Game#4: Bowling Green @ Virginia Tech:

(1-2) Bowling Green @ (2-1) Virginia Tech:

TV coverage: ESPNU: 12:01pm
Announcers:
Tom Hart (pbp)
John  Congemi

Vegas line:
VT is a 21.5  point favorite
o/u=48 points
$-Line: bet 12 to win 1 on VT, and bet 1 to win 8.5 on B.Green

Virginia Tech returns home after being pawed by a suddenly upstart Pitt Panther football team with seemingly more question-marks than solutions in tow.

Bowling Green has beaten Idaho by one play, hung within two plays of Florida and a play and a half of Toledo. That to me would aver a medium level Mid-American Conference football team of moderate capabilities and of likewise moderate strength. Or to put it another way Bowling Green could prolly go 4 up and 8 down on the current twenty-twelve Virginia Tech football schedule.

So to me this one is really only about Virginia Tech, as Bowling Green will need some Hokie assistance to steal this one down in the New River Valley.

How will O’Cain and Stiney respond in the aftermath of Pittsburgh? Will they go back to basics? Will they turtle? Or will they stick to their variety max guns and simply ride this 2012 offensive storm right on out?

Bud Lyte will very likely respond well enough. The early returns suggest and edgy week of practice outta them. However, they are hurting in the secondary and at Linebacker alike and this Bowling Green Qb can throw it around a bit.

Hokie Special teams appear to be solid of not potentially electrifying as return capabilities go. So right now Virginia Tech really should win and go ahead and stop me if you’ve heard that one before, or within a calendar week.

 

Top–10:

1. 231 INT’s by VT since 2000, good for first-best in the nation.
2. Due to injury only two starting Hokie oLinemen have played every appointed starting snap. (Miller and Painter)
3. Only three Hokies are in double-digits as knock-down blocks go thus far. (Miller 14, Painter 11, Becton 10)
4. 45 of the 59 Hokies who played at Pitt have eligibility remaining beyond the 2012 season, 32 of those 45 have 2+ years left. (i.e. this is a young football team)
5. Bowling Green only has five all-star candidates in terms of the M.A.C. pre-season all-M.A.C. teams three deep (i.e. first, second, and third stings).
6. Six hokies have catches of 20+ yards this season, so there is: “a flicker here and a glimmer there.”
7. 37-1. VT is 37 up and one down vs. its last 38 non-conference foes in Lane.
8. 28, as in VT has fielded twenty-eight different starters already this season.
9. Bowling Green is 97th in pass defense and 1o7th in pass efficiency defense so now might be a good time to air it out.
10. Tenth. As in Jack Tyler is 10th in America in tackles per game with 11.67 per contest.

3 or 4 wide shotgun spread Bowling Green offense: (, 8 back)

• 4 wide, 1 back, short to intermediary passing, read option,
• almost has a California or West-Coast flavor to the B.Green passing attack
• sloppy infraction and error prone, drops are an issue as well
• red-state offense that appears risk-adverse
• regulation sized
• 5 underclassmen start

  

Right now and from what I’m seeing, I am seeing a version of Pittsburgh Lyte outta this twenty-twelve Bowling Green possession unit. Qb Matt Schliz (just like Tino) can become streaky hot as his two 400+ yard passing performances and 3,000+ total yards from last year suggest. Right now he has been on a 66% completion percentage tear for eight quarters play; and yet his total aerial yardage has been averaging out in the mid-200’s and his completion percentage has plummeted by 12.1 percent when playing pitch-n-catch in your house. Matt has also authored 3o career picks for a reason and he has not closed out games well this campaign at 41.7% during the forth quarter for 2012. That said there is still something happy-go-lucky about this kid and he is well experienced enough as an impoverished mans gun-slinging Pivot or Qb. The Bowling Green rushing attack basically fields a supped of Pitts of A.Peay fame in #6 Anthon Samuel who is fresh off of M.A.C. rookie of the year honors at Tb for Bowling Green. Samuel will remind you of our very own M.Holmes as he is just a tad undersized at 183 lbs.l and in apparent lack of Usain Bolt game-breaking speed when he runs. In fact for you yesteryear folks, there is something positively #45 Eddie Hunter mid-1980’s about his game.

