The Boston College Eagles finished the regular season on
Saturday with a 17-14 win over Wake Forest. The Eagles did not play on well on offense, but used a great
defense, and forced 3 turnovers to overcome this. BC finishes at 6-6 and will be playing in a bowl game for
the third time in 4 seasons.
When BC had the ball: BC could get nothing going on offense
all game, save for 2 drives in the fourth quarter. The offense was given 2 golden opportunities in the first
quarter and were able to get 10 points out of them. This was huge considering how poorly they played for the
rest of the game. Patrick Towles
had a rough first half, but came up big in the fourth quarter when the Eagles
needed a touchdown. He finished
10-23 for just 74 yards. When
Towles is used correctly, he is a decent quarterback. He throws a good ball on slants and quick passes over the
middle. Where he struggles is
reading a defense, and decision making on long drop backs. Towles also did a good job of deciding
to take off when nothing was open and gaining yards with his feet. He hit both Tommy Sweeney and Jeff
Smith 4 times each, the only 2 receivers to have more than 1 catch. Sweeney does an excellent job of
getting open particularly on the quick posts that Towles is effective at. His touchdown catch come off of
this. Smith had a tough day with
drops, but it was good to see BC try to throw it deep to him a few times. Michael Walker had a great run after
catch on a screen pass, which BC should be running more. On the ground, BC had a terrible
day. They ran for 93 yards on 39
carries, just 2.4 yards per carry.
No running back played particularly well, as the Eagles struggled to
block up front. However, BC did
have a few decent runs outside, yet didn’t use this often.
When Wake Forest had
the Ball: The BC defense did an excellent job holding Wake Forest to less
than 300 yards of offense, and forced 3 turnovers. Those turnovers lead to 10 points, with the final one
sealing the game. BC completely
stuffed the traditional run game of Wake, and forced to Demon Deacons to throw
more than they wanted to. Wolford
was 16 for 33 with 137 yards, just 4.2 yards per attempt. Wolford was able to get some yardage on
the ground, but most of those came on 2 long runs. BC’s defensive line was excellent, both against the run and
the pass. The Eagles finished with
4 sacks, and 2 hurries, with Harold Landry accounting for 3 of the sacks. BC’s defense had 8 tackles for
loss. Zack Allen seemed to be
involved everytime Wake tried to run, and did a great job of getting push. The linebackers played well, in
particular Connor Strachan, who led the team with 10 total tackles. The linebackers did get out of position
a few times on Wolford scrambles, but were only burned twice. The BC secondary also had a good game
with 2 interceptions and 6 passes knocked down. They did an excellent job when the ball was in the air, and
played physical without getting called for pass interference. This was arguably the best game the
defense had played all year, and felt like a throwback to last season the way
they got to the quarterback.
Overall: The Eagles are going bowling this
season, and have improved from a 3-9 season from a year ago. While many will not be happy about it
Daz will be coming back next season, and has made it to a bowl in 3 of his 4
seasons as head coach. While the
BC offense did not play well on Saturday, the defense played excellent, and was
opportunistic. BC probably got
outplayed overall, but still managed to pick up the win.
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