Florida State 38 Boston College 31: Stock Report
Boston College fell to the Florida State Seminoles 38-31 in the Red Bandana Game. There is a lot to digest, so let's take a look at which players, coaches and units had their stock rise and whose stock fell in the loss.
Stock Went Up
Dennis Grosel: Call him a gamer, a winner, a guy that makes plays, whatever cliche you want to use they all accurately describe the sophomore quarterback's performance yesterday. Over and over again Grosel hit clutch plays whether with his arm or his legs, especially when BC was backed up on third downs. Grosel was especially effective ripping apart FSU's zone defense, which he was able to find receivers over and over again throwing passes with impressive precision. He had what should have been his "moment" when he flipped into the end zone with a game tying touchdown, but unfortunately we saw what happened after that.
David Bailey: Of the two backs he was the most effective against FSU's stingy defense, and it was his injury that forced Addazio to lean especially hard on AJ Dillon which limited his effectiveness near the end of the game. Hopefully his injury isn't too serious because his loss would be a major blow for the Eagles.
Kobay White: There have been moments where White has looked like a top tier wide receiver, yesterday was one of those moments. Two touchdown receptions, and he was Grosel's favorite target throughout the game.
Stock Down
Zay Flowers: To quote my favorite podcast The Solid Verbal, the true freshmen had some freshmen truths in a tough game. Big drop that along with an AJ Dillon drop killed a drive, while he found no space on his end arounds.
The Defensive Gameplan And Execution: I could nit pick certain players and what went wrong there but let's just throw Bill Sheridan and Steve Addazio's whole gameplan on here. First off, let's bring back a topic that was brought up yesterday, defensive scheming on obvious passing downs. How many more times can the Eagles stay in a base 4-3 when it's clear that the opposition was going to pass? This is Football 101, but we have seen BC stick with that formation again and again. BC's defensive back depth hasn't shown much in terms of production but wouldn't you rather have cornerbacks Tate Haynes or Josh Deberry lined up out there instead of linebackers like John Lamot or Joe Sparacio. Here is a perfect example, on the play that effectively killed the Eagles late in the 4th quarter:
Secondly, the coverage schemes in general were a mess. After last year's game where Tamorrion Terry beat them on a long touchdown catch in single coverage by Brandon Sebastian with no safety help over the top. How did BC adapt this year? Tamorrion Terry scored on a long touchdown catch in single coverage by Brandon Sebastian with no safety help over the top. How do you let yourselves get beat again and again making the same mistakes?
Finally, how is Boston College's tackling consistently so poor this year? Play after play BC had players stopped for short to no gain, and play after play FSU receivers/backs/QBs broke loose and turned seemingly everything into a positive gain. That is a systemic issue, something that coaching should be able to fix, but as we have seen we are up to game 10 and this is still a major problem with no solution in sight.
Steve Addazio: Yesterday was an encapsulation of all the problems that have plagued Boston College under Addazio. First off, special teams were a mess something that has been a problem every year except 2013 under Addazio. Aaron Boumerhi missed two field goals, but what was worse was the coach's decision to play for the field goal instead of going for the points. In the second drive of the game, BC was driving, they had AJ Dillon and David Bailey shoving the ball down their throat seemingly at will, they get to 4th and 4 and instead of possibly stepping on FSU's throat and getting them to quit early he tries a low percentage field goal which they missed. Conservative play calling at it's worst.
Then right before half we got another perfect amalgamation of Addazio's worst qualities. Driving Dennis Grosel had hit two great third down passes to White, but the drive looked to stall when he was sacked setting up 3rd and 19. Inexplicably Addazio immediately called a timeout much to the bewilderment to the TV announcers with :50 seconds remaining, which if BC failed on the next play would have given FSU plenty of time to score Grosel hit a 15 yard pass to Jake Burt. With timeouts to burn, he instead elected to see Boumerhi out again into the wind, who had missed this kick before and he shanked it.
BC had every opportunity to really set the tone of this game, but questionable play calls, and a style that has defined Steve Addazio's tenure at BC, doomed them.
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