Pack Nine Take The Field For The First Time Today At 3:00

Season preview from GoPack.com

The Wolfpack baseball season kicks off officially today with a 3:00 start against the University of Rhode Island as part of a three-game weekend homestand. Xavier and Santa Clara round out the field.

I won't pretend to pass myself off as an expert of all things Wolfpack Baseball, 'cause I'm not. But it doesn't take a Bruce Winkworth to tell you that the Pack pitching staff will be missing a lot of firepower from the season before.

Clayton Shunick (7-6, 2.76), Eric Surkamp (5-3, 4.89) and Eryk McConnell (4-2, 4.85) are all gone from last year's fantastic rotation, and the Pack will be turning to relatively untested arms to fill their considerable void. The extent and rapidity that they do will likely determine just how far this team can go this season.

One notable member of the squad won't be taking the field today. Russell Wilson, who made quite a name for himself on the football field over the back half of the season but was injured in the bowl game against Rutgers, could miss a considerable chunk of the baseball season. He is scheduled to have a final MRI eight weeks after his injury, which would be the week of the 23rd, and even then he'll likely have some further recovery/evaluation time to log before seeing the diamond to ensure he's 100% healthy.

He's no doubt itching to get back out there, and Pack fans will be just as eager to see him take the field when that time comes.

The Doak is a wonderful place to take in a game on a sunny weekend day, so I encourage you to make it out that way at some point this year. There are great opportunities to see games against some top-notch ACC opponents this year, particularly toward the back end of the schedule: FSU, Carolina and Clemson all come to town for three-game sets in late April and early May. Hopefully all four squads will have something significant to play for heading into those series.

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Russell Wilson's knee injury will not require surgery

Per GoPack.com, it's a sprain that should heal successfully with rehab.

Good news for Pack fans, obviously. The next question is how the rehab timetable will impact his availability for baseball. The season begins next month and it's tough to imagine that he'll be completely healed come the beginning of the year.

If he's not, does Coach Avent sit Wilson for a while early on to allow more than enough time to heal (you just know with Wilson's competitive streak that he'll be eager to play before the doctors think he's 100%)? I would hope so. Wilson is dynamic enough of an athlete in both sports that risking too early of a return isn't worth it.

Take your time, Russell. We can wait for your healthy return, even if maybe you can't.

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Duh.

Russell is your ACC Rookie of the Year

Other notables:

• Wilson was also named offensive ROY, as you might imagine
• Sean Spence of Miami was named defensive ROY
• Paul Johnson beat out Jeff Jagodzinski for Coach of the Year by a fairly sizable margin, 46 votes to 12. Tom O'Brien did manage one vote for COY.
  

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Russell Wilson named first team All-ACC

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Given how great Russell Wilson has played over the last month and a half and given the lack of any real contender throughout the rest of the league, it was pretty much a foregone conclusion that Wilson would win this honor. Thaddeus Lewis finished a distant second in the voting, garnering 28 points to Wilson's 106 (67 voters/134 maximum total points).

This makes Wilson the first freshman quarterback in the ACC history to ever be named to the first-team. Pretty heady stuff when you consider all the great quarterbacks that have come from the league (Rivers at State, Boomer Esiason at Maryland, Charlie Ward and Chris Weinke at FSU, Michael Vick at VT).

Nate Irving, Willie Young and TJ Graham all earned honorable mentions for their contributions (Graham as a special teamer).

Coach of the year and rookie of the year will be announced tomorrow. Tom O'Brien will get a couple of votes for coach of the year but will likely miss out to either Paul Johnson or Jeff Jagodzinski at Boston College. Wilson's first-team selection all but seals the Rookie of the Year award up for him, and he may have a shot at the Offensive Player of the Year award announced on Wednesday if he can beat out Jonathan Dwyer from Georgia Tech. It doesn't look good, though, given Dwyer was a unanimous first-team selection.

Nevertheless, an incredible achievement for Wilson who spent most of the first part of the year injured in some fashion.

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Is it right to feel this good about a team that's 6-6?

I think so, given they were 2-6 just a month ago.

As a friend asked me today at the game, "What would've happened if this team had stayed healthy all year?"

It's tough to know.

(Continues)

A couple more wins were there for the taking this year. The BC game, perhaps. Maybe the Florida State game or the Maryland game.

But what effect did the adversity at the beginning of the year have on molding the team into the squad that ran the table over the final four games? Freshmen and walk-ons had to step in and play more minutes then they ever could've thought coming into the year. That built some experienced depth to rely upon for spelling the starters later in the year.

