With nine games worth of data, we pretty much know who teams are at this point in the season. Of course, what happened in the past doesn’t necessarily lead to a direct correlation of what’s to come, especially in the world of college football, and certainly not with this Clemson team, but it’s still fun to predict.
So who’s going to have a big performance against the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets on Saturday? Here are our leading candidates.
1. Phil Mafah, Running Back
Tech probably had their best defensive performance of the year against the run last week vs. Virginia. However, statistically, the defense is still ranked 126th in the country for average yards per rush allowed with 5.3. With Will Shipley likely to be brought along cautiously, and following Mafah’s huge performance against Notre Dame, No. 7 is in line to run all over the field once again.
2. Tyler Brown, Wide Receiver
The Yellow Jackets’ pass defense has been slightly better than their run defense but they’re not immune to giving up big plays as they rank 115th in the nation on yards per pass with 8.3. With Antonio Williams still out, Brown is the biggest threat to be to catch some downfield shots.
3. Ruke Orhorhoro, Nose Tackle
While more of the talk surrounding Tech’s offensive resurgence has centered on quarterback Haynes King, Tech’s running game as a whole has been getting the job done. The Yellow Jackets are ninth in the nation at 5.4 yards per rush. Ruke Orhorhoro, being the big man in the center of the line most often, will need to be stout and reset the line of scrimmage for Clemson. Making them one-dimensional would play heavily in Clemson’s favor.
Leave a Reply