I was fairly pleased with SC's OLine play yesterday against one of the better DLines in the country. I mean NC State's DLine is just incredible. They've either got a great DLine coach or they snuck up on everyone recruiting DLinemen three and four years ago. I looked this morning and saw on NFL.com where all four of their DLine starters are projected to go in the first three rounds with Chubb (Nick's cousin from Chubbtown) expected to be a top ten pick, higher than Nick.

But our OLine held up well. No one is going to run the ball against that line. NC State is going to have a good season.

With that said we're going to be able to run the ball against Mizzou I would expect. And we'll play more ball control to keep the ball away from Mizzou's offense if possible.

Defensively ... our defense is not nearly as bad as the stats from yesterday's game might suggest. NC State had over 300 yards in the first half mainly because they are very very experienced, full of Juniors and seniors who started for them last year ... and they ran the HUNH dink and dunk to perfect yesterday - in the first half. They've got an outstanding QB who was getting the best of us until we hurt him, and two outstanding WRs, including their Samuel, who will play on Sundays.

Mizzou will test us the same way with the dink and dunk stuff but I expect Mizzou to try to burn us with the stop and go stuff too ... that worries me a bit. The SC secondary matured a lot during the course of the game yesterday. I think I read where we played five true freshmen in the secondary and at LB yesterday. You could see them getting better and more confident on every series. I told my Son this morning that for them to survive 99 plays on defense yesterday .... might have been the best thing that could have happened to them. By the end of the game several freshmen we're making big time plays.

Our punter did not have a great game but he still averaged 46.5 yards per punt in six tries. He out kicked the coverage once and that cost us a 30 yard return on a 70 yard punt I think they said ... coverage was good other than that. PR was good except one bonehead play by Lammons that shifted momentum but we overcame that thankfully.

We were 5 of 7 KOs in the endzone and KO coverage was outstanding on the other two. KR was better than average it goes without saying. After Deebo took the first one to paydirt they kicked to AJ the rest of the day and he did very well.

We never attempted a FG against NC St ... we will against Mizzou.

I thought our halftime adjustments on D were outstanding.

I thought the play calling by Roper was outstanding ... although we rarely used our TEs ... we will against Mizzou.

So I think we win the special teams battled at Mizzou.

Mizzou is going to score points. Key to SC winning is to keep the ball out of their hands and, when they do have it force turnovers. Get pressure on their QB, he's pretty damn good if you give him time. I do believe our DLine wins the battle in the trenches against Mizzou's OLine.

Offensively SC has got to establish a running game, control the clock, keep the penalties down and don't turn the ball over.

I don't think this game is going to be as high scoring as some others believe it might be. I believe SC wins the time of possession by eight minutes or more and I believe SC wins the turnover battle by a considerable margin. I also believe SC comes away with a half dozen sacks against Mizzou. Boom has got his defense buying-in and gaining confidence. You could see it transpiring during the course of the game yesterday.

I am really excited to see how our defense does against Mizzou's offense. IMHO they are going to surprise some people and put to rest all of this "SC's Defense sucks" nonsense from the first game stats.

That performance yesterday, especially by the young guys, was one of the gutsiest I can remember in a long time.

SC only has 75 scholarship players on their roster right now and 70% of those are freshmen or sophomores. We're very young but man these kids seem to love playing for Boom.

I'm not sure where Mizzou stands on experience comparatively?

This post was edited on 9/3/17 at 12:12 pm