Folks like Owen Spencer have emerged late in the season as the opportunity to shine has presented itself. It's tough not to look ahead to next year when a (hopefully) recuperated Donald Bowens returns to the lineup on one side of the field and Spencer lines up on the other.

Russell Wilson...what can you say, other than "wow." The kid continues to amaze, turning busted plays into scores, breaking the will of opponents just when they get a glimmer of hope. I know he may be a couple of games late to the Player of the Year discussion, but there simply can't be another contender for Rookie of the Year in the ACC, and without a doubt NO other player in the conference means more to the success or failure of their team than Wilson.

To go 4-0 over the final four games, against an upstart Duke and three teams ranked at some point in the year, is one of the more remarkable things I've ever seen a Wolfpack football team achieve as long as I've followed them. From where I sit, the future is indeed bright.

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Russell named Rivals.com Freshman of the Week

Plenty more awards to come following this week, I'm sure.

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Something to consider heading into Death Valley

You know me. I'm all about searching for a sliver of hope heading into a game State's got no good shot at winning.

So here's one.

(Continues)Russell Wilson, State's only legitimate hope at quarterback this season, went down with a concussion in the first half of the South Carolina game. As a result, the Tigers have a very limited amount of film on the redshirt freshman quarterback. Couple with that the fact that State's offense was retooled over the offseason to install a read option scheme tailored to Wilson's skillset, which subsequently was shelved when Daniel Evans and Harrison Beck had to come on in relief, and it's likely that the offense Clemson sees this afternoon will be quite a bit different than the majority of what they've seen of the 2008 Pack on film.

The flipside of that coin, of course, is that Wilson has only a half of game experience under his belt. But in front of 80,000 fans in Columbia, Wilson didn't show any signs of intimidation or jitters operating the offense. In fact, the Pack looked solid in moving the ball against the Gamecock defense right up to Wilson's injury.

So we'll see. Things could get ugly in a hurry, but the defense of the Pack has been our strong suit so far. If Wilson shows flashes of athleticism--something certainly not shown from Evans or Beck--then who knows?

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34-0 Cocks; Wilson goes out with a concussion

I had a root canal performed about a month ago.

It felt a TON better than watching the South Carolina game, that's for sure.

(Continues)

I hate, hate, hate to go down this road...but damn if it didn't seem like the South Carolina defensive linemen were headhunting on Wilson. They took two questionable shots on Wilson early in the game, making helmet-to-helmet contact. Even Chris Fowler had to wonder at least once if the 'Cocks should've been flagged for leading with the helmet.

But after it looked like Wilson was getting comfortable leading the offense, with Andre Brown making headway on the ground, Wilson would take yet another blow to the helmet that left the quarterback lying on the turf for what seemed like an eternity.

As his teammates prayed in silence, Wilson was carted off the field in what we would later find out was a grade 2 or grade 3 concussion.

After that, there was just no life left in the Pack.

Evans came in and absolutely stunk. There's no other way to put it. I thought he was better than what he showed tonight; perhaps Wilson's injury rattled him quite a bit.

Ugh. I just can't even seem to process how quickly things went from a 0-0 defensive grudgematch to a 34-0 bloodletting.

The defensive line looked solid holding the SC offense in check up front, winning battles along the line early, pressuring the quarterback enough to lead to four interceptions.

But again, Wilson's injury just completely devastated this team, mentally. Credit SC for taking the game from that point; Spurrier knows when blood's in the water, and he got after it when State was clearly shaken.

So now it's time to regroup, prepare for William and Mary and pray that Wilson can return and bring some life back to a team that was lifeless without him.

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It's Russell Wilson at QB

Well, I'm a little surprised. After planning to redshirt Mike Glennon for the season earlier this week, I thought Tom O'Brien would choose experience over the unknown heading into the South Carolina game. But he's stated all along that his decision would be based on who he thought gave the team the best chance to win, period.

“The decision always came down to who we thought would give us the best opportunity to win a football game. Right now, our offense and the way we are structured it will be Russell Wilson. That was the deciding factor.”

(Continues)

Interesting language here: "...the way the offense is structured." Is he saying that State's offense, at this stage, suits a mobile quarterback better than a dropback passer? We've known that the Pack's offensive line has been a work in progress ever since his arrival. Perhaps it's still too far away to give a quarterback like Evans enough time to be effective.

I think if O'Brien had a good offensive line, Evans would be the starter. Experience counts for so much in college football. None of the five quarterbacks blew the staff away with their offseason work, obviously. That it was such a neck-and-neck race to the end of fall practice tells me that Evans and Wilson were and are still very close in ability. What may have ultimately tipped the scales in Wilson's favor is his escapability, his ability to roll the pocket and his greater effectiveness when tucking the ball to run--all positives when your lineplay is subpar.

