Clemson vs Syracuse Film Review: 1st Quarter

Saturday wasn’t the affair most expected coming off Clemson’s historic win at Georgia Tech and Syracuse’s dud at the hands of a school which I don’t even want to acknowledge. I humbly include myself in with most, since I rounded up my pregame piece on the Syracuse defense with a jinx on every single point below:

This should be another ho-hum nooner unless Clemson piles up a ton of unforced errors. No matter what Dabo said about them publicly, the Orange shouldn’t force nearly their usual amount. Syracuse’s saving grace has been turnovers borne from aggression in the back end, but Clemson has been clinical through the air and remembered they can out-scheme instead of merely out-talent opponents. This should be a monster game for Travis Etienne if he actually gets 10 carries. Trevor Lawrence merely needs to pick up where he left off and exit this game by halftime.

Welp. It wasn’t a ho-hum nooner until nearly 3 o’clock; Clemson did indeed pile up more unforced errors than any point in the last 1.5 seasons, seemingly; Clemson was nowhere near clinical through the air; there was little “out-scheming” or “out-talenting” (and we could argue the complete opposite regarding the wide receiver positions); and neither Travis Etienne nor Trevor Lawrence had monster games.

DLG and I will go play by play here over the next day or two to try and explore what happened. I had notions going into review on who/what is perhaps most to blame, but I won’t harp on specific individuals up here. I’ll merely point out the two biggest concerns entering the season reared their ugly heads, and then some: interior OL play and outside WR development.

The past few seasons, we’ve seen defenses load up against Etienne to take him away. This is pretty much a no-brainer approach against an elite running back, but then you realize the #1 overall draft pick is next to him at QB. It numbs the brain to think the correct strategy is, “yes, let’s force the generationally talented quarterback to beat us with his arm,” when (of course) he can blister you with any and every possible throw. Yet this year, more than the last two years, it can work because defenses like their chances against the guys Clemson trots out at field and boundary receiver.

The staff is correct when they say the constant inside run blitzes Syracuse called all day make it seem the OL is worse than it is. This is why there are quick flares and screens to Rodgers thrown into every inside zone, and why it seems Clemson throws so many short passes and never feeds Etienne enough — defenses force this and Lawrence is right to pull the handoff and flip it outside.

But this is where the wide receiver group, excepting Amari Rodgers, leaves a lot to be desired. A year ago Clemson countered this same normal tactic (often to a fault) with elite outside threats, and no one could cover them consistently until Ohio State and LSU showed the country that the way to blow up Clemson’s lanky outside WR group was with physically overpowering and aggressive man or pattern match coverage. This year, Clemson is nowhere near as good outside, and defenses have learned they can play even more conservatively out wide and still not worry about Clemson getting open.

Until the WR group begins to show some development — Ladson leads the nation in drops, Ngata doesn’t look 100%, and Williams isn’t yet big or strong enough — Clemson may grow increasingly inconsistent against some of the better defenses in the back half of the schedule because they don’t have developed outside threats to bail out the scheming or the OL play like in recent years.

The good news, though, is that the defense was solid given they were down their top player at each level of the defense. A pick 6, a blocked punt, and a slot receiver beating a backup safety with tempo were the only scores surrendered. The defense bailed out the offense with scores and short fields most of the day, and basically forced the offense to finally put the game away.

This was a remarkable defensive effort given all the new faces playing major snaps (and on offense as well, it must be noted), but this was against the worst QB and perhaps overall offense on the schedule, and it shouldn’t have come to this. I’m not going to sound any alarms, but we need to look for more urgency and development from the WR group if Clemson hopes to keep up with OSU or Bama in two months — and that’s assuming you only need to score 20 points or so to get past Notre Dame.

Clemson goes 3 & out for a short field goal on 3 consecutive touches for Etienne. Stewart gives up a horrible TFL on an OZ in particular on 1st down, easily let the 1 technique get past him without even a technical move.

The quarter ends with Syracuse in the red zone after the blocked punt. Prepare yourselves for the doldrums...