The Beak Football Breakdown: Cards vs. The Orange

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Our Cardinals have a quick turnaround this week as they will take to the road to play Syracuse on Friday night. Yes we will be heading into the the Carrier Dome. Every Cardinal fan remembers the last time our Cardinals played Syracuse there. We had a perfect 9-0 season going in 2012 and they crushed our hopes of going undefeated winning that game 45-26. The Cardinals are 3-3 at the Carrier Dome and 6-6 all-time against the Orange. This will be their first ACC game of the season. Friday will be the Cardinals fourth conference game, and in all four games they will have faced a team playing its ACC opener.

Syracuse dropped to 2-2 on the year after losing to Notre Dame last weekend, 31-15. The Orange won their first two games of the season over Villanova and Central Michigan, before losing to Maryland. Against Notre Dame, the Orange gained 429 total yards while giving up 523 total yards to the Fighting Irish. The Orange run a hurry-up no huddle, run-first spread offense, and have adapted triple option principles for one of their primary offensive plays. This is a team that favors the run but they have a pretty balanced offensive attack with 930 yards on the ground and 872 through the air. They are 48th in the nation in total offense.

Syracuse 2014 OVERALL FBS RANKINGS
PASSING YARDS
218.0
81st
Overall
RUSHING YARDS
232.5
25th
Overall
POINTS FOR
25.5
88th
Overall
POINTS AGAINST
23.5
56th
Overall

Leading this Syracuse offense is quarterback Terrel Hunt. To say this guy likes to go right at defenses is an understatement. He is the leading rusher on offense with 299 yards and 6 touchdowns this season. He has also thrown for 782 yards and 1 touchdown. This team has some other good weapons in this option offense as well. Running back Prince-Tyson Gulley already has two games where he’s ran for over 100 yards. He has 280 yards with 1 touchdown on the season. He averages 7 yards a carry good for 14th in the nation. Gulley is running his way into the record books as his current per-carry career average stands at 5.6, trailing only Jim Brown and Ernie Davis on Syracuse’s career list. Running back Adonis Ameen-Moore is not too shabby either. He has 208 yards with 1 touchdown on the season. All three of these guys are seniors and play like it.
They’ve got a pretty good group of receivers in Jarrod West who has 236 yards, Ben Lewis who has 134 yards and Ashton Broyld who has 125 yards. One of their top receivers Brisly Estime will miss the game Friday.

Our Cardinals are ranked 3rd in the nation in total defense and have the #1 defense in the country against the run. It is going to be interesting to see our unit take on the triple option this week. This should be a great test for our defense and a good battle. Can’t wait to see what Mauldin, Burgess, Mount, Kelsey, Gaines, Holliman and company can do against this Cuse offensive group. My money is on the guys in red.

The Syracuse defense is ranked 53rd in the nation and they aren’t a big until but they do get to the ball well and have some decent speed. They have a good defensive front seven, led by DE Micah Robinson and LBs Cameron Lynch and Dyshawn Davis. Lynch is one of the best pass rushers in the ACC and in the country ranked 5th with 4.5 sacks this season. The Orange have been stingy against the run allowing only 104 yards per game ranked 38th, and good at getting into the backfield. Syracuse is 36th in the country of tackles for loss per game at 6.8 per game. Syracuse loves to send pressure.

We learned on Wednesday that Reggie Bonnafon will get the start again on Friday. Will Gardner may be available if needed. The word coming out of the offensive side this week is consistency. Coach Petrino wants his guys to establish more of a rhythm this week and also do a better job at execution. Penalties and turnovers have killed the offense this year and it won’t be pretty Friday night if our guys make mental mistakes and turn the ball over. Wide receiver Eli Rodgers played well in that last game at the Carrier Dome and he will need to step up again this week. He and James Quick will have to play well. I really like our running game in this match-up. We got 4 guys that can go at their defense all night long. With the way they come at you fatigue will start to be a factor if we pound it down their throats all night. Our offensive line has acknowledged their need to get better. I think we’ll see that this week. Our offense has caught a bad wrap this season and it’s justified to some extent but we have played some solid defenses and this group for Cuse is also pretty good. Hope our guys answer the call.

I think we’ll see another good ballgame early on Friday night. If our offense struggles it could be another very close game. They will be hype wanting to win their first ACC game of the season and will have a great home crowd behind them. I really think our defense along with a solid running attack will be the difference and our Cards will roll to their 5th win of the season.

The Beak Prediction:
Louisville 34 Syracuse 17