Amidst all the woe is me, I want to congratulate our team & staff on a solid though unspectacular 2018 season. Our blowout loss yesterday to UGA has had no impact on my view of the season. That game played out as I expected it would. I felt we had no chance to slow down their offense and as it turned out we didn't. I had some hope we might be able to sustain a few drives on offense, but after being limited to 200 to 250 yards rushing by both UofM & UVA, my optimism was dampened. I have been a diehard GT fball fan for 36 years, and during those 36 years we have had maybe one team (1990) that could hang with the current version of the Dawgs. Like Clemson, they are just that good at the moment. We will beat them again at some point, but I tend to believe their regression will be a big part of the reason when it happens.
Now getting back to congratulations, here are a few things that make me feel good about what we accomplished in 2018.
1) Offensively we are a highly flawed unit that I believe maxed out performance. I never thought we would be as productive as were offensively with our complete lack of a passing threat. I still can't believe what we did to Bud Foster in Blacksburg. That had to be the low point of his coaching career.
2) Over the course of the season we returned to being an opportunistic team that took advantage of opponent mistakes. That had been lost in 2017 but about half way through the season we got it back.
3) After a miserable start special teams became a strength. A sign of strong leadership is continuous improvement which we accomplished over the course of the season in almost every facet of ST's.
4) By the latter half of the season we were back to being a team making clutch plays in Q4 to win games rather than losing them. This is a big deal and the primary reason for an ugly 2017 outcome.
5) We implemented a drastically different defensive scheme with lots of mismatched piece parts and managed to make a difference in several games along the way, primarily via creation of disruptive plays (see #2 above).
6) Lastly & most importantly, after a miserable start to the season that closely resembled an extension of 2017, the team stuck together, stayed focused, and demonstrated great character in righting the ship. The surge that raised us from last to 2nd in the Coastal was quite satisfying to witness.
Looking ahead to 2019, I am very optimistic. I believe we have a returning group that can elevate us to Coastal champs and perhaps something a bit bigger. I believe it is very possible we will look back on the 2nd half of 2018 as the turning point that got the program back to playing like winners.
Now getting back to congratulations, here are a few things that make me feel good about what we accomplished in 2018.
1) Offensively we are a highly flawed unit that I believe maxed out performance. I never thought we would be as productive as were offensively with our complete lack of a passing threat. I still can't believe what we did to Bud Foster in Blacksburg. That had to be the low point of his coaching career.
2) Over the course of the season we returned to being an opportunistic team that took advantage of opponent mistakes. That had been lost in 2017 but about half way through the season we got it back.
3) After a miserable start special teams became a strength. A sign of strong leadership is continuous improvement which we accomplished over the course of the season in almost every facet of ST's.
4) By the latter half of the season we were back to being a team making clutch plays in Q4 to win games rather than losing them. This is a big deal and the primary reason for an ugly 2017 outcome.
5) We implemented a drastically different defensive scheme with lots of mismatched piece parts and managed to make a difference in several games along the way, primarily via creation of disruptive plays (see #2 above).
6) Lastly & most importantly, after a miserable start to the season that closely resembled an extension of 2017, the team stuck together, stayed focused, and demonstrated great character in righting the ship. The surge that raised us from last to 2nd in the Coastal was quite satisfying to witness.
Looking ahead to 2019, I am very optimistic. I believe we have a returning group that can elevate us to Coastal champs and perhaps something a bit bigger. I believe it is very possible we will look back on the 2nd half of 2018 as the turning point that got the program back to playing like winners.
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