When watching the game Thursday, pay particular attention to how well the offensive line plays. South Carolina has one hell of a defense, but if the offensive line struggles against them, it could very well mean the job is Wilson's for the rest of the year--or at least until the line gets shored up. Evans just doesn't have the physical tools to operate behind a sieve-like line.

Regardless of the line play, Evans will still see some action in the first half, according to O'Brien:

"Somewhere in the first half he's gonna have to go in and play – he's done too much for this program and he's a good enough player. Somewhere Russell is going to get a little tired in that first quarter or first half – just the emotion of the night and trying to get it done your first time out. He's gonna need some time to sit and rest a little."

It will be an opportunity to see if Evans' surgically repaired shoulder has improved his ability to throw the ball any. If it has, then it should be interesting to see how this ever-evolving quarterback scenario unfolds from there.

One hopes, however, that we're still not trying to resolve it three or four weeks into the season.

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...and then there were three.

QB battle trimmed to Evans, Wilson and Glennon.

You could almost see this coming, given how few reps Harrison Beck and Justin Burke were getting in the scrimmages. Glennon was getting the lion's share of reps and Wilson must've shown the coaches something that keeps him in the race. Evans, by no surprise, is still in it, but it appears that he's no longer a lock to be the starter for the South Carolina game based on TOB's language:

"I don't have anything to say about them individually," said O'Brien. "The idea is to find a guy who we think we can win with. We made that decision [to cut it to three]. Those three guys all have something we like about them, and it's all down to how they perform in these next two scrimmages."

A part of me keeps rooting for Burke to do something to get on the field, but it's clear at this point that he lacks some key ability to do it, be it accuracy, strength or leadership. I thought he looked the best out of the bunch at the Spring Game, but perhaps that was simply an anomaly. He seems content at this point to serve in a backup capacity and earn a degree for free, which I certainly can't begrudge (especially after dealing with that beech Sallie Mae this morning).

As I wrote yesterday, I would like to see Glennon redshirt this season, get more comfortable with the team, the playbook and build some size to increase his durability. But it looks like TOB is open to the idea of him playing season, perhaps from day one. If Glennon is to play this year, I would like him to play the first game. The worst case scenario, in my mind, is to sit him the first half of the year and then bring him in mid-season if we stuggle. At that point you've burned a full year's eligibility for 5-6 games of experience as a true freshman. It wouldn't be the first time that's happened to a player, though, and preserving eligibility doesn't seem high up on the list of factors for O'Brien as to who plays and who doesn't.

I still think Evans starts the South Carolina game, but at this point Glennon and Wilson seem to be closing the gap...stay tuned.

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Glennon: QB, or not QB...that is the question.

We're two weeks and two days away from the first game of the season and State's no closer today than they were two months ago to knowing who the starting quarterback will be.

The big cry from the internets these days is anointing freshman Mike Glennon the starter against South Carolina, bypassing incumbents Daniel Evans, Justin Burke and Harrison Beck and newcomer Russell Wilson.

Here's two reasons why these State fans think it will work, and why I think it is a bad idea.

1. The Unknown is better than The Known. It's the classic scenario...the backup QB is always the most popular player on a football team. The reason being he hasn't done anything wrong to that point in his career. It's much easier to point to all the mistakes of the starting college QB and say he sucks while simultaneously touting all the accolades an incoming freshman received in high school as evidence that he's a better option. Comparing one's high school performance to another's at the college level isn't a fair comparison, by a long shot. Yes, Glennon was rated as one of the top two or three QBs in the nation as a high school senior. But how do you extrapolate that into what he'll do at the next level? You can't. But it hasn't stopped folks from making that argument.

2. Philip Rivers. While he will likely remain the greatest QB in school history for decades to come, Philip's legacy for the near future is that no QB to don the Wolfpack red will ever be comparable. Some folks lose sight of this, however, in wanting to thrust Glennon into the first game of the year, citing how well Philip did as a true freshman. They say he has all the tools Philip had, can make all the throws and has all the mental aspects in place to succeed as a true freshman, just like Philip did. If it worked then, it can work now. They may be right.

Here's why I think they're wrong.

First off, there were three things about Rivers' situation in 2000 that made his immediate success possible: his size and strength as a freshman, his offensive coordinator (Norm Chow) and his early enrollment. Glennon has none of these three things working in his favor. While I don't mean to shortchange Dana Bible, he's no Chow (no one else is). Glennon's thin as a rail (6'6"-195), and he didn't join the team until the summer, missing out on all of the spring workouts and practices.

