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I'll go with eight wins. 7-5 in the regular season plus a Tier 2 bowl victory. And for the record, we are going to beat Navy in the Military Bowl on December 31st.

Who wants to play?

I'll start with the losses.

Clemson and Miami. Of course I'd love to win both of those, but unless the Tigers come down with food poisoning, that one ain't happening. Miami is doable, but it's an away game and they are going to be very good this year.

Wins will be
Army, Baylor, NCCU, GT, Virginia, unc, Wake

That leaves a few tossups. I can see Northwestern, VT, and Pitt going either way. I'm going to say we take 2 of 3 of them.

So I'm predicting 9-3, and a win in a top tier bowl.

I also think how we are looking after the Baylor game will set the tone for the season. If we don't have at least 2 wins by then, we're in trouble.

I'll go with 8-4 with losses to Clemson, Miami, VT (we've found a lot of ways to lose to them the last few years ) and 1 other when some sorry-ass excuse for an acc ref screws us out of an interception or ignores an obvious PI call as we drive for the go ahead/winning TD like the @#$% crew in the Pitt game last year.

Then, we'll win our bowl game.

We should go 8-4 regular season but we will manage to lose one along the way we have no business losing which is why I predict 7-5. Breaking the season down into three 4-game mini-seasons:

1. Army, NW, Baylor, NCCU - we go 3-1

2. VT, GT, VA, Pitt - we go 3-1

3. Miami, UNC, Clemson, Wake - we go 2-2

That adds up to 8 wins but we will only get 7. It is hard to argue with Daryl that a shit call will be a significant part of the calculus.

Army - W
NW - L
Baylor - W
NCCU - W
VT - W
GT - L
UVA - W
Pitt - W
Miami - L
UNC - W
Clemson - L
WF - W

8-4 and then a Win over Florida in the Belk Bowl to finish 9-4.

I think we all agree a win against Miami or Clemson would be shocking. The other 10 are all gettable. Going 8-2 in those 10 wouldn't surprise me if our core remains healthy.

With an easier schedule, I could see this being a 10 win team. The defense is very strong at all three levels. An offense returning seven starters, including QB/RB/WR/TE, has no excuse not to imporve drastically. If there ever was such a thing as a hot seat, Zac Roper is on it. The system is in place, the pieces are in place, and a healthy Daniel Jones should result in a big year for the entire group.

Playing two, road non-conference games was really bad oversight by Cut/KWhite. I understand wanting to schedule home/home's with Power 5 schools, but we should never be in this type of situation. Strength of schedule really doesn't mean anything in college football anymore. Bowl selection is determined by win total. Yes, we should be playing one tough non-con game every year. But three of the four should ALWAYS be at home, period.

10 Days!

wolfpackdevil wrote:
If there ever was such a thing as a hot seat, Zac Roper is on it. The system is in place, the pieces are in place, and a healthy Daniel Jones should result in a big year for the entire group.

I agree wholeheartedly on Zac Roper and the hot seat. He has to do a much, much better job with play calling this season. The offense really struggled at times to achieve and sustain a rhythm. We would be successfully running the ball and then start passing on every down. While I realize you have to mix things up, I really do not like passing on 1st down except once in a while to catch the defense napping.

Another thing I'd like to see is more pre-snap movement...put the slot receiver in motion, fake the jet sweep, fake the end around, run the jet sweep, run the end around, mix it up! Consistently run between the tackles then pop it outside to catch them by surprise. With Coach Cutcliffe stating he intends to play Brittain Brown and Deon Jackson simultaneously, I believe we will see more diversity in the run game.

I am READY for kick-off!