We get a chance to see Will Thompson!

...because Mac is doubtful.

Injury report came out this morning and it's kind of depressing to be honest. AA (Alex Albright, not alcoholics anonymous) is questionable with an ankle injury. To be honest I would say this is the same recurring injury that hes had since the second half of the FSU game that has limited his playing time.

Lapham and Mac are listed as doubtful. Lapham with the shoulder that took him down in the Notre Dame game (couple beers makes an interesting point of noting the shoulder injuries we've had an relating it to Loco's conditioning, anyone out there with a lot of free time should take a peak at our # of shoulder injuries over say 3 years as compared to a another ACC or Big 10 team). Mac I haven't heard much about though I have to be honest that I've been underwhelmed with his return. He looks a little bulky, and really doesn't have the same burst he used to have. Combine the fact that he seems a step slow with the fact that he has an apparent need to hit people and you see why he's had two or three late hits already. On the bright side we should get a chance to see Will Thompson who looked solid in the spring, only issue is that I'm afraid he might be suffering from the same rust that Mac has.

On top of all that word seems to have gotten out that Finch has mono. Mono takes about a week to get over but you can't participate in contact sports for about three weeks after that because of an enlarged spleen so you should be able to see Finch again say around a bowl game.

Another little side note is that Scafe is listed at number 2 on the Depth chart. From what I saw in the spring and summer I can only imagine that this is because he's still battling the injury in his neck that has limited his playing time, which is a major league bummer because he looked solid at the beginning of the year.

Which brings me to a new point. I expected our linebackers to be weak this year but the addition of Kuechly has just been all kinds of ridiculous and DiSanzo, Legrande, Morrissey have all been reliable as well. One area where the experts said we would suck is the D-line and I felt like we would be awesome. Looks like the experts were right. Since Scafe has gone down we've been soft in the middle and the only person able to generate much pressure (aside from that Safety with Ramella) has been Albright who still hasn't quite shown up. Now I don't know what the deal is exactly with Albright but the guy was a sackmaster in limited time two years ago before missing the end of the season and most of the 08 season with injuries. It might just have something to do with the increased skill of QBs today or the fact that he doesn't Larkin on the opposite end or it might be the injuries but I really expected Albright to have 12 sacks by now. Maybe next year.

Tuggle and Haden to Transfer

Big news out of the Yawkey Center this morning as Tuggle and Haden have announced that they are transferring and have already left the team. I'm not overly surprised about Tuggle, I think the guy has quite a bit of skill but with the overturning of the offensive scheme he just wasn't much of a fit for the program anymore, especially with Shinskie playing passably well and Rettig set to join the team next year.

The Haden transfer didn't surprise me either, if you look back to my NCAAF 10 season review Haden transferred after Harris played all kind of ridiculousness. With Deuce Finch behind Harris I don't know how much this will hurt us except in terms of depth (with Smith currently out that leaves us with currently Redshirting freshman Phifer). I will miss Haden though, I think he had quite a bit of ability and was hampered by a lot of injuries. I wished that he stuck around because I still think he can be great but I understand the desire to be a feature back.

bceagles.com already has both removed from the player roster...damn their speedy.

Straight Class

The Butkus Award Committee has elected to make Mark Herzlich one of the 16 semi-finalists.
Now that is just straight class.

NCState Game

I don't like to look back, lets look forward.

I just checked out the depth chart for this weekends game and it looks like we'll have all hands on deck for the 3rd Annual TOB bowl. Only interesting thing to note is that apparently Rich Gunnell is the 2nd String Holder...

Assuming everyone's as healthy as planned this weekend should be a good game. The fact of the matter is that while NCState doesn't make mistakes they don't blow you out of the water and they certainly arent the No. 3 team in the country. Wilsons a solid QB who's throwing to average receivers. In fact it looks a lot like TOBs last BC team in 06, except without the incredible 0-line.

Depth Chart Update

I should have done this ahead of time but I just checked the depth chart

Albright is listed behind Newman at DE which suggests he might play but hes not healthy

Scafe is out altogether.

That right there ladies and Gentleman is some serious bad news bears.

How to win in Blacksburg

Be the Boston College Eagles, seriously take a look.

1. VaTech has only had 8 losses to ACC opponents since joining the conference, 3 have been to BC including the last time any team beat VT in Blacksburg.

2. Our strengths offset their strengths and some of our strengths exploit their weaknesses (running game anybody?) Throughout the first couple games of the season VT relied on the excellent running of their backs to offset Taylor's slow start. Most of their running game developed out of Williams and Oglesby's ability not necessarily the awesomeness of their line. While our d-line isn't going to crush their o-line I would be willing to say that Linebackers Mac, Luke and Dom can limit the YPC.

In all honesty I would say this game depends on the QBs, but wait, doesn't every game rely on QBs? Well yes and no, but the fact is that this one relies even more. Everyones been talking about how Tyrod Taylor has only had 2 decent games so far this season. True, I'll give you that but of the last three one has been his best game this season(in fact the most recent). One was in a monsoon and the other was against one of the best pass-rushing teams in the country (Nebraska).

Meanwhile Shinskie has been only getting better since taking over the reigns and continues to show improvement. He has shown some mistakes the VaTech might be able to capitalize on but the reality is that VaTech takes advantage of everyone's mistakes and as long as the offense has spent some practice time working on tackling I'm ok with our defense watching Uncle Dave's back.


So here's where the rubber really hits the road: Alex Albright.
If he's healthy, we win. Everyone has been talking about how the secondary played too conservatively in the second half, but the difference is really somewhat negligible when you actually compare to the second half. The difference was that Albright spent most of the first half terrorizing Ponder who I would consider to be very similar in style and ability to Taylor. Albright when down and didn't play in the second half... and the secondary got roasted. Combine that with that fact that VaTech's line isn't as good and you got yourself a recipe for a win.

Now we wait for the injury report...