Rumble Seat | Joe Ovies | BCInterruption
Yet Another NCSU Blog | On the B.Rink | Tomahawk Nation

Now that most ACC teams’ non-conference schedules are winding down and we are starting league play, it’s time to take the vitals of the ACC’s play in non-conference action. Here is how the ACC fared against the rest of college football through 4 weeks (based on my back-of-the-envelope math):

Comment on your team’s (if applicable, sorry Miami) and the conference’s non-conference performance through 4 weeks. As a conference, what head-to-head record against another conference stands out to you most?

(Because we like to fan the ACC vs. Big East flames …) The only BCS conferences the ACC has a .500 record against so far this year is the Big East (4 games) and the Pac-10 (2 games). Yikes. In a weekend where 2 of 3 Big East teams knocked off ACC teams, we have to ask: The ACC is still > Big East, right?  Right?? The ACC record versus FCS teams should be perfect every year, two losses is still inexcusable. 1-2 versus the Mountain West (TCU beating our Tigers and UVA, FSU thumping BYU) is also fairly poor, IMO.

On a scale of 1 to 10, where 1 is losing to a CAA team and 10 is getting the ACC some much needed street cred by winning the BCS MNC, how satisfied are you with your AD’s non-conference scheduling this year? With the non-conference opponents your program has lined up over the next few years, will you be more or less satisfied?

We’d give it a five. It’s only that high because we got TCU as a last minute addition. Middle Tennessee State and Coastal Carolina round out our non-Sakerlina OOC schedule. Another reason for the mid-range grade is because we’ve got two decent OOC teams and two squash teams.

Last one, ESPN’s College GameDay is heading to Chestnut Hill this week for Florida State (2-2) at Boston College (3-1). Both teams are unranked. Parts of the blogosphere are going completely ape shit over the WWL’s selection. Justify the selection (if you can). If not, tell us why you dislike the selection.

The justification is that ESPN is further milking the teat of the Boston sports market, tying into the ESPNBoston imprint (though they’ve denied this and you can always trust the WWL, right?) to further whore themselves. There aren’t a ton of marquee matchups this weekend outside of the SEC, and you know GameDay will probably be at an SEC venue every other week from here till the end of the season anyway. Additionally, and much more admirably, they will shine a spotlight on BC linebacker Mark Herzlich’s battle against cancer.

Another reason is the proximity of Boston to Bristol. All in all, it’s a relative bargain. The big wigs and office folk over at the Big Red Network won’t have to play weekend warrior. We get a decent/mediocre performance and two decent/mediocre teams.

I don’t care one way or the other, but I will expect further shitting on the conference due to the sad turnout we’re likely too see from BC “fans” in comparison to other conference matchups Game Day could visit. Hey, they might sell more tickets than the ACCCG does… so… that’s a plus, right?

Posted by Chili

I was disappointed in the inability of Clemson coaches and players to adjust; the defense’s inability to adjust to the fake handoff play TCU QB Dalton ran over and over and over and freaking over, and Billy Napier’s inability to put any real fold in the Clemson offense other than “just get it to CJ” not to mention the glaring ineptitude of the offense anywhere near sniffing distance of the end zone. Maybe blame it on a combination of a wet ball, TCU pressure, and the continued mediocrity of our receiving corps (minus Jacoby Ford), but Kyle Parker didn’t look too stellar throwing the ball. That’s not a call to insert WILLY KORN, because with the way our coaches seem to work, any talk of him getting a fair chunk of playing time is just dust in the wind. He’s done, and the rumors will continue to swirl about him transferring to App State or wherever until he actually does so.

When Parker was able to zone in on a target, they either slipped (hey guess what, wet grass is slippery!) or completely bungled the catch. Dabo stated on Sunday that there were at least 5 plays where wide open receivers couldn’t catch the ball. Unacceptable. Get those guys out catching tennis balls like the Texas Tech receivers do (or maybe we do that already and they need it explained to them that the tennis ball is just for practice and not a real gametime situation). CJ Spiller had a good day on an injured limb and our offensive line provided more protection for the backfield than some thought would be possible. Spiller joined Reggie Bush as the only players  “in college football history to record career totals of 1,000 receiving yards (1,067), 2,500 yards rushing (2,623), 1,500 kickoff return yards (1,534) and 500 yards in punt returns (541)” - source. Though Spiller did it without having a house bought for him and his family by some schyster agent. The o-line seems to be improving incrementally with each game, despite the fact that our playcalling seems at times to be stalled.

