Drinkwitz is on the hotseat
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Classy! I wonder what line of work he will be in when we play them again.
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My impressions:
In Game:
On the surface the defense didnât look great, but we have to consider App (last year at least) was one of the top offenses in the nation. Itâs also important to consider that speed was a factor for App breaking off three of those massive touchdown runs. Since their average third down position was 7.7 yards, I think that speaks volumes about how well the defense played outside of those three breakaway runs. I think Harris having played would have helped limit Apps breakaway run ability.
Offensively I was very impressed. This is now Reynoldsâ job and he earned it Saturday. The O line, much maligned in the off season as our big weakness, looked very good too. They did give up a few sacks and rushes, but overall they held firm against a very fast end run. The receivers also looked great, except for a few times when they didnât get into position in time.
Special Teams, still special. Have to work on closing off running lanes.
Honestly, we got beat by one guy. That Evans kid is impressive.
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Outside the game:
Boone: Not bad overall. Like a smaller Greenville in the mountains. Clearly a college town.
Kidd-Brewer: Surprisingly small feeling. It felt like their 29K was equal to our 19K last year. The hill is nice, but makes it feel like you have fewer people there than they do. Not sure of the construction on the home side but itâs erector set on the east stands (nothing wrong with that). To me JRS feels âbiggerâ and more permanent. If feeling bigger and sturdier earns us the UNC Concrete moniker than I can live with that.
I heard a shit-ton about how scenic Kidd-Brewer was. Maybe folks are talking about the view in winter because the hillside woods around it made it feel closed in to me. It was a much more claustrophobic view from the east stands on the left or the right and I donât remember any gorgeous mountain views from behind us either. Blowing Rock was very scenic, but Boone, not so much.
Fans: Didnât encounter a single issue with fans. Seemed friendly enough to me.
Also: this is a valuable picture to retain for future reference. Even successful programs have a hard time keeping fans after halftime:
Monday Morning thoughts:
Watched the game again last night.
Darrynton Evans is fast. wow. Heâs going to be a good back, and I would be stunned if he doesnât get a shot in the league.
Our kids have put in so much work in the offseason itâs unreal. We lost an NFL draft pick at tackle, and a fringe practice squad guy who was in the top 10 in college football in INTâs, but this is essentially the same roster, and we gave app all they could handle. Laskowski is a dude.
Alex Atkins is very good at his job. 6 sustained drives against that roster is impressive any way you cut it. Our presnap adjustments made me feel some type of way.
Healy has an aggressive philosiphy. Heâs the antithesis of Lambo ball.
Highsmith got bigger, faster, and stronger in the offseason.
Hope Deluca is ok. Wonder if something is up with Cruz.
Watts as an athletic pass rusher, but I do think he struggled to hold the edge. he has a long time to get better. We kept 12 moving, and that was good to see. He was just good enough to make the throws. Our interior D line is much better as well.
4/2/5 should have been great for stopping the short passing game, and we didnât do much of that. That said, that is an outstanding offense on the other side of the ball.
Special teams has lots of room for improvement. App didnât go after the first couple punts of the game, and you could tell our guys didnât expect them to go after the one that got blocked. That will be fixed.
Benny has gotten faster. Chris seemed faster than I remembered, and made great decisions with the ball all day.
Osbourne shut down his side of the field, but similar to the panthers with Josh Norman, we didnât have him follow anyone, he just stayed. Our lack of depth in the secondary showed at times, but once again, thatâs an incredible offense.
Freshman. Wow. Elder and Bemah were incredible. Canât wait to watch them grow and develop. Henderson is the real deal too.
I know this sounds crazy, but I actually thought we could have been better on offense. We have a very gifted tight end room we didnât get much from in the passing game. Our run blocking from the tight ends is much improved on last year.
Lots of room for improvement, but lots of good things too.
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Healy is PISSED this morning on 730. I love it. Says execution was terrible and we should have won. This is a new mentality.
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I overlooked Arizona State, so that is my mistake. And I was on the fence about including Boulder as part of Denver, because they are close and I donât know if people in Denver would consider UCBoulder a âhometown teamâ or not (despite them being nearly 30 miles apart). But to me it doesnât seem like Rutgers (35 miles from NYC), Akron (40 miles from Cleveland), or Stanford (35 miles from San Fran/Oakland) can count as being in the same city as an NFL team. They are certainly nearby, but they are also far enough out and near enough to other cities to be a different situation than Charlotte/Panthers or USF/Tampa etc. Also, unless Iâm overlooking something, neither Chicago nor Baltimore have FBS teams, which I didnât see on your list.
So I could say there are 20 applicable cities (adding in Tempe and Boulder) with 17 solid fanbases. If anything, I think this is a reason for optimism, not pessimism as was originally suggested.
clt says he doesnât seem too smart or a good coach
Forgot to include Chicago and Baltimore.
And FYI, Stanford is closer to San Fransisco than Leviâs Stadium in Santa Clara, so if San Fran doesnât have a college team, it doesnât have an NFL team either! If youâve ever been there all of the little cities and towns are just a giant metropolis. SAN fransisco itself isnt that big of a city from a land area standpoint. I think most people would consider Palo Alto, Stanford, and the rest of the south bay towns to be part of San Fran. San Jose is trying to carve out itâs own identity but itâs hard to argue itâs not all one big clusterfâ with the 49ers playing in Santa Clara.
Rutgers is 15 miles from Staten Island, and certainly in the metro area. Just because they dont play in Manhattan doesnt mean they arenât there. Hell, MetLife Stadium is probably about the same distance from the boroughs.
Its a fun conversation to have but not entirely relevant I dont think. Winning brings fans, losing doesnât. If you win in a large metro area fans come. If you win in a small town, fans come. If you lose in either situation they donât. It all comes down to success on the field.
Charlotte and App could play each other in a bowl game before 2026.
Would hope thatâs the fertile myrtle bowl
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Only matchup theoretically better for the MBB would be Coastal versus us or App, maybe GaSo.
Sorry if I missed it in the shoutbox, but what is Delucaâs status? Harrisâ too.
Some crowd shots. I felt like we had at least 3 solid green sections around us up top. Not sure how it was below or on the hill.
https://twitter.com/NelsonAerials/status/1170501854289170433?s=20
Section 114 near the scoreboard had a rowdy Ninerâs crowd!
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Who you calling rowdy!?!
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Heâs obviously talking about my son 
If any of your students or other fans were treated poorly I want to apologize of behalf of AppFans. I heard there were some App students on the hill being idiots. Not the way we like to roll. We have some pretty upset folks here about this.
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I walked through the student tailgate and got some stuff yelled at me, but I could have easily gone around. I just didnât feel like walking extra in the heat. I figured thatâs just the price you pay for laziness. If any opposing fan of any team walks through a student tailgate and doesnât expect that they are insane. Certainly no reason to clutch the pearls.
Every app fan I met outside of that mosh pit was nice as they could be, except when discussing ted roof.
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