#14 Virginia Tech @ france:

TV Coverage: ESPN or ABC
Announcers: Clavy Matvick, David Diaz-Infante and Chris Slade
Vegas Line: france+17, O/U=42

The Commonwealth Cup.

Le` arch-in-state rivalry game.

Al deGroh’s swan song.

Our 10 game seasonal win streak must survive 8 more quarters of mortal jeopardy.

There are enough story lines, sub-plots, cameos, curtain calls and understudies in this one to even de-funk a rather (bored) Will –freaking- Stewart.

I am also mutually personally and professionally curious to see if the Sabre honors the rematch clause to last years final Men’s hoops game fight-song wager and publishes “Hokie Hokie Hokie Hi” on their Message Boards after we make the french sit on our lap to close the Chessmeisters era. (no smiling or wiggling allowed)

Can france win?
Nope.
This one is over. Done. Thru. Read on to find out by just how much.

Top-10:

1. One. The french are 1-5 in paris this year. (BONUS: VT has only allowed 1 offensive TD in its last 12 quarters of play.
   

   WOW!

2. Twenty-two. As in the french are 22^nd in Pass Efficiency Defense and 19^th in Passing Defense this season. Clearly the maginot line is stronger the further away you get from the line-of-scrimmage.
3. Three.  TT is in first place with the least INT’s of any fulltime starting D-1 Qb with 3.
4. Forty-four. If injured hoo Qb sewell can not go; back-up Qb verica is a juxtaposed 44.4% passing on the year. A Spread scheme based Pivot (Qb) He simply is not. Sources also report that verica’s head is concussed.
5. Five. france has drooped their last 5 season finales and is a lowly 44-71-4 in their last regular season game all-time.
6. Six. As in the Paint-Shop (Vincent Painter) has now quietly logged 6 plays on the year!
7. Seven. As in Cody Grimm has already forced 7 fumbles on the year. This leads all of D-1 and is an A.C.C. record!
8. Eighty-four. As in R.Will has broken a jaw dropping 84 tackles already on the year and could bust the centennial mark before our Bowl ends. WOW!
9. Nine. Meaning Frank is 13-9 all-time vs. france. (or 59%)
10. Ten. As in VT is now 1-10 in coin-tosses this season.

french offensive X’s and O’s:

• Will deploy either a Pro-set (Qb under Center) or a Spread look from the shotgun.
  

  Spread package.

• I noticed a whole lotta Trapping when the french go Wildcat with Simpson or hall lined up at Qb in the Shot-gun. Jus’ key the pulling Guard to follow the play.
• france however will cross you up with a very seldom seen revere-pull of their G.
• Short passing team.
• Tons of Qb hurts.
• Couple of decent Rb’s and not much else.

Seriously folks, this quite possibly the bottom feeding first-worst offense in all of D-1 football. Chris already gave you the digits; though a couple are worth presenting in a different format.

There is just not a whole lot to love here folks. This french offense is so impotent; I am even

toying with picking goose-egg shutout as I type.  I do kinda respect on simpson’s running ability; and Hall is so dangerous as a player that Ima gonna have to capitalize his surname in tribute. france does have one good Offensive Tackle (Ot) and one above average Guard. After that they have been thinned by injuries and even Jenny Craig can not thin you out post going on a Thanksgiving drumstick binge like this many hurts can…

1. all-everything Guard morgan moses has classroom ills and is out for the year
2. rod wheeler (a quality Tight End) transferred.
3. keith payne (a back-up Rb) quit.
4. dominique wallace; uva’s best Rb is done for the year (Foot).
5. torrey mack has a bum ankle as the back-up Rb right now. (Questionable)
6. javaris brown a back-up Wide Receiver (Wr) blew out his ankle.
7. tim smith another back-up at Wr has a bad back (Questionable for our game).
8. raynard horne a Wr and critical ST’s player has a bad back (Questionable).
9. marc verica, has a concussion at Qb.
10. jameel sewell who is a pretty good Qb has had a blizzard of hurts and is nursing a bum shoulder right now. (will play)
11. vic hall (multi Position player) has been dinged and dented all year long.
12. mikell simpson hurt his hammie and ankle on the same leg at the same time on the same play vs. Klempson last week. (Questionable)

See what I mean? Very tough to be much of anything on offense with such a deluge of skill-position hurts; immediately after you have switched to a Spread Offense for the first time last spring. The book on that says 24 months of transition and then 1-2 years to real wind the Spread Offense all the way on out. That would put france on schedule to get right with the Spread by 2012; as this year has been a total wipe out. The one thing the french are good at on offense is Red Zone efficiency. 11th best when they do get inside an opponents 20 yard line. Though they have only been there 27 times this year which ranks uva as 3rd from last in Red Zone trips to begin with.

As such, guess hoos 5th from last in Time of Possession (TOP) and as such segueing neatly now …  guess which unit is getting worn out?

french defensive X’s and O’s:

• Base 3-4 set.
  

  3-4 look

• Will morph into a 5-2 or quasi 4-3 look situationally or on short-yardage.
• Playing a little Man-to-Man this year; though still many more traditional Zone drop looks as commonly found in most standardized 3-4 sets.
• Linebackers (Lb’s) are uncovered (i.e. not stacked) and easier to get to.
• Though their Lb’s do take deep 5 yard drops off the LOS pre-snap.
• Not a great tackling team, less than epic Euclidean angles as well.
• Not a whole lotta speed outta the Inside-Linebackers (ILb’s) for france. Zone-Stretch plays come to mind as such.
  

