Syracuse football: first down offense in 2022

The Syracuse Orange are preparing for their bowl game so we’ll take some time over these next couple of weeks to look back at 2022 and look ahead to 2023.

All year long we’ve looked at the first-down offense to see if the Orange were able to put themselves into position to keep the defense off-balance while setting themselves up for manageable 2nd and 3rd down situations.

Overall averaging 6.8 yards on first down is a positive sign. The Orange would be at 6.11 yards per first down if you take out the Wagner game so that shows the offense was improved in 2022. It also shows that Syracuse needs to figure out how to better take advantage of this success to score more points in 2023.

Some other notes:

• The Orange ended up running more on first downs in every game except the Pitt one.
• After the first half against Clemson, the offense struggled until facing Wake Forest. Shrader’s injury which limited his running and kept him out for Pitt really slowed this offense.
• The final two games give hope that the staff and players were able to adjust after the slump. Can this carry forward if Sean Tucker doesn’t return?
• When Syracuse found success passing, the ball was spread among players. It’ll be interesting to see what another off-season will do to the trust and timing between the quarterbacks and receivers.

Does anything surprise you about these numbers for 2022?