Drake won last week’s prediction contest and earned the right to guest post. Here are some of thought on the state of the problem under Coach Houston.
For the first time this season, and the 3rd time in the past 2 season, I won the prediction contest. I tied with a fellow reader a few weeks ago, but he/she picked the JMU score correct, so he/she technically won. This past week, I was the first comment and was only 1 point off with a 42-38 score. Leading off with all of this is just to say, I’m kind of a big deal. Wait, who am I kidding. I just basically go with a decent looking score. There’s no talent involved. Of course, I love bragging to my wife about this, but it just adds to her time spent making the “I don’t give a shit” look. And for some reason, these wonderful people who take their precious time, let us write incoherent ramblings. For this, I’d like to say thanks. Like many of you, I look forward to each post and count on it to get hyped for gameday. They give us a place to celebrate, bitch, and come together with fellow JMU fans (and the occasional troll). So while we may not all agree on where JMU is headed this season or in the future, we can all agree that this is one fantastic blog/community. Now, on to the in depth analysis.
I love coach Houston. He reminds me a whole lot of the coach of the Atlanta Falcons, Dan Quinn. Now, most of you might not be familiar if you live outside the Atlanta area. We don’t get a lot of national attention and for good reason. There’s never been a big culture of winning and toughness in this city. Coach Quinn is slowly changing that. Coach Houston is doing the same thing. He’s not over the top, he’s not trying too hard to connect with the younger generation, and he’s straightforward.
Mickey Matthews, at times, was stuck in his ways and more worried about using some old farmer saying as a press conference one liner. Coach Withers was more worried about offensive stats, and the “bright lights”. We won’t know for 2 or 3 years what affect Coach truly has on the team, but so far, he’s done great with what he has. As a previous article I read mentioned, he has some players that have been under 3 coaches, and coordinators. That’s a tough spot, but yet they have kept winning. The defense has it’s gaping holes, yes. Some statistics and rankings are up from last year, including 3rd down conversions. Halftime adjustments have been positive, minus last week’s Chernobyl size melt down.
All of this is to say, we are in a good place. Playing Richmond on the road is typically good for us. You don’t have to worry about raucous crowds at either road venue that’s left, the distance isn’t terrible, and we have a history of winning at both stadiums. I’m confident that when it all shakes out, winning 3 out of 4 could get us a top 4 seed, especially if one of those wins is Richmond. I know I’ll be at the final game this season, making the trip up I85, to 29, and finally that sweet stretch of I81. The crowd may possibly be lighter of students since it’s just beginning their Thanksgiving break, but I’m excited. A huge playoff spot could be on the line, the weather will be perfect, and I finally scored some sweet lower level tickets thanks to my generous JMU loving parents. We may have things to complain about, but consider ourselves lucky. We consistently rank top 5 in FCS attendance (often times beating out many FBS schools), have been ranked in the top 10 most weeks in the past 2 years, and have a Quarterback that is easing the transition from an amazing player we lost (Vad the Impaler). Soak up the next 4 games, let your fingernails grow during the bye week, so they can last the final games, and keep wearing purple.
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Great post. Sometimes I think we as JMU fans lose sight of how good we have it and how far we’ve come. Looking forward to this final stretch and hopeful for plenty of Home playoff games later this year.
Hear Hear.
And I do think the guys could get more credit for taking on this blog project. The coverage is akin to many “professional” coverages I’ve seen and it gives us a chance to talk, disagree and agree on all things JMU Sports.