  5-2 morph

The french stop-unit has been a good deal less insalubrious than the french offense has this year. For that reason, they are a semi-solid 47th in Total Defense and a very keen 22nd in Pass Efficiency Defense this year. Not half bad. As you already know the french field a 3-4 base defense. That makes normal or short week preparation a bit testy because you seldom see the 3-4 defense below the N.F.L. level. All the more so on a Holiday week when you have to travel to play in paris which further truncates perp’ time even further.

In film study I was simply not impressed by this french defense. Will and Chris are higher on this 3-4 than I am. Phil likely will be as well. Why am I so much lower than they are on the hoo stop-unit this year? Because…

• I saw guys flat out quit in pursuit vs. Klempson last week. Nothing good about that.
• I did not see much athleticism or quicks outta the french Inside Linebackers (ILb’s).
• And I was not overly impressed by the undersized french Nose-Guard (Ng). In the 3-4 everything begins and can end with a suspect Ng who can not control the two A-Gaps that he faces immediately in front of him.
• Then there is the chart below…

When you add that all up; france has been out-gained by an average of 171 yards overall per game. Now take a closer look at the rushing column and its red or negative numbers. Getting run over by over 120 yards per game on average is not a good thing with Ryan -Nutrasweet- Williams coming to town. Not at all folks. Nor is the Cover-1 look I repeatedly saw outta the french pass-coverage scheme(s). More on that below as I am running outta space in this section.

Special Teams:
Chris nailed this one down pat. uva has a potential all-Conference quality Kicker and not much else. Also note the horne injury listed above that is not helping in kick or punt coverage; not one iota. Or, in other words … except for the very quality uva Kicker; this is hands down the least great Special-Teams unit we’ve faced all year and they are very impoverished at setting up field-position. If you have to drive long-fields vs. Bud Fosteryou are in for a long afternoon up in paris with such a pitifully inert offense.

Fourm-Guide:
In Boxing this form of intense analysis compares and contrasts how fighters fared vs. common opponents. I knew the numbers would indeed favor VT; though even I was astonished by just how much…

When you crunch the Fourm Guide digits the results were dazzling to say the least. Taken in absolute value Margin based terms…

• VT’s average rushing edge = +227 yards to the good
• VT’s average passing edge = +119 yards to the good
• VT’s average scoring edge = +32.4 yards to the good

WOW! If you are a most welcome uva visitor; simply turn those numbers around (make ‘em negative) to see your deficit when we compare how VT and uva fared when playing common opponents this year.  I did throw the UNC game out as a statistical outlier due to mitigating injuries that rendered the result non sequitur.

Illation, conclusion(s) and prediction:
Still … for my money, R.Will has been ever so slightly slowing down for weeks and now big Ed Wang has hurt his knee. (don’t freak, he’ll play). Though we do recover the 3-4 play-calling reconnoiterering services of one B.War at Center; who is a notch above Via on Inside-Zone blocks. Conversely the french are quite lame at this time as health -or lack thereof- goes. C’est la guerre.

I said above I’d get to this french Cover-1 below. As you can see in the pic on the right; the french play a Centerfielder of sorts in a deep to very deep midfield zone. That’s their Free-Safety in the pic. The advantage is that it is tough to get behind him. He is indeed the last line of defense. The problem however is that this halves or thirds -depending upon the football being spotted at mid-field or on a hash-mark- the playing-field; thereby creating either 2 or 3 deep seams in this Zone. 2 seams when the ball is in the middle of the field, and 3 when it is on a hash-mark.

If we have the Time To Throw®, there will unequivocally be some HR balls to knock outta le` park up in paris. This could lead to a total blow-out.

However, it is my current thesis of thought -and the Ed Wang injury is aiding and abbeting this- that we will run to daylight and play a very GOP conservative game-plan up in c’ville. Frank is too much the elder-statesmen, the gentlemen, the throwback good ole boy from Fancy Gap to really go after and stuff and mount a lame-duck like one al groh. (please be respectful of such; imagine you last day at work knowing tomorrow you WILL be gone).

Per this kinder gentler version of game-planning; I foresee france hanging around a little bit; though that has a whole lot to do with us and our press-box scripting and not so much to do with france. The french simply do not have the offense to win this year; and my spies report that Poland is licking their chops.

Finally … and I am not kidding around this time. ENJOY THIS WHILE IT LASTS! Or in other words; no matter hoo the french hire to replace al groh; it will alter the Commonwealth balance of power for 1-3 years. Possibly longer if this is a good hire for france. Oui-oui, it may take a couple of seasons to really feel this in full effect; as 2010 recruits will not turn the 2010 tide. We are insulated for a season or two. However, no matter who gets this ride; they will enjoy that new-car scent right away when they are out wheeling around the Commonwealth recruiting trail. Frank’s O&M perfect storm may now finally begin to dissipate; which is why beating france this year and next season by as much as possible is critical to stemming any in-roads or VA gains this regime change will net. If it were me, I would take a strategic out-look and at least consider running up the score to try to paint a bipolar picture of the haves (VT) vs. the have-nots (france).

Being RATT, al groh's departure really means.... That france will make some gains on VT now. This series evens out in a few years. Status Quo. VT has pulled too far out in front for france to catch up. france has a lot of potential; given time they will eventually supplant VT in Commonwealth terms. View Results  Loading ...

Per my aforementioned GOP gameplan; I see us/VT slowing establishing the Line of Scrimmage (LOS); then slowing taking control of such as the afternoon wears on and the french wear down and then out. R.Will and Tyrod will eventually run away with this one, though it may look like a real game for about 30 minutes and change.
Virginia Tech=27, france=3

“LETS GO!”

“HOKIES!”

b’street

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