Late Late Game recap

[Captain Kangaroo]

Game Recap (Very late…but unfortunately work sometimes gets in the way of my hobby)What an unbelievable weekend! Where to begin? The wife and I arrived in Raleigh around 2pm. Our hotel was right on campus, about 4 miles from the stadium. Hillsborough Avenue was a great place to go out at night. It didn’t offer the pre-game night environment of Penn State, but it was a great time nonetheless.Saturday: We set up shop for our tailgate around 8:15am. Tents, beer, grill…and the parking was FREE (Did I just hear Pat Kreiger have a heart attack?). We hooked up with a few other Zips fans as time rolled on. Had the pleasure of meeting SoFlaZip. Great guy, and a very astute football fan. He brought some awesome Carolina barbeque with him, and Peach moonshine too. I will soon initiate a ZipsNation fund drive to get him up for the home opener. Please donate generously!Once about 11:30am rolled around we packed up shop and headed for the stadium. To get there we walked through a corridor of several thousand students, fans, etc. all partying pretty hard. It was definitely impressive…something the likes of which I hope to see at Zips games one day. Several NC State fans approached me before the game with well wishes. I didn’t meet one jerk the entire time in Raleigh. In fact, it was quite the opposite. The people couldn’t have been nicer. Many of the college girls wore red or red/white dresses to the game. Hands down the prettiest girls per capita I’ve ever seen. They alone were worth the flight 1 ½ hour flight!All right…on to the game. The place was packed. Mike Waddell is trying to assemble a “Sea of Red” for the Akron/Cincinnati game. He could go to school off the NC State’s fans. 57,000 were in attendance and about 50,000 wore the red. The students and fans alike were very vocal. Lots of cheers…the best being when one side of the stadium roared “WOLF” and the other responded, “PACK.” Lots of great graphics on the multiple Jumbotrons…again, something I hope to see at Zips games one day. The Wolfpack team emerged from the stands via a fan-level tunnel and walked through the crowd down to the field (as opposed to entering from a field-level tunnel). It was pretty cool.Once the game began, it was pretty evident NC State was red-ripe for the picking. There was no real size or speed advantage from the BCS-anointed Wolfpack. In fact, the Zips appeared to be even quicker than the ‘Pack, with Dennis Kennedy breaking off several nice runs on wide sweeps. Our running backs almost NEVER successfully take the ball wide in BCS games. It was amazing that we only had a 7-point lead at the half, considering how the had Zips dominated every facet of the game to that point. I’ll break off the paragraph format at this time and go into random note format…it’s already Wednesday for Rick Chryst’s sake:Kennedy was a stud. To have 25+ carries against such a premier defense for the second consecutive week and still finish off the game as strong as he did…with his third TD…was the stuff legends are made of. In a post last week I predicted 15 TD’s for Dennis this season. I may be on the low side. Complementing Kennedy, Walker showed some real quickness on his few carries. If Kennedy is going to last a 14 game season, he’s going to need a break every now and then. Looks like Walker will be a great change of pace back. Hope his carries increase as the season goes on. I also think the duo of Tuzze and McDaniel is working out well. Have two fresh blocking backs seems to be a big help to Dennis. It’s a luxury Brett Biggs never had.Luke ran for his life much of the game. If he did ever get time to throw, it usually was nullified by a holding penalty. I believe the Zips had 16 penalties? That’s utterly amazing. Some of that was BS home cooking by the ACC refs, but much of it was legit. I thought the holds that happened late in the game we the result of exhaustion. But on thing struck me as odd. Crouch was benched…reason unknown…in the 4th quarter. If I recall correctly, Kemme moved to the left side, and Schepp filled the spot vacated by Kemme. After that switch, no more holding calls. Coincidence? Do we see a shake up within the Zips OL 2-deep for CMU this week? As