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Friday, November 24, 2006
Jackets are better and more inspired
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Terence Moore
They are just better. They also have more reasons (as in five consecutive losses to the woof, woof people) for motivation. Oh, and Georgia Tech President Wayne Clough provided the clincher as to why the Yellow Jackets will sting Georgia today between the hedges. Said Clough to the AJC, “It’s about time.”
It’s definitely about time for Tech to turn this rivalry that really isn’t at the moment into a rivalry again.
For those who keep insisting this actually is a rivalry, consider the following ugliness in white and old gold: The Jackets dropped the opening three games of their current losing streak to Georgia by a combined score of 116-41. Not the stuff of Auburn-Alabama. In contrast, Tech was within a touchdown of catching the Bulldogs during the waning moments in each of the past two seasons’ games. To which Tech defensive tackle Joe Anoai said to the assembled media this week on campus, “As everyone knows, you don’t go out there to play your opponent tight. You go out there to get a ‘W.’ “
Translated: These Jackets are obsessed with the concept of victory or bust, especially when Bulldogs are across the way. Added Anoai, speaking for his teammates in general, but for his fellow seniors in particular (who never have beaten Georgia): “Right now, we’re not even thinking about losing.”
There also was this from Tech running back Tashard Choice at that same news gathering: “We’ve played in hostile territory, so that won’t be a factor for us.” No, it won’t. The victory that propelled the Jackets toward the ACC championship game came earlier this season in noisy Blacksburg, Va., where they drilled Virginia Tech. The year before that, many of these same Jackets players helped orchestrate huge upsets at Auburn and at Miami. So, with most of the 93,000 or so squeezed into Sanford Stadium for this one barking for the other guys, Tech players won’t shiver at the sight of dogs in cleats and helmets.
Would you be scared with Calvin Johnson on your side? He’s the Jackets wide receiver who will be the most extraordinary player in Clarke County. Yes, Georgia stifled Johnson during the past two seasons, but this Johnson is operating from a totally different solar system than even those Johnsons from the past. Consider, too, that Tech coaches finally are getting the guy the ball more often than not.
The other Johnson (James) also is wonderful at catching passes. That’s in contrast to Georgia receivers who are wonderful at dropping them.
If you add that to Choice leading a Tech offense that has outrushed Georgia by an average of 30 yards per game, and to opportunistic players on Jon Tenuta’s blitzing defense producing 28 sacks to Georgia’s 13, the Jackets have the edge in personnel. Even so, that personnel is listed as a one-point underdog despite a superior record (9-2 to 7-4) and a national ranking (16th) to Georgia’s none. This is all good for the Jackets. This is just another reason why they are highly inspired to knock off somebody’s dog collar.
You also have that Reggie Ball thing. He’ll be the player on the field in search of the most redemption. As a freshman quarterback against Georgia, Ball had an interception, a lost fumble and a concussion. Then came his amnesia game, when he forgot it was fourth down instead of third down and threw away Tech’s chance for a comeback in the final seconds with a pass out of bounds. Then he tossed an interception near the goal line on his last play of last year’s squeaker.
This is a smarter Ball, though, with more touchdowns than interceptions during a season for the first time in his career. A smarter Ball means this will be a tougher Tech team to beat, especially with the rebirth of that rivalry and a mighty dose of pride on the line.
Permalink | Comments (72) | Categories: Tech / ACC, Terence Moore, UGA / SEC
QBs give Dogs the edge
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Jeff Schultz
For some reason, Georgia and Georgia Tech have been viewed as separate colonies of divergent species. I don’t know why. They’re really pretty much the same.
Both play in major conferences. Both go to bowl games. Both give their coaches tangible incentives to win their annual rivalry game: If the Yellow Jackets win, assistants are given a $5,000 bonus. If the Bulldogs win, Willie Martinez is given an opportunity to make it out of the parking lot.
OK, so there is one difference: Expectation. Both want to win. But one school has come to view it as an ambitious project, like installing ceiling fans in Hades. The other sees it as a therapeutic jog on the beach to forget about whatever might’ve gone wrong that year. Like: “I feel better now. But are we ever going to beat Florida?”
Georgia wins today. Why? Because for as much as Tech likely has the better team (9-2 vs. 7-4), certainly has the only BCS hopes (Orange Bowl) and claims the game’s only real star (Calvin Johnson), there are too many flaws to assume logic — a sixth straight Georgia win — will get flipped upside down.
Tech believes this is the year. That’s based at least partly on the fact that Georgia already has lost four games. But then, the last time the Bulldogs lost four games was in Mark Richt’s first season in 2001. That year, Georgia won at Tech 31-17.
Richt is 5-0 in this game. Chan Gailey is 0-4. Neither is an aberration.
In Gailey’s four losses, the Jackets have averaged 11 points. Tech fans say: Yeah, but Patrick Nix is calling the offensive plays now. OK. But look at the quarterback he’s calling the plays for.
This is game 12 of year 4 for Reggie Ball, and he’s the same thing he always has been: an emotional, competitive and erratic quarterback who drives through a season like a Wiffle Ball through a wind storm.
Which way will Reggie go? I dunno. Go kick a fire ant hill and guess which way the ants go.
This is game 12 of year 1 for Matthew Stafford. After throwing eight interceptions in his previous three starts, Stafford was 14-for-20 with a touchdown and no interceptions in a stunning 37-15 upset at Auburn. Is this the time to bet on a backslide?
One start, one win does not make a trend. But if you had a choice right now, would you take Ball or what’s behind door No. 2?
Ball is 0-3 against Georgia. In those games, he has a 47.6 completion percentage. Folks, that’s the good news. The other totals: one touchdown, three interceptions, two fumbles, six sacks, one concussion and a throwaway on fourth down because he thought it was third down.
In Tech’s biggest win of the season at Virginia Tech, Ball threw interceptions on back-to-back throws from his own side of the field that could have cost the Jackets the game. At Clemson, with a chance to show a prime-time TV audience how far this program has come, Tech was steamrolled and Ball failed to complete even one pass to Johnson.
Two weeks ago at North Carolina, with the backdrop of clinching a berth in the ACC title game, Ball threw for 78 yards and the Jackets managed just seven points against a Tar Heels team that already had fired its coach and allowed 79 points to Furman and South Florida, thought to be a scientific impossibility.
The issue is not whether Johnson can shred the Bulldogs’ secondary — he can. The issue is what happens after Ball takes the snap.
Georgia is not a great team. It’s somewhere between the team that lost to Vanderbilt and Kentucky and the one that beat Auburn. But rivalry games often come down to a quarterback either making a play to win it or not making a play that might lose it.
Reggie Ball is 0-3. Matthew Stafford is 0-0. But right now I think I’ll take that unknown and the Auburn game as signs pointing to an edge at quarterback and another Georgia win.
And when it’s over, the Dogs can once again wonder what went wrong in the Florida game.
Permalink | Comments (71) | Categories: Jeff Schultz, Tech / ACC, UGA / SEC