 The Bowling Green pass-catchers have been drop prone all year as Butterfingers is clearly their favorite snack du jour. Observe that their top-4 pass catches are all bound between 7 and 13 yards per grab, which tells you something regarding the lack of game-changing ability here and the preferred mid-range to underneath passing mantra of Bowling Green alike. The Bowling Green offensive-line is a rather East-West or finesse oriented one and they are much better inside at G-C-G than out (at Ot). Two freshman starters up-front will do that to you although Tb Samuel can do some intelligible work between the hashmarks when give the necessary room to do so where his stutter-step and darty forward leaning core-strength style can keep the sticks moving. Samuel will catch a pass outta the backfield and we just saw that the squeaky Wheel (route) gets the oil to be sure. As you can see in the pic you will get a lotta shotgun and single-back looks outta these Falcons, so there should not be any mystery as to who gets the ball when they run. And don’t forget that Qb M.Schiz is a yo-yo effect or up-n-down thrower who never met an open football player that he did not like. Regardless of the uniform color they were wearing.

4-3 base Bowling Green defense: (10 return)

• 4-3 Lb’s backed up off LOS, medium-man, shell-2
• Slanting and blitzing to fight the run galore
• 3-3-5 look in passing situations
• possibly the best front-7 defender in the M.A.C. in #91 C.Jones
• slightly undersized
• stays home vs. the run very well (i.e. our reveres and counters may not work)
• 5 sophomores start (A.K.A. they are a bit young)
• lotta Man underneath and on edges with Cover-2 or Shell-2 behind that
• couple of dings and dents in play here as well

  

On tape this is a Bowling Green defense that appears to rally well enough to the ball. Clearly they prioritize stopping the run first second and maybe even third. This can in effect leave them pass poor at times. They do flow well to the football in front-7 terms and although not overly athletic nor overtly fast they are savvy and well coached in terms of keying the run. I also noticed that 2 outta 3 or sometimes 3 outta 3 Linebacker target the exact same key. This would aver an opportunity for a secondary Virginia Tech ball-carrier to do some smart work behind the first key in the opposite direction which raises the possibility of some Fb carries or maybe even some work for the other Tb per se in our Ace formation. The Falcons secondary plays a variety of Man on the edges or on the slot. The cushion tends to be a bit deeper on the outside vis-à-vis the middle of the field and the Ss will cheat forward to check an opposing Te in man. I also saw what appeared to be some openings behind the Cb’s when the line-up in apparent medium-man and instead switch off into a forward zone. One of the things the Bowling Green Safeties do not do well is rotate over in coverage. There should be some room to work some edge patters here 15-25 yards downfield and we all know how much Coach O’Cain likes his precious sidelines indeed. The Bowling Green defense is a chirpy one, and they will sometimes engage you in post-play dialogue. They are not soft or totally unauthentic, although they can at times become too emotionally involved in fighting the inside-run as their Linebacking first step tends to be forward at the expense of the occasional difficulty in chasing outside beyond the hashmarks. They have one bell-cow Dt #91 Chris Jones. They deploy a true Rover in lieu of a Will or WLb. Their second layer is a touch lightweight with all three starters south of 227 lbs. Though they do play well enough as Linebacking is clearly the strength of the Falcon defense not named Chris Jones. The Bowling Green secondary is undersized in vertical terms with nobody taller than 5`10“ in their hind-4 starting line-up. They have one all-conference candidate -#24 “boo-boo” Gates Whip- in a rather inexperienced secondary that appears to lack play-makers as they only have a single pass pilfered out of 88 passes attempted against or 1.13%.

