A Sea Of Red

Coach McKay mentioned part of the schedule for next year today at the Flames Club luncheon. He didn't give dates, but he said who five of the first six games are:

@ Mason
vs Clemson
vs Old Dominion
@ Notre Dame
@ Northwestern

Ouch, we could be hurtin

0-5 - what is there to talk about.....

That sounds like a "higher level of competition" to me.

Cider Jim wrote:That sounds like a "higher level of competition" to me.

That was my first thoughts when that came out. I found it funny. We're upgrading our schedule pretty good for next year. We'll still have some non-DI's but there'll be some good games, as evidenced by those five.

I dont see any reason we couldnt end up 3-2 or 4-1 and id be happy with either.

I'll be perfectly content with two wins out of those five and I fully believe that's possible.

TheLouder wrote:I dont see any reason we couldnt end up 3-2 or 4-1 and id be happy with either.

What? We're going to be young again next year, two of our rotation players are coming off season-ending injuries (Anderson and McMasters), and on the road for 3 games. We played the game of our lives at Clemson and still lost.

We have a bright future ahead but let's not get ahead of ourselves.

TDDance234 wrote:

TheLouder wrote:I dont see any reason we couldnt end up 3-2 or 4-1 and id be happy with either.

What? We're going to be young again next year, two of our rotation players are coming off season-ending injuries (Anderson and McMasters), and on the road for 3 games. We played the game of our lives at Clemson and still lost.

We have a bright future ahead but let's not get ahead of ourselves.

I agree that we're young, but beating GMU, ODU, and NW dont seem out of reach. Haha and heck someone on here has got to be optimistic.

I say 0-5 for those games, would love to be wrong.

Oh ye of little faith. These are the types of thoughts I heard on here about our schedule we just completed. We will be handful for every team on our schedule when we bring it.

The ODU is the return on the BracketBuster and the Clemson home date is the return for that quick turnaround game we had down there this season.

Notre Dame & Northwestern are our Chicago swing similar to what we did this year with the tourney.

The staff has done its part to give us an opportunity to raise our RPI. Now it is on the team collectively to seize the opportunity.

I say 1-4 for those 5

I would list them in terms of winnability as:

1) Mason
2) Northwestern
3) ODU
4) Notre Dame
5) Clemson

Clemson is at home and should be a huge crowd so who knows.

SuperJon wrote:I would list them in terms of winnability as:

1) Mason
2) Northwestern
3) ODU
4) Notre Dame
5) Clemson

Clemson is at home and should be a huge crowd so who knows.

you listed the top winnable game as a road game......how many solid OOC teams have we beat since youve been around?

UVA lookedl like a good road Wearlier in the year but they had what like 7 wins....Predicting any OOC road win is just silly as #1. You should have been around long enough to know that at least, since you know everything else haha.

I love it...folks complain about a cupcake schedule...yet when the team starts off on a stretch like next year's...folks cry about an 0-5 start.

Fumblerooskies wrote:I love it...folks complain about a cupcake schedule...yet when the team starts off on a stretch like next year's...folks cry about an 0-5 start.

I know... and how do we have any flippin' idea how we're going to do in those 5 games?

Can you name our starting five? Can you tell me who is going to be the go-to guy? Our roster for next year isn't even final, let's hold off on this "4-1" or "0-5" crap til we have an idea who's on the team.

We got demolished by UNCA and then beat UVA and GMU with the same team full of Freshman and Smitty... I don't think looking at the schedule right after BJ Jenkins said he would transfer did we all think that's how the season would start.

SuperJon wrote:Coach McKay mentioned part of the schedule for next year today at the Flames Club luncheon. He didn't give dates, but he said who five of the first six games are:

@ Mason
vs Clemson
vs Old Dominion
@ Notre Dame
@ Northwestern

That is a tough road. Glad to see that MK is beefing of up competition. I believe that these will be tough but winnable.

I base my prediction on the five games we now have unsettled team chemistry with the defections. We also do not have the players for next year signed, so one or more may back out for whatever reason. The hardest thing for a team to be successful is chemistry and that takes time. I just hope none of those five games are shown on ESPN.

4everfsu wrote:I base my prediction on the five games we now have unsettled team chemistry with the defections.

I tend to agree with you on things.... but really???

I think that couldn't be further from the truth. I don't think there will be any more chemistry issue than we had coming into this season... and we beat UVA and GMU and Almost Clemson blah blah blah.

So before you look too negatively at the future, look to the past. We lost Alex, Rell, TeeJay, Justin Holland and BJ (who "defected"), had 3 freshmen starting, and won a couple of games against good teams in the first month of so of the season.

Rumors of our demise have been greatly exaggerated.

Time will tell

4everfsu wrote:Time will tell

I just really don't see where you guys are getting these ideas. Our starting five will have just as much experience, if not more, than last years team, and they will have all played and practiced together for a year now unless JVP, Ovie, Perez, or Bo crack the starting 5 (or if JCS magically arrives, but he would have chemistry with his brother at least...)

So you base this on the starting five, well you better have depth and good skills coming off the bench. There were some games where we stunk this year after going to our bench. Again we are dealing with uncertainty at this point. Wishing and hoping is not going to get it done.

Rocketfan wrote:

SuperJon wrote:I would list them in terms of winnability as:

1) Mason
2) Northwestern
3) ODU
4) Notre Dame
5) Clemson

Clemson is at home and should be a huge crowd so who knows.

you listed the top winnable game as a road game......how many solid OOC teams have we beat since youve been around?

UVA lookedl like a good road Wearlier in the year but they had what like 7 wins....Predicting any OOC road win is just silly as #1. You should have been around long enough to know that at least, since you know everything else haha.

And I stick by that and here's why: It's the first game of the season for both teams. Neither will have played a game yet. You always see upsets and crap happen that shouldn't right out of the gate. The first game of the year, especially if you're playing good competitions, is completely unpredictable. Add to that the fact it's on a Friday night in the middle of football season and who's to say the crowd will even be that great (I know Mason doesn't have football, but their fans are VT and UVA football fans just like everyone else). I'm not saying we'll win that game, but I'm saying I think it's our best shot. I could be wrong. It's happened before and it'll happen again.

As for how many solid OOC teams have we beat since I've been here - Niagra in 07 and then W&M, Mason, and UVA in 08. Niagra is top three in their conference (maybe top 2, can't remember). Mason and W&M are CAA teams so even in a down year, a CAA win is a good win. UVA is in the ACC so, just like the other two, in a down year an ACC win is an ACC win. So that's one quality road OOC game in two years under McKay.

I say @ Mason and Northwestern are our most winnable games.
Aren't we also supposed to be playing at VCU???

I'll chime in with what I know about the G-W sched:

road games at Texas and at UNC-Charlotte, looking for two more 'money' road games.

Home games with JMU from Bracketbusters and should have return home games with Longwood and Western Carolina.

I don't see G-W scheduling more than two non D-1's next season.

Odds are we shouldn't meet until January sometime, being that we played y'all up there in December last year.