Boston College 16 - Syracuse 7: Who Knew 7-5 Would Feel So Disappointing

Nassib takes advantage of these extra practices and gets his shit together. Or else we are going to have 4 qbs going for that starting spot next season. Kinder at least would give us an additional threat when it comes to running the ball.

Sounded great before we knew what a gigantic clusterfark the BE would be.

7-5 was a minimum for me after that.

What’s our record after selling those “Bowl Bound” t-shirts?

I feel like our over-marketing of accomplishment minutiae is making things worse if we wind up underachieving (see the “We’re #1” basketball shirts).

Tom Savage was the QB with the most experience heading into this season. Little surprise that the Big East fared poorly OOC. Naturally, however, some of those QBs got their crap together by October and November. What makes the Big East mediocre was September losses. October and November was the scrum it was supposed to be.

If Pitt had beaten Miami (home) and ND, they would be 8-3 right now, with losses to Utah, UConn, and WVU. No shame in that—the two best BE teams and Utah on the road in the opener with a new QB. If UConn had beaten Temple, they would be 8-3 right now and perhaps ranked. All of the sudden, the Big East looks a lot like the ACC. Instead, Pitt and UConn laid eggs in September, creating the illusion that the Big East was weak.

As for Syracuse, eventually teams figured out how to beat us. Credit to the coaches and players for staving off that inevitability until November. Once upon a time, teams with speed destroyed us.

First, it gives the team time to regroup, rest and and gameplan. Hopefully Marrone and the squad use that time and come out strong again.

Second, it gives me to time to get over the bad taste these last two games have left (and the overall November performance quite frankly). By the end of the game Saturday I wasn’t interested in watching this team play another down. I think with at least 3 weeks of time away I will be back to wanting to watch this team for 3 hours.

P.S. Marrone mentioned something earlier in the season that I hadn’t thought about again until yesterday: bye weeks. We only had one bye week this season. I think Louisville just beat us. But I think our performance against Rutgers and our losses to UConn and BC are somewhat related to the lack of bye weeks. The offense has its own problems, but the defense has simply looked tired on the field. Another bye week somewhere in the second half might have helped us out this month.

Marrone and the staff will keep bringing in the right recruits and the team will no longer get pushed around. Regardless of the quality of the Big East and the quality of the two I-AA opponents we played, I really feel we will look back on this season as the year it all changed for the football team.

I think after a week or so, I will be able to appreciate the season, which pretty much hit our most realistic desires. but the feeling of backing into the bowl does leave a bad taste. Now I have utter confidence in Marrone to continue recruiting well and to build on this success. We may actually take a step backwards losing so many starting seniors, but in two years i think they will be beast. But after all that, Marrone punting on 4th and 2, down two scores, with under 6 minutes to play was compeltely indefensible. That is giving up on a play and simply trying to keep the final score down. That is not doing everything for victory. I know he’s far from the only coach to do this, but it stinks and I absolutely hate when it happens.