Bowling Green Special Teams (both legs return):
Right now this is one of the lesser kicking games we will face all season long if Bowling Green holds to Punt and Kick form. Punting is weak at 1o2^nd in net punting and punt-coverage is a mirror image at 1o1^st best overall. Ergo, #34 K.Jarrett has to salivating at the opportunity to catch a wall right or left and plum clip these Falcons wings. Place-kicking right now is basically F.U.B.A.R. as Bowling Green is already on their second FG Kicker of the year. That’s not good this early on and neither is 75% on P.A.T.’s and an abysmal 25% on FGA’s.  The Falcon return game is highly pedestrian at 69^th in punt returns and 70^th in kickoffs taken back. Not a lot beyond a couple of average return guys and good KO coverage (17^th best) to see here folks and things fall off and fast after that. (Bowling Green special-teams letter-grade: D+, just too many points left on the field and too much danger of giving up the same to do any better than that)

Illation, Conclusion(s), OPT digits:
Maybe I’m getting too caught up in my own narrative for once, and yet again our Fake I.D. offense has no sense of its lawful self. I do expect special-teams to be very good, maybe even great vs. this mismatched counterpart. I feel pretty good that Coach Foster will stock some more Bud Stout –or at least pour that entire skunked Bud Lyte down the drain. It is the Virginia Tech offense however intriguers and simultaneously beleaguers me here.

Can we stand the sight of our very own shadow if we continue to attempt via variety max to dislodge ourselves from our very own offensive shell? Or will we turtle, say –yet again- that we had to “simply things” and “get back to basics” at about 3:30pm Saturday afternoon? Right now I don’t know though I do know that history and regression analysis alike suggests the later. However, and in this particular case, I also know from informed film-study that this 2012 Bowling Green defense is semi good at one thing –stopping the run- and rather user-friendly at another –stopping the pass. That would appear –and strongly- to invite a wide open approach in terms of airing it out and hopefully allowing LT3 and company to get back on track. Airing it out puts the rock in our best offensive players hands full time and might just loosen things up to get the suddenly stuck 2012 Virginia Tech rushing attack back on track below.

The weather will not be a factor so this one is all about Virginia Tech. The ceiling version will beat Bowling Green by 20+, maybe more with some Falcon turnover prone help. The version that just got floored last week up in the Keystone state will win by 24-10 or something that lacks sexxy like that.

CLOSER:
I looked, yes-sirree, I did indeed. After last week I did a double-check in triplicate. I’m as sure as I can be after last week and the betting public is too. As the point-spread has plummeted almost 5 full points since the line  opened five days ago. Right now Virginia Tech is a relatively mere 16.5 point favorite over 1-2 M.A.C.’tastic Bowling Green, at home of all things. With one caveat firmly in place, #6 of Bowling Green.

Right now Bud Ice needs to stick to one dimensional teams via self-definition. Preferably uno-dimensional teams that can not pass. IF #6 of Bowling Green (A.K.A. Anthon Samuel) going, that will really start to open things up for seasoned yet quite streaky Schliz kid at Qb for the Falcons. Bowling Green defends the run fair enough at 39^th best at such in point of fact. That posits the mytharc that Bowling Green could possibly make Virgina Tech a sporting singularity indeed. If that is the case we will suddenly and abruptly have  real live game on our hands that everyone thought we would win by ’round 30 odd points just 7 days ago. Right now I’m hoping that Bud Lyte is at least on Ice and comes out loaded for bear. If that is the case Bud will out-coach and out-scheme Bowling Green all by his ownself. We still have enough sticks and stones left to take care of that much — at least over on defense. On offense? I’m not so sure either way. Though I am sure that Virginia Tech should win this one, at least I’m pretty sure because I sure did like the Bowling Green Qb rating metric allowed. 159.9 allowed is about as about as inviting as it gets; accordingly lets all hope that O’Cain and Stiney accept the invitation.

Virginia Tech=3o, Bowling Green=15

“LETS GO!“

“Hokies!“

bourbonstreet**