Saturday saw the NC State Wolfpack play the first truly important football game the program has seen since the Rivers’ era. State, off to 4-0 start, hosted Virginia Tech, and the game was a chance for the Pack to cement themselves as a legitimate class of the conference and a favorite to play in the ACC championship game following a convincing road victory over defending champion Georgia Tech.
The Pack was nationally ranked for the first time since 2003, when a guy by the name by Phillip Rivers, who you might have heard of, was under center. A win last Saturday would mean that a 5-0 State would have cemented its place at the top of the conference, and would have made them the favorites to take the Atlantic. After three years of stops and starts under O’Brien, things were finally on the way up.
The NCSU turn around this year has been fueled by the defense. A defense that couldn’t tackle, couldn’t defend the pass, and got torched by Duke last year has turned into a unit that has been getting into the back field and making life very difficult for opposing quarterbacks. But Virginia Tech’s massive offense line, stable of running backs and an excellent performance by Tyrod Taylor revealed that they are simply not ready for prime time. Virginia Tech averaged a staggering 8.6 yards a carry as a team, gouging NC State over and over on its way to its comeback victory.
The NC State offense garnered some impressive offense statistics. The team rushed for 166 yards on 33 carries, averaging 4.4 yards a carry as a team. Mustafa Green led all rushers with 94 yards on 10 carries. Russell Wilson added another 10 carries and 42 yards on the ground, while throwing for an incredible 362 yards and 3 touchdowns.
But when you dig a little deeper, you see that Bud Foster and Frank Beamer’s defense did a better job than you would think at first glance. Russell’s yards came on 21 completions and 49 attempts, a paltry 43%, with 3 interceptions. Virginia Tech’s defense has at no point this season looked like the kind of unit fans up in Blacksburg are used to seeing, but it was able to pressure Russell and force him into mistakes.
NC State just did not run the ball enough. Even if you remove Mustafa Green’s long run from his totals, he still averaged 5 yards a carry on his remaining 9 carries. For the first time in the Tom O’Brien era, NC State appears to have a budding stud running back in the backfield, and in a game in which Russell was struggling to complete passes and was throwing uncharacteristic interceptions, the team should have leaned on Green and instead chose to ride Wilson.
What we saw Saturday was two teams that stuck to their guns, one with success, and the other without. State stuck with their “Live or die with Russell” strategy and they came up short, despite accruing 500+ total yards. Virginia Tech, despite being down, stuck with what they do best and gashed the State defense on their way to victory. It was running and special teams, with key turnovers that led the Hokies to a win over the Pack, and for the Pack, it was a porous defense and mental mistakes on special teams that doomed them. It’s an old story for Pack fans, one they have tired of seeing.
So instead of making that big step up into prime time, the Pack now see themselves sitting at 1-1 in conference and with that bright and shiny defense that looked so good against UCF and Cincinnati looking just as poor as State fans are accustomed to at this point, with BC, FSU and Clemson looming on the schedule. While the VTech loss doesn’t doom their chances at the Atlantic title on paper, the shine has definitely come off this team.
But despite not having his best game, Russell Wilson is still one of the top quarterbacks in the conference, and the team still managed to get pressure on Taylor with 4 sacks, and the receiving core is still very good. State fans still have something to hope for, but once again, it looks like it is going to be another year in which things rise and fall with Russell.
