Two weeks is long enough.
“Seems like it’s been forever since we played the first week,” Georgia Tech coach Paul Johnson said.
After their mildly informative blowout win over Elon on Aug. 31, the Yellow Jackets play their second game of the season, and it ought to reveal much more. Duke is no powerhouse, but the Jackets’ visit to Wallace Wade Stadium will be their ACC opener, a Coastal Division game and a road game.
The Elon Phoenix, Tech’s opponent in the season opener, were good for a workout in the humidity, but not much more. The answers to questions about this team — and there are several — will begin to reveal themselves more over the course of Saturday afternoon at Wallace Wade Stadium.
“We’ll have a much better indication of where we are after this game,” Johnson said.
Duke has become a more nettlesome opponent since the school hired David Cutcliffe to coach shortly after Tech hired Johnson in December 2007. While Tech has won nine in a row in the series, the past three games have been decided in the fourth quarter. Perhaps in a moment of charity, Johnson compared the improved Duke defense this week with “the old Pittsburgh Steelers.”
(Cutcliffe responded in kind, saying “I think they’re performing at as high a level as anybody we’ve seen on tape.”)
“Our big goal is to go up to Durham and play as well as we can play,” Johnson said. “There’s a lot of things we need to clean up from the first game.”
A short list — tackling, third-down defense, ball security, punt return, pass protection. You might not think that Tech’s 70-0 win over Elon could contain so many flaws, but Johnson and his staff didn’t seem to need to look hard to find them.
Defensive coordinator Ted Roof and his unit will be tested by a quarterback, Brandon Connette, who is subbing for injured starter Anthony Boone (fractured collarbone), but who has experience in the offense. Against Memphis on Saturday, he led the Blue Devils on back-to-back 75-yard touchdown drives in the fourth quarter to secure the game, completing six consecutive passes (including touchdown throws of 22 and 12 yards) along the way.
“You can’t feel any better about playing a backup quarterback in my opinion than you would be playing Brandon Connette,” Cutcliffe said. “That’s how strongly I would say (it).”
A big key will be Tech’s play on second down. In Roof’s eyes, giving up long gains on second down against Elon because of missed assignments or poor tackling set up third-and-short situations that the Phoenix exploited.
“You know what? We’ve just got to get ready to get a lot better,” Roof said.
Defensive players will be able to see if they’re more fit than they were against Elon, when many players cramped in the humidity and heat at Bobby Dodd Stadium. Temperatures are expected to be in the mid-70s, but Duke’s no-huddle offense will push the pace on the Jackets defense.
Better play on third down goes hand in hand with warding off fatigue.
“It’s tough, but the way you prevent that is finding a way to get off the field, get a turnover or make ’em punt,” linebackers coach Andy McCollum said.
Tech does have this advantage — Duke doesn’t have much to go on. The Jackets didn’t show much against Elon, leaving Cutcliffe and his staff to look at video of Penn State (Roof’s last stop) and other past employers for clues as to how the Jackets will defend the Blue Devils.
The Tech offense can test itself against a defense that, comparison to the Steelers withstanding, is improved but by an uncertain degree. In the teams’ meeting last year, the Jackets rolled up 330 rushing yards and kept the ball for 38:10 in their 42-24 win at Bobby Dodd Stadium.
Quarterback Vad Lee, amped for his return to his hometown, could use better protection than he received in the first game — three hurries in 11 pass attempts. Johnson will watch to see Lee and backup quarterback Justin Thomas carry out fakes and how B-back David Sims and others protect the ball. Both areas did not meet the coach’s standards in the first game.
Beyond the opportunity to gauge improvement, the Jackets’ pursuit of an ACC title begins Saturday. They may not need to run the table to win the Coastal, but they don’t need to slip at the start.
“Our expectation is not to win by ever how much,” Johnson said. “It’s to win the game.”
