Clemson vs. Boston College Film Review: 2nd Half

In my circle of gambling friends, we have a saying whenever one of our bets wins by the skin of its teeth: Never In Doubt. Dave’s bet on Ole Miss over hits by 3 points because of a bad snap on a punt? Never In Doubt. Luke’s bet on Patriots -7.5 hits because a Jets QB throws a pick-six while being sacked with time expiring? Never In Doubt.

This isn’t just a reflexive joke to distract ourselves from a nearly-bad-beat. It’s more importantly a device with which I use irony to prevent myself from getting bent out of shape about football, which at it’s most basic level is a game for our entertainment (will not be getting into the enormous amount of complexities surrounding football that cloud it and prevent it from being boiled down to this simplistic reduction). I mean, it’s already bad enough that I’m putting a non-insignificant amount of money on a game. No need to put too much emotional energy into it as well.

And so, while the Clemson extended universe was crumbling around me, STS was going nuts in both the gamethread and Slack chat simultaneously, and nobody wearing the Good Kind of Orange could operate with any other tone but that of doom, I remained relatively tranquil. For I was parked on one of the many LiveBet portals online, waiting for my opportunity to pounce on a good-value-for-Clemson moneyline. However, just as I suspected, Vegas wasn’t budging.

When Clemson went down 28-10 with a minute left in the first half, at the point of the game where every Clemson fan I knew was going full-blown Doomer Emo, Sound The Alarms Hopeless territory...the odds dropped to the best value I could find for Clemson all day: Clemson ML (+145). So, in essence, when we were down by 3 scores with barely more than a half of football to play, we were still only slight underdogs to win the game. Vegas said the words I needed to hear so badly: Never In Doubt.

*Hopefully me sharing a story about a live bet I won will also double as evidence that my gambling instincts aren’t nearly as bad as my awful inaugural Pick’em column that I debuted this Saturday, which I will NOT link, and that this was just a rare bad weekend for me*

The main reason I’ve subjected y’all to my gambling spiel is because I don’t want to dwell much on this game since I choose to call it by what it was: a fluke game. Except unlike Pitt 2016, we survived this time. I don’t want to come off as a sore winner here or discount the resilience BC showed in the first half (including a fake field goal so nifty that I’m sure this game will have Hafley’s name buzzing in “Hot Seat” rumors with more affluent programs by the end of the year) but a lot went weird for it to get to this point.

I’ve been told by my colleagues that I shouldn’t complain about awful officiating like some fanbases of Other Schools & Universities, but c’mon man. Additionally, we were not only down Sunshine, but at least 5-8 other essential contributors. There were definitely still some trouble spots we need to address that were on full display, but with every bit of context accounted for, I’m much more prepared to dismiss this as a game with an unusual amount of bad beats than I am with calling it a “sleepwalking” game.

If you made it all the way through Alex’s article, then you can see the finish line: the light at the end of the tunnel. Not sure if I need to add a spoiler alert, but Boston College would not add a single point to their total of 28 in the second half. Here’s my analysis of the 2nd half that saved the collective soul of Tiger Nation. Feel free to chime in below.

I’ll let the ACC network and Greg McElroy draw it up for you. It’s your standard Zone Read keeper that we’ve seen a million times with Clemson, but it works so effectively here because of just how hard BC sells out to stop the run up the middle on short yardage. Not only does the edge defender on the boundary crash down hard, but both ILBs sell out against Etienne as well. With only one safety deep, it’s up to him to provide a last level of defense, but he also gets sucked into the inside handoff and puts himself out of position. Which is funny because you notice that he widens out when he sees Uiagalelei running around the edge, but then seems to be convinced it’s a handoff by the ILBs crashing in hard. By the time he realizes the truth it’s too late.

This is my take on the 2-point conversion:

No disrespect to Brannon Spector or DJ Uiagalelei, but this play should be retired along with the #13 jersey.

The best player in Clemson history is now the new ACC all-time rushing leader. You really couldn’t have scripted it better for the combined effect of honoring Travis Etienne and providing momentum for a come-from-behind effort. The 3rd quarter expiring right after the play was perfect for capturing both. Admittedly, I was generally against having fans during the COVID-19 pandemic, but even I will concede that it just wouldn’t have sat right if Etienne had achieved this honor in an empty stadium. God Bless Travis Etienne!

I’m still bewildered by the Xavier Thomas hit and how out of his way he went to make helmet-to-helmet contact. Not sure if we have any soccer fans in the audience, but it reminded me of a flying version of Zidane’s headbutt on Materazzi in the 2006 World Cup.

Clemson proceeds to drive the ball to midfield before Etienne is stuffed on 3rd & 1 and forced to punt. This sets up the final play of the game, which turns out to be a glorious safety to cap the day. I have to assume Venables knew the TE would vacate the line, which is why he calls a stunt for Bresee to wrap into the C gap where he’s 1-on-1 with a RB whom he easily blows by before jerking Jurkovec around, nearly getting a strip sack in the process. That concludes a very fluky and miserable game for our Clemson Tigers. I hope you enjoyed the review. I want to never think about this game again.