Candorly Speech

October 26, 2006

 

If I may speak with candor, Candor has a pretty good team. OK, I got my punny article name out of the way and can just write normal now. It’s tough coming up with these names on a regular basis, especially with the stress of a boss piling work on you like a bunch of Walton folks piling onto a dead raccoon.

Candor does have some things that we have to worry about though. You could knock their schedule, and it is really bad. However, whenever you face a kid (Dustin Quick) who rushed for over 1500 yards through 8 games, you have to be concerned, no matter whom he played against. And don’t forget his single game best, a 21 for 362 yards, 4 TD performance against Spencer-Van Etten. If you’re still not at all worried, please realize that they have a good deal of other stuff they can do. Their FB looks pretty nice – Luke Thomas has put up over 9 yards per carry on 584 yards worth of rushing, his 9 rushing TD’s complemented by his 3 receiving TD’s. And then there is a very nice WR in 6’2” Pete Ahart, whose 302 yards receiving leads the air attack. In all, Candor has passed for better than 600 yards.

So, while I would say that Delhi’s defense is vastly better than anything Candor has seen, this amount of firepower will give us some trouble I think. There is just too much there to completely shut down. I for one will be quite happy if we can hold them to 2 scores. I think our defense did a great job in keeping Oxford to just 2 scores.

If we win the game it will once again be on the other side of the ball. This is really the 4^th time this season we’ve been in this situation, where the time on defense is much more of a known event, and the offense is the uncertainty. I said Sidney would score 2-3 times, and that our offense would have to outscore that. Sidney’s O scored twice plus a field goal, with their defense scoring once, and Delhi’s offense struggled enough early on in the game to not let us go over the top. I knew that our D would do pretty well against Walton, and they did, holding them to 99 rushing yards and 1 offensive TD, but, again, the offense didn’t get it done enough of the time. Against Oxford, it was a different story. There was a 3 and out to start the game, but Delhi scored on the next FIVE possessions. Our defense is pretty much always right there….we just need to have GAME-WIDE strength on offense. And, as an aside, we can’t be giving them points on interceptions either. That killed us twice this season, and it will kill us again if it happens.

One last thought on this game, I really hope it isn’t too close. If we’re up by 2 and they have the ball with 3-4 minutes left, they certainly have enough there that with some will-power they can move that ball down the field, not to mention the threat of Mr. Quick breaking one. We need to get a commanding 2 TD lead by the end of the 3^rd.

As for around the section, I think any of the 4 teams could win class C. Right now I’d rank them Sidney-Greene-Lansing-Tburg, but that order could change completely without any surprise to me. I’m really worried about Sidney being all screwed up after the loss. They were overachieving before, and they need to find that again. Forks certainly looked impressive in B….they are coming together well. They will probably win the section, but I wouldn’t count Windsor out yet. Corning East should win A, but they do have to play their rival for the second week in a row Friday. That’s tough to do. They have potential, but I don’t think any game will be an easy one from here on out. UE looks like the best in AA, but given Horsehead’s desire for respect and Vestal’s intense rivalry (with UE), either one could knock them off. There don’t seem to be any real superpower teams in the state this year in AA. I’m curious to see how it will play out. Let’s see if UE can really play well as a team and start to overachieve. If so, they could go a ways.

For picks, I had a great Friday night, not missing a single game, but Saturday wasn’t as good. I finished 18-4 (0.818), making me 146-45 (0.764) for the season. I’ll pick the crossovers to count against my season total, but, again, there’s no mathematical way I can make it to .800. For crossovers, I’ll go with Ithaca, EFA, Unatego (good one for a crossover), Oxford, Spencer, UVE (this and the Spencer game are BCS games I think), Waverly, Chenango Valley, Seton, Edison, Harpursville, Groton, and BG. These are really tough to pick, so I expect to do poorly. Heck, how can I expect to do well when it’s down to picking Ithaca, Spencer, UVE, Harpursville, and Groton to win?!? For the playoffs, I’ll go with Vestal, UE, Corning East, Maine Endwell, Forks, Windsor, Sidney, Greene, and Walton. Incidently, if the B, C, and D picks go as I picked and if Delhi wins, the sectional finals for all 3 will be charter Sus schools. Pretty cool, eh?