Syracuse Football: Week 3 review, week 4 preview and other news

The episode where I curse on Twitter about the Charles Dickens “It was the best of times…it was the worst of times” exemplifies the Syracuse football game we watched over the weekend.

Week 3 Review:

• If Sean Tucker has not earned the right to wear 44, nobody else will ever wear it! Listen, the offensive line and blocking overall did a fantastic job and I am so happy to see that but if you watched this game and wanted to give it a sitcom title, it would be called the Sean Tucker Show. Sean had FIVE touchdowns on Saturday afternoon (four rushing and one receiving) along with 132 yards rushing and 121 yards receiving and sure this is Albany but those stats are still impressive even if they were playing CNS. He has 235 yards rushing already in three games (and likely should be at over 300 if he was utilized more against Rutgers). There are a few players on this team that excite me but right now Sean is the one who consistently does so.
• Congratulations to Andre Szmyt on breaking the record for most field goals completed with 60. Head Coach Dino Babers was asked in his post-game press conference about Szmyt and he talked about him hitting a camera on the crossbars and realizing how good of a kicker he was because of that and Sterling Hofrichter telling him how good he was.
• How about that defense? People will say “but it’s just Albany” but how many of those same people were the ones thinking Albany had a chance to win or this would be a close game? I said after that Rutgers game that I thought Syracuse had to go out today and dominate and then not play Liberty like they did Rutgers if they want to get some faith back into the fan base and they did dominate. A 62-24 win is impressive and the defense did some great work. Keep in mind that of those 24 points, 6 were a tipped interception that turned into a pick 6 unfortunately so the defense can’t be held responsible for that score. There were not many plays one might consider “memorable” but I do think overall as a unit, they were definitely impressive and contained Albany as they needed to. That said, again linebacker Mikel Jones led the team with 7 tackles and SU had NINE sacks including 3 from Cody Roscoe.
• Like many, I did not see enough out of the quarterback play today for me to say, “This guy is THE guy.” I think both guys played very well for the most part and I can honestly say I would not be mad at either one being named the starter going forward and content knowing the other is there if needed. I stated recently on social media that I think Tommy DeVito gets a lot of unnecessary flack for his play, which I have said in the past seems to be more team manager than Peyton Manning and I am okay with that because it limits turnovers. Neither Tommy nor Garrett Shrader did anything to overtly win the job but neither did anything to lose it either (that I saw anyway).
• Okay, now for the one negative from this game that caused me to drop an eff bomb on Twitter and appears to have frustrated everyone…penalties! I don’t get frustrated often watching Syracuse sports but the number of penalties called did cause me to snap wondering when they would stop. BTW, those stats I listed above for Sean Tucker would be even more impressive if penalties, including one of his own for a facemask call, didn’t hurt them. I know Coach Babers is equally as frustrated after seeing many of them but how can you not when the team combined to set a new Syracuse football record with 16 penalties for 163 yards. Those penalties cost Tucker at least one huge run, a receiving TD and a huge kick return. That is just unacceptable and if this were a competitive game, it could have resulted in lost points that cost them the game or at the very least given a more competitive opponent better field position or momentum. I am not a Negative Nancy and I will even say that if not for the penalties, this is a team I hoped we would see this season and could lead to at the very least a quality bowl game.

Syracuse football closes out its non-conference docket later this week.

Week 4 Preview:

• Syracuse football wraps up a three-game home stretch this Friday with the Liberty Flames coming to the Dome for an 8 pm start time. This game will also be on the ACC Network just like the Albany game was if you are curious where to find it on your TV if you were able to watch it (I believe Comcast still doesn’t carry it) and I am sure locally on TK99 if you want the radio feed and can’t make it to the Carrier Dome or your local sports bar.
• Before the season, the only ranked team on the Syracuse football schedule was Clemson however both Boston College and Liberty were just outside the top 25 with receiving votes so taking this game lightly would be crazy. Hugh Freeze is a former SEC coach who has built a successful program at the small religious school in Virginia including recruiting possible Heisman candidate Malik Willis at quarterback and has been ranked at times as well since Coach Freeze took over in December of 2018.
• This game will be the rubber match as both teams have won their respective home game against the other team so hopefully playing this at the Carrier Dome will help give Syracuse football the advantage. The overall record is only 1-1 but this could be for bragging rights between fan bases.
• Liberty is 3-0, having defeated Old Dominion 45-17, Campbell 48-7 and Troy 21-13 at Troy. After playing Syracuse football, Liberty will play UAB, former SU head coach Scott Shafer’s Middle Tennessee and later in their schedule UMass, Ole Miss (Coach Freeze’s former head coaching gig) and Army.
• If Syracuse football can beat Liberty, that then makes them halfway to bowl eligible, though some 5 win teams have played in some in the past as well, but generally, 6 wins are the mark to be at for a bid.

My Hopefully Positive News and Notes:

• Could we see the return of the Rhino Chris Elmore? I have heard from many that the belief was that Rhino’s return was likely to be after the first three games. Also in the post-game press conference, Coach Babers said he is hoping to have Garrett Williams back against Liberty as well.
• Pitt lost to former Syracuse football assistant coach Tim Lester and Western Michigan 44-41. Miami lost to Michigan State and Wake Forest stomped FSU. So if you are looking at the Syracuse football schedule trying to figure out who Syracuse will win or lose to going forward, good luck with that. This ACC football season has more twists than an M. Night Shyamalan film. Who knows, maybe everyone will go .500 at this rate or maybe a team like Wake could win it all?
• Syracuse field hockey upset #3 Boston College on Friday 3-1 to up their record to 2-2 on the season including beating #12 UConn and losing to #8 Rutgers.
• Is 44 available for Sean Tucker and in his locker yet?
• Today’s local spot highlight for game watching is Trappers II in Minoa. I saw recently they offer specials for NFL and SU games such as $2 pizza slices and $16 beer buckets and throw in a different weekly special as well.
• I would like to point out that if you read our work on this site on a regular basis, you will likely see that sometimes fellow contributor Jeff Abramo and I disagree or at least share different viewpoints. Jeff is someone I consider a friend and he and I often discuss our views together. I bring this up because we do so without insulting the other and respecting the other person’s opinion or at least their right to think that way and sometimes I wish more of us could explore our differences in such a manner when discussing sports in the stands or on social media instead of resorting to fights and trolling. How boring would life be if we all thought alike, looked alike and agreed on everything?
• Ifeatu Melifonwu and Chandler Jones are former Syracuse football players so far having really good NFL seasons. Iffy had a forced fumble recovery and Chandler Jones had 5 sacks amid speculation that his agents wanted a new deal before the season started, with this being his final season contractually with Arizona.