The Good, Bad and the Ugly

When one team dismantles another team by a 73-7 score, it makes it real easy to discuss the good, the bad and the ugly. For Clemson, there was good from the opening kickoff to the very end of the game.

The Bad – to be honest, there is very little to talk about here. The tigers pretty much did everything right, both offensively and defensively. Last week against Miami, BT Potter had 3 blocked field goals.Apparently, the tigers worked on that during the week. All in all, Potter put his foot to the ball 19 times, including 17 times in the first half. He had 7 extra point kicks, one FG and kicked off 9 times. Pretty busy day for Clemson’s kicker.

Georgia Tech’s lone touchdown was a 59 yard TD pass in the 1st quarter to tie the game at 7-7. It happens. On the day, Georgia Tech totaled 204 yards on 58 plays. Take away the 59 yards on one play, that is 145 yards on 57 plays. Going a little further, at the end of the game, GT had a 41 yard run as the last play of the game. That brings the total number of yards down to 104 yards on 56 plays. That’s bad for GT and good for the Tigers.

Hard to find anything ugly about this game for the tigers while there is plenty for Georgia Tech to work on for the rest of the season. The tigers did have two first half turnovers, including Trevor’s 1st interception since October 19, 2019. Travis Etienne also had a fumble in the 1st quarter The team’s most explosive weapons each had a turnover early. That would be the extent of anything resembling “ugly” in this game, unless we mention Georgia Tech. The yellow jackets gave up 671 total yards, including 500 through the air. Lawrence put up a personal best 404 yards and 5 touchdowns. Freshman quarterback Jeff Sims came into the game with high hopes, had his one moment of glory, then was schooled by the Brent Venables’ defense. Sims had one pass completion for 59 yards. Take away that one pass, and he was 5-12 for 22 yards. According to the stat sheet, he carried the ball 14 times for -23 yards, mostly because he was sacked 5 times for -41 yards. Yeah, it was pretty ugly for Georgia Tech all day long.

The good? It’s honestly too much to try and capture. It’s becoming fairly obvious that Trevor Lawrence is the front runner for the Heisman Trophy. It’s also fairly obvious that he cares more about his team winning games than he does his own hype. Amari Rodgers had the best day of his career, hauling in 6 passes for 161 yards and 2 touchdowns. 15 different tiger receivers caught at least one pass. Freshmen receivers accounted for 105 yards on 6 catches and two touchdowns. DJ Uiagalelei did not play due to soreness in his shoulder. Ajou Ajou got his first TD reception on a spectacular 35 yard jaunt through the GT defense. Hunter Helms came in in the 3rd quarter and simply went 5-7 for 74 yards and two touchdown passes. Punter Will Spiers came in to finish up the day and completed 2 of his 3 passes. Offensively, the tigers racked up 671 total yards.