The defense that is one of our strong points seemed baffled by the fakes TCU threw at them and demonstrated a hardheaded inability to adjust. There were also shades of the Vic Koening days with the defense holding strong for a couple plays only to give up huge chunks of yardage.

SCORE A DAMNED TOUCHDOWN IN THE RED ZONE, CLEMSON OFFENSE. THAT’S WHAT YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO DO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!111!!1!!1!ONE!1!EXCLAMATION!!!

Anyway, Clemson lost a close game to a good team. There are worse outcomes, but at the same time I think that moral victories are for high schoolers. Napier needs to do some homework and/or our receivers need to step the hell up, and our team needs to grow some balls in the red zone.

Actual writers have this to say:

Swinney believes Tigers are progressing
Clemson-TCU – thumbs up, thumbs down
Clemson football falls to Texas Christian
Spence wasn’t the problem
TCU’s Dalton runs wild

Posted by Chili

Lots of moving and shaking this week. Teams taking massive tumbles include Cal, Penn State, Ole Miss, Miami (I got the Kool-Aid knocked out of my hand), FSU, and UNC. Teams rising include Virginia Tech and Oregon. Oklahoma also rises, but largely just because of the vacuum created by the top ten tumble. Newcomers to the poll include Sakerlina and Iowa.

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Florida
2	Texas
3	Alabama
4	Virginia Tech	8
5	Boise State	2
6	Southern Cal	4
7	Oklahoma	6
8	California	4
9	Ohio State
10	LSU	1
11	Penn State	6
12	TCU	2
13	Oregon	7
14	Brigham Young	4
15	Cincinnati
16	Miami (Florida)	8
17	Oklahoma State	1
18	Mississippi	12
19	Georgia Tech	5
20	Georgia	1
21	Kansas
22	Nebraska	3
23	Michigan
24	Iowa
25	Sakerlina
Last week’s ballot

Dropped Out: Florida State (#17), North Carolina (#22).

Posted by Block-C Staff

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Posted by Willy Mac

A buddy of mine and I recently got into a heated debate the other day. The argument?

“If Clemson isn’t playing South Carolina, should you pull for them?”

One of his main bullet points is that it makes Clemson look better if we beat a team with more wins at the end of the year. He stated that it’d be best if we were to beat the best Carolina team we could. Everything comes into play at that point.  Rankings, bowl selection, bragging rights, the ramifications of us ruining the end of their year yet again grow larger…  I can see where’s he’s coming from too.  Now that they’re decent year in and year out, it’s a higher stakes game.  The game is not just to decide whether or not they stay home for the holidays anymore. The end-of-season showdown now determines how good of a bowl game each one of us will get into.  Face it, more likely than not neither one of our teams is going to their respective championship game year in and year out.

One of his other points was that it makes not only the state of South Carolina look better in terms of football prowess and talent, but it makes the south in general look better than all the other regions. I agreed with him on his first point, but this point kind of turned me off of his argument.  I don’t care what any other team in another conference does.  If it’s not the ACC, I don’t care what region a team is from.  Also, I want to be the best team in this state.  Not only that, but I’d like for Clemson to be consistently heads above the rest in this state. Our only competition on that category comes solely from the Gamecocks. I think the ACC being a conference that’s not exclusive to the southern territories weighs in on my mindset here. If an ACC team is playing an out-of-conference opponent, it’s my feelings that I want our guys to win so it makes Clemson and our conference look better. Likewise, I’d like for the rest of our OOC opponents to win the games on their schedules as well so it makes us look better.

But when it comes to South Carolina I feel that you cannot root for them, lest you betray your Clemson fandom. Now, we’re getting picky here and it’s obviously a slow day around the office but bear with me. We have a deep-seeded and intense rivalry that I can’t just put on a shelf for three hours a week when the leaves start turning colors. If you ask the same question to an Alabama or Auburn fan, you’re not going to get the response that they put their rivalry on hold. I’m not saying I want our fan base to emulate another group of fans… we do that enough as it is. I usually take a step out of character here and say that life is too short to worry about trivial things like this. However, the man with the keyboard says that life is too short and that’s exactly why you should have principles like strictly not rooting for a rival team. You should take things like this seriously because you’re only here for so long.

My dad had a saying, “If the Russians were playing the Gamecocks in a game of tiddlywinks… I’m rooting for the Rooskies.” There is a ringing of truth that follows that statement in some maniacal kind of way. I guess you could call my approach “waging total war.”  It’s one culture against another. It’s how the greatest wars in history were decided… why not apply the same theory (sans horrific killing… or not… it’s your decision ultimately) to a game played by kids?  Sign me up.  How about you? Comments? Thoughts?

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