BC-Wake Forest preview

Although I dread playing them every year, I am glad Wake Forest continues to have success in the ACC. They remain the counterargument to any media member, fan or supposed expert who says BC’s limitations will keep us from winning championships. Now this is college football and the limitations will keep both schools from being No. 1 year after year, but Wake Forest won the conference two years ago. When we line up this Saturday, we should look across the field and realize that we can do it this year.

Narrative talking point that you’ll tire of by the end of the game.
“Special teams will really make a difference in this game.” With their Mr. Clutch Sam Swank returning and our kicking situation kindly described as uncertain, the placekicking will probably be an added emphasis of the broadcast. I think the importance might be a bit overstated. Although Ohligher shanked three FGs in Winston-Salem in 2004, the Wake games haven’t really turned on kicking. The key to their success against us have been big plays on misdirection. Now that the more teams are playing like Wake, I think BC is better prepared than we have been in the past for the Deacons.

Three Simple Keys
1. Exploit the splits. Wake’s offensive line uses fairly wide splits. This makes double teaming a big DT a little more difficult. The trade off for the offense is you assume the big DT is slow and cannot cover as much ground. That’s not the case with BC. We need Raji and Brace sprinting through those gaps and forcing the play elsewhere.
2. Pressure on Riley. It is unfortunate that we don’t have a great pass rusher. We’ll need someone to step up this weekend. When teams get to Riley their offense starts to break down.
3. Getting big plays out of play action. After last week, Wake will be keying on Crane out of the option read. It would be a nice twist to play fake out of that and get a few big passing plays.

Gambling notes
-- Jim Grobe is 4-1 against the spread when playing BC
-- BC was favored in all five of our most recent meetings
-- As a member of the ACC, BC is 1-4 in regular season game in North Carolina
The current line is BC+2

Factoid
Due to the conference move and the break in the Virginia Tech series, Wake Forest is now BC’s longest active series. Saturday will be the sixth year in a row that BC has played Wake.

Scoreboard Watching
I'll have my eye on Maryland-FSU. We control our own destiny but what happens to the Terps this Saturday will certainly influence how they enter our game next weekend.

I hope to see…
The Tight Ends get more involved in the passing game. We’ve used our bigger Tight Ends to exploit holes in Wake’s D in the past. It carries more risk since you are asking Crane to throw into traffic, but I think we can get some big plays with Anderson and Purvis.

BC is in trouble if…
Wake gets big plays in the passing game. I am fine with letting them dink and dunk. If they go over the top on deep routes, BC might be vulnerable.

Bottom Line
I think last week gave the whole team a nice shot in the arm. The offensive line showed they can control a game and made life easier for Crane. I think BC stays conservative, wins the battle up front and stays alive with a win.
Final Score: BC 30, Wake 17