The Orange offense did reasonably well on first down plays on Saturday afternoon but they committed too many mistakes and were unable to convert on 3rd downs as well as they had done in prior weeks.
Syracuse
actually went pretty run heavy on early downs in the first half. Success was helped by Yasin Willis’ big 35 yard run. If the Orange had turned their first two drives, which went into Duke territory, into touchdowns maybe it would have been a different contest.
Instead Syracuse came away with only 3 points and then struggled to do anything on offense until late in the third quarter. By that time the game was out of hand and the Blue Devils had backed off their pressure.
Mistakes at inopportune times cost the Orange. Collins’ had a first down interception, plus the ball slipping out of his hand. Johntay Cook fumbled on the first play of the second half and in a couple of spots, penalties put Syracuse behind the sticks.
The overall numbers are why the offense graded very well on PFF, but unlike the previous week, Syracuse missed the explosive plays in this one. The offense didn’t get the ball to Justus Ross-Simmons, Dan Villari or Darrell Gill as often as prior weeks. You can see that the Orange aren’t the offense of last year which could go on long 10+ play drives. This year they need to hit those big chunk plays to be successful and it didn’t happen against Duke.
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Chart failed to load. Please refresh the page.
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Fran Brown wants a better gameplan this week, so we’ll see Jeff Nixon can scheme up some better big-play chances at SMU? It looks like the Orange need that if they want to win on the road.