mentioned on this board several times in August…David Harvey is blatantly awesome. He’s pretty much the #1 WR in my book. Jabari was seemingly invisible for the first 119 minutes of the season, but came up HUGE on the last drive. I hope the competition brought on by Harvey’s emergence sparked something. BTW: Where’s Johnny Long?Kasparek was really no factor in the game…at least with his hands. Did we keep in to help pass-blocking? Beats me, but I hope we can get him the ball soon. He’s too good an offensive weapon to stay in the blocks.Talking to some “newer” Zips fans after the game is was interesting to hear some critical opinions regarding the Zips defensive showing. I can’t buy into that at all. Compared to the Zips defenses I’ve watched over the past 15 years, this one is awe-inspiring. Stopping the opponent on 3rd down is now almost expected. BCS-level opponents now need to ice their punter’s leg after the game. Unheard of! Take away Morelli’s perfectly tossed bomb to begin the Penn State game and the Zips have totally taken away the “big play” from the opposition. Again, unheard of! I was disappointed we let NC State convert that 4th and 5 into what could have been the game winning TD on such a simple, and predictable, RB screen. But overall, despite being on the road in the severe heat and humidity, our defense played one hell of a game. Stec shows great promise, but something needs to be done on his punts. He’s either taking too long to boot it, or the blocking is terrible. Or both. Regardless there needs to be some shoring-up of the punting game very soon, or one of these times it’s going to bite us.As some others stated, Groza had a great game. He’s really developed into a solid player.What can you say about Luke? He’s as cold-blooded as they come. How daunting a task was it to follow an act like C-Frye? It really didn’t even take a full season for Luke to escape Charlie’s shadow. He’s pretty much established his own identity as “Mr. Clutch.” He’s a winner personified. I know Chuck Amato would give his left nut to have Luke instead of Stone. The one question that results from his latest performance is: Since Luke seems to have such a penchant for late-game heroics, why not institute a little no-huddle into the Zips repertoire? The drawback is that we risk a quick 3-and-out. But if you look at Luke’s performance at the end of the NIU Championship game…the two quick TD’s at the end of the Motor City Bowl…the NC State 4th quarter…I have to believe no-huddle is worth a look? In the interest of full disclosure: I’m not a coach…and for good reason… so what do I know?After the game I had the opportunity to thank one of the player’s parents for giving me the thrill of winning such a landmark game. The parent was very gracious, but you could tell they didn’t know the pain so familiar to those of the ZipsNation prior their son coming to Akron. I now realize that, if you’ve only been part of the Zips family for two or three years, you really only know winning. 7-5 under Charlie. MAC Championship and a Bowl game last year. BCS win to start off 2006. “New” Zips fans almost expect to win games like the NC State match up. It’s time everyone does.A final closing note: A local writer wrote a Zips related column a few weeks ago that, amongst other things, stated the Zips should be playing YSU. That the Zips would get beat up both physically and mentally by the big, bad BCS teams they faced to start the season. He inferred the game was really all about the money. The Zips got paid $325,000 to travel to Raleigh and physically beat down an ACC school. Yes, it was NC State that had their hands on their hips, gasping for air as the Zips pushed them down field late in the 4th quarter. The Zips didn’t get lucky. Far from it. Despite playing Penn State the week prior…despite the heat and the pundits and the opposing crowd and the 100million dollar facility…the Zips won. They were the better team and they won. To be honest, it could be said the Zips played well below their capabilities, as evidenced by the 16 penalties. And yet they beat an ACC school on the road. It begs the question: “What are we capable of when we put together a ‘complete’ game?” I hope I find out this week.

