Syracuse Football: Rolling with the punches after Week 7

The 2019 Syracuse football season began with more hope than we’ve seen in a long time. While this season’s expectations have lowered, hope still remains.

The 2019 season is turning out to be much more frustrating for Syracuse football fans than anyone could have expected. This includes players, coaches, and fans.

After falling to NC State on Thursday night Syracuse once again finds themselves sitting at .500 and 0-3 against Power 5 schools.

In the preseason some, including myself, pictured Syracuse playing in the Orange Bowl this year against one of the best in the SEC. This will not happen this year and expectations around the program for the 2019 season are being assessed to find a more logical outcome. That, however, does not mean the dream of a New Year Six Bowl in the future is gone forever.

Head coach Dino Babers is still molding the Orange into his vision of “Orange Is the New Fast.”

Even after his fourth season at the helm. He has a quarterback that he believes in with Tommy DeVito even though the voices outside the program are showing there dismay.

DeVito did not have the best performance during his first road ACC start against the Wolfpack when the Orange offense only mustered 10 points. DeVito this season has experienced many firsts and last nights first might have been while being more banged up then we realized after he left the Holy Cross game two weeks ago.

DeVito still holds the same talent and potential that we saw last season in wins over Florida State and UNC.

Yes, he also still has to go through the growing pains we witnessed against Notre Dame as well. Earlier this season we saw DeVito roll out against pressure and deliver two horrendous passes along the sidelines that were picked off instead of being thrown away; one against Maryland and one against Clemson.

This week we saw him get rid of the ball too quickly, some of that could be trying to avoid being hit when banged up, which led to intentional grounding calls. DeVito’s experience under center for a full season this year is invaluable.

Keep an eye on DeVito using his legs more to help alleviate pressure more in the coming weeks as the next step in his growth as a player.

Late in the game, DeVito broke off a few nice runs to pick up positive yards when nothing was there in the passing game and when the field opened up. DeVito has shown the awareness to slide as well to hopefully avoid any big hits.

To take more positives out of this game is the defense.

The defense last time on the road gave up 63 points to a team that has benched their starting quarterback already. On Thursday night they were once again without Andre Cisco, McKinley Williams, and Ifeatu Melifonwu and allowed only 16 points.

Yes NC State was playing two quarterbacks on Thursday night including starting a redshirt sophomore for the first time but this was still a good showing. The defense we saw just a couple of weeks ago would not have been able to get six stops in goal to go territory like they did Thursday night after an Antwan Cordy unsportsmanlike conduct penalty.

The Orange defense also had a few new names leading in the sack column now after last night. With all of the attention, Kendall Coleman and Alton Robinson are getting by opposing teams, guys like Lakiem Williams and Brandon Berry are leading SU in sacks. Berry had one on Thursday for an eight-yard loss. The pressure was on for the Orange who had six tackles for loss on the night and pressure on the quarterbacks for a good amount of dropbacks.

Having young guys step up reminds you of the strides the Orange have taken in recruiting the right guys the past few seasons. Taken the right guys for coach Babers’ schemes have been more crucial than taken ones that will just drive up Syracuse in recruiting rankings.

In past years when Syracuse suffered an injury anywhere on the field, the replacement wasn’t the caliber of a player to be on the field of an ACC game. This is different, with Williams already out then both Josh Black and KJ Ruff both shaken up on the same play SU had the depth to replace them for the short time they needed.

The next place that you hope to see growth this season will be the offensive line.

They struggled again to keep DeVito remotely clean with eight sacks surrendered and countless false starts, including one that ended the game. This will be a focal point going forward for the coaching staff. Offensive playcalling has suffered from it as much as it has from having a young QB.

With limits on what you can do because of the performance from the offensive backbone, the O-Line, and the field general, quarterback, it is hard to dial up more than what we have seen this season. The NC State contest did see the addition of more Wildcat formations than we have seen in the past and maybe that is the answer to take off some of the heat from the line and DeVito.

There are stars on this team that will help even propel this team to a bowl game this year. This is not your run of the mill 2-8 Syracuse team. Guys like Robinson, Coleman, Moe Neal, and Trishton Jackson are too good for that to happen with the remaining schedule.

The team is not where many had hoped but future potential and current growth of the team should not be ignored. Their is a process. It may not be going 100 percent according to play but it is there. That for Syracuse football remains a step in the right direction.

In today’s world patience is not the easiest task, but, it is the reality. Syracuse has a chance to become a relevant football program. It won’t be a linear process and there will be stepbacks and body blows to the progress, but the progress is still there.