Glennon needs two things right now: time and size. Missing out on spring practice cannot be diminished, in my mind, because those hours spent in the weight room and on the practice field are crucial team-building opportunities. The recurring theme coming out of Rivers' first spring in camp was how strong his leadership skills were at an early age. He worked harder than any of the returning players and incoming freshmen, and it helped build the kind of rapport a QB needs heading into fall camp and the first game of the year. Glennon hasn't had that time, and while I'm sure he's making the most of his time with the team now, he missed out on almost four months of time he could've spent in playbook memorization and team building.

His size is also a concern. While Glennon will never fill out into a 265-lb monster, he does need every pound of muscle he can add to his frame to ensure he'll survive the pounding he'd surely take in 2008. State's OL isn't exactly where it needs to be -- witness the moving of two defensive linemen over to the OL in the spring to fill in gaps -- and it would be risky, in my mind, to put a thin QB who hasn't physically matured back there with inadequate protection. Rivers stepped of the plane at RDU weighing a good 220. That's a full 25 pounds ahead of Glennon at this point, and Glennon is about an inch taller.

Couple the time in the weight room with a year of college-level film study and you'll set the groundwork for Glennon to maximize his output over four years of eligibility. If you need a good example of what holding a clipboard in your first year can do for a QB, look no further than Rivers, who sat his first two years in the NFL. It gave him plenty of time to learn the playbook, continue to workout and gain more strength and to build a rapport with his pro teammates. Glennon, in my mind, needs that time in moving from the high school to college level.

Some other factors:

• State's picked to finish last in the Atlantic Division.
• State faces one of the toughest schedules in the league this year. The Pack could be 100% better as a team than they were last year and still finish with the same record.
• You run the risk of damaging Glennon's confidence if you start him too early in a situation where he fails often. A QB is measured between the ears, and if his confidence gets damaged early, it may take a lot of time to get it back, if ever.
• Tom O'Brien is in no danger of losing his job if he struggles this season. Is it better to use a year of Glennon's eligibility now, in a year that won't amount to much more than a rebuilding season where Glennon will get pounded, or to have for a fifth year in 2012 with (hopefully) a much better OL and better surrounding talent?

Redshirt Glennon this season and let the quartet of other contenders duke it out for the honor to captain rebuilding season #2 of the TOB era. Evans has experience and a repaired shoulder that he claims is stronger than ever. If that's the case, I say give it to the senior and let the other three vie for the job. Because if Glennon is the truth, let's focus on the future with him at the helm and give him the best chance to succeed.

That means sitting him in 2008.

Edit to update Rivers' weight as a freshman...good catch.

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Triangle Pigskin Preview...interesting QB comments from TOB

PP link.

"Daniel was not able to participate in spring practice," O'Brien stated. "He has a lot of experience under his belt, and we have to give him every opportunity to do what he can do and be the quarterback.

"One of the things that the injury allowed us to do in the spring was take a long, hard look at Russell Wilson who is a pretty talented freshman. He did an excellent job this spring."

"We had a great performance out of Justin Burke in the spring game... the second half of the spring game," added O'Brien. "We will look at Mike Glennon, the freshman coming in, who is certainly a talented individual."

A decision from O'Brien on his starting quarterback will likely not come until the week of the South Carolina opener. Naming the starter is a big decision, and O'Brien feels you shouldn't do so until the choice is obvious.

Now, it's interesting to note not so much what he said but whom he didn't mention: Harrison Beck.

It's risky reading too much into a name omission in a collection of quotes like this. It could be he mentioned Beck in passing, or in a quote that was tough to make out on tape (I've been there before). And I'm sure if you asked why he didn't mention Beck, O'Brien would quickly tell you that it means nothing.

But Beck is not a name you just gloss over, like a walk on or fifth-year senior that was lucky to get a spot on the squad.

No, Beck was the high-profile transfer from Nebraska with a ton of stars on his recruiting profile and a cannon for an arm. There were plenty of folks that felt like he was going to instantly lock up the starting spot from the minute he became eligible to play.

It hasn't worked out that way, though. Turns out Beck cannon's about as accurate as one pulled from a shipwreck, and he sports a brash attitude that apparently rubbed folks the wrong way in Lincoln. And when the starting QB job was there for the taking, he couldn't supplant an undersized, underpowered Daniel Evans.

Fast forward to today. In response to a direct question regarding all of the possible options at QB, O'Brien takes time to break down the incumbent, the two players that turned heads in the spring and the incoming freshman...but not Beck.

Again, it's tough reading too much into something not said...but it's an interesting omission nevertheless.

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