[GoZips88]

Thanks for the recap Captain! I planned a similar road trip with my son but had to cancel for a number of reasons just before pulling the trigger on plane tickets. Thanks for heading out on the road and representing the rest of us! The thought of putting Youngstown State back on the schedule makes me want to hurl We are showing that we belong on the same field as most of the other D1 schools and need to put 1-AA behind us. The expanded schedule makes that tricky but I'd rather play North Texas or Troy instead of YSU.

[ZipDude]

Excellent recap My Captain. I only got a small taste from talking to my son who saw part of the game on the ESPN Bonus Coverage. It also sounds like JD did some nice game management at the end of the game. Is it fair to assume that the O line did better in this game. How about Crouch did he play like a Senior leader 4 year starter? Also Kimme, did he "get it" after the PSU game? Thanks again

[GP1]

Good report. Be careful not to trick the masses CK. They will start to tell us that the $3.00 game day parking is too much. Just so you guys know, not all parking there is free. I know many of you think it should be free, but it wasn't. A large part of their fans actually pay through the nose to park.The tailgating was good. I had a real nice guy sitting behind me who explaind how seating and parking works there. They have it all figured out. He told me that people own their own individual spots and gave a lifetime donation for the spots. The people there also purchased something similar to a PSL that gives them lifetime access to their seat. It was $2,500 per seat for the PSL. All of the black chairback attachments for the benches were people who dontated $2,500. There were thousands of these seats set up. That's how they helped build all that nice stuff around the stadium. Akron could do something similar to this on a smaller scale when the time comes to build a new stadium. People could have their own spot for basketball and football games. My guess is State does this same thing as their basketball arena is the hockey arena next to the stadium.There are parts of the stadium that have seats, not benches, like an NFL stadium. Another great idea if we ever get a new stadium. Very comfortable.Carolina pulled pork sandwiches in the stadium............mmmmmm pork.I don't know how many of you had a chance to look at the pressbox closely, but only a small portion of the box is used for the press and coaches. Everything else is like club seating. And I don't mean a small section either. This pressbox was HUGE.Could the grass have looked nicer? It looked like an astroturf field it was so perfect......even at the end of the game it looked great.One guy has a parking spot very close to the stadium that has a slight downhill grade to it. He built a small deck as wide as the spot and about ten feet long so he can back his truck up to it and tailgate on a level seating area. This level of dedication to tailgating deserves a .My only complaint about the stadium, and it really isn't the stadium, is that I have never been in a stadium where there is such a constant stream of fans walking up and down the steps. They were all State fans too. Akron fans seem to go to a game to watch the game. State fans seem to go to a game to be seen walking up and down the steps. For a while I thought it was only our section, but it was happening everywhere.

[Captain Kangaroo]

Is it fair to assume that the O line did better in this game. How about Crouch did he play like a Senior leader 4 year starter? Also Kimme, did he "get it" after the PSU game?

All can say is I never saw so many holding calls in a game. In the late 3rd quarter Crouch got called for something...facemask or holding, I forget. He wigged out...picked up the flag...started jawing with the refs...and had to be restrained by some of the other OL's. Very disappointing loss of composure in such a close, critical game. Especially from a senior.Crouch didn't see the field after that outburst. And the holding calls subsided. It will be interesting to see the starting OL this week. Glad to see the 'Dude still checks out the board!

[GoZips]

I think we can pretty much forget about Youngstown.Penn State is going to take their frustrations out on YSU this coming Saturday. Thatshould cure YSU of visions of misplaced granduer.The Zips have a home date open for 2007. YSU could be a last ditch fill in. Thisprogam deserves and needs a quality I-A opponent.For the pipe dreamers: There is no way Akron plays at Youngstown. This will not happen.

[bobbyake]

YSU travelling to Akron would draw a good size crowd. Possibly a sell out. It's hard to pass that up.

[ZipDude]

CK. I thought LO and KU made a mistake with him in the beginning. He was always a complainer and IMHO did not do an adequate job protecting 5's backside and now Getsey's. I really dont care that he is All-MAC Academic. They should sit his big ass and put someone in there who wants to play. We have a championship to defend in hostile territory. Those are for my little buddy Yep, I am watching

[UADavid]

and the parking was FREE (Did I just hear Pat Kreiger have a heart attack?).

But on thing struck me as odd. Crouch was benched…reason unknown…in the 4th quarter. If I recall correctly, Kemme moved to the left side, and Schepp filled the spot vacated by Kemme

You are correct and I believe the reason he was benched was because of the facemask penalty he committed on the series before. He was melting down and was pulled off the field before getting tossed by the ref. I hope Kemme is our new left tackle. All three td's came over Chris. Once when he was right tackle, and two over left. The boy can play. After crouch left, we started moving the ball again. We also don't need a team leader who seems to lose his head every game. If he would or could move his feet, he wouldn't get flagged so often. All the linemen need to improve their games. Holding penalties, false starts, etc. really killed some momentum the offense was developing.

How about Crouch did he play like a Senior leader 4 year starter

I've watched the game four times and I don't think he played well. Slow and out of shape is how he looked to me.

YSU travelling to Akron would draw a good size crowd. Possibly a sell out

I don't think so. I also don't want to play them. They can't help us, but I'm not worried about them anymore. We couldn't beat them when Gerry was coaching. 2-6-1