Having had been afforded an extra hour of sleep last night (…yes, the best day of the year), I have very mixed feelings after the disaster last night. I am conflicted with the disappointment of repeated failure, but my frustration is somewhat placated by the fact that these late losses by default demonstrate that victory was on our grasp. While crossing the wire fourth in the 200M Sprint four qualifying rounds in a row rips your heart out, at least you aren’t that token white guy pulling up with a pulled hammy in Lane 8 as Bill Burr says in his set.
We are where we are as a program. We are not winning when it counts, we are not closing, we have a lot of injuries, we have good, but not top-level coaching staff, we have a growingly apathetic fan base beat down by scandal and bureaucratic disfunction, we have young team without a great deal of top-level talent, we have money, but not the kind of money needed to buy our way to prosperity, and we have a team that play their asses off but can’t seem to get over the hump.
So where does that leave us?....Where we are. Pissed, frustrated, dejected, and not sure where the program goes from here. Sure, we can rightfully vent our frustrations at the coaching staff, Satterfield not showing the “proper” amount of remorse at a press conference, missed interceptions and questionable treatment by the officials that may have changed the course of the game, but at the end of the day we have to respect the effort these kids are showing out there. They are fighting, even though they haven’t been able to get it done in the last quarter. They could easily have folded the tent and phoned it in at this point, but they haven’t.
I was personally affected by the pain and sympathy I felt in Malik Cunningham’s tweet late last night: “Idk how to feel at this point”
Here was a young man that left it all on the field last night, hobbled by injury when the team needed him the most, and like myself, wasn’t sure what to think after having our hearts ripped out once again in the 4th quarter. I have such respect and compassion for that young man. His pain and frustration is 10x greater than mine since he spends almost every waking hour of the day trying to achieve that victory while I occasionally check in on social media during the week and game day.
It’s tempting for me to check out after the scandal, frustration, mediocre play calling, and seemingly skewed ACC officiating. All of these things justify the apathy and anger demonstrated watching one our biggest fans destroy his seat in front on me after the failure to score on the last play, but I have a hard time doing that while you have kids like Malik, banged up, but out there fighting their assess off to the end for their teammates and fans. Yes...we didn't close against a Brent Venables defense with an injured quarterback and a backup center. I don't think we're the first, nor will we be the last.
Hard for me to just check out when these kids are still fighting. We just need to be goldfish as Ted Lasso teaches us because dwelling on the loss and frustration will not help us get over that hump to success. However, fixating on it could certainly doom that goal. We aren’t getting blown up by 35 every game with players phoning it in, we just haven’t been able to close. You don’t raze the house and start over; you fix it up where it needs fixing. It seems easier to tear it down and start over. Fire Satterfield, fire Tyra, get rid of “Little Miss Sunshine” and things will be better, right? They won’t. Starting from scratch seems like a good idea only because you don’t remember how much pain and effort was put into the foundation of getting to where you are now. We have a good foundation; we just need to fix up a few things. I think we can do it because the kids are still fighting and we are closer to getting there that we feel.
We are where we are as a program. We are not winning when it counts, we are not closing, we have a lot of injuries, we have good, but not top-level coaching staff, we have a growingly apathetic fan base beat down by scandal and bureaucratic disfunction, we have young team without a great deal of top-level talent, we have money, but not the kind of money needed to buy our way to prosperity, and we have a team that play their asses off but can’t seem to get over the hump.
So where does that leave us?....Where we are. Pissed, frustrated, dejected, and not sure where the program goes from here. Sure, we can rightfully vent our frustrations at the coaching staff, Satterfield not showing the “proper” amount of remorse at a press conference, missed interceptions and questionable treatment by the officials that may have changed the course of the game, but at the end of the day we have to respect the effort these kids are showing out there. They are fighting, even though they haven’t been able to get it done in the last quarter. They could easily have folded the tent and phoned it in at this point, but they haven’t.
I was personally affected by the pain and sympathy I felt in Malik Cunningham’s tweet late last night: “Idk how to feel at this point”
Here was a young man that left it all on the field last night, hobbled by injury when the team needed him the most, and like myself, wasn’t sure what to think after having our hearts ripped out once again in the 4th quarter. I have such respect and compassion for that young man. His pain and frustration is 10x greater than mine since he spends almost every waking hour of the day trying to achieve that victory while I occasionally check in on social media during the week and game day.
It’s tempting for me to check out after the scandal, frustration, mediocre play calling, and seemingly skewed ACC officiating. All of these things justify the apathy and anger demonstrated watching one our biggest fans destroy his seat in front on me after the failure to score on the last play, but I have a hard time doing that while you have kids like Malik, banged up, but out there fighting their assess off to the end for their teammates and fans. Yes...we didn't close against a Brent Venables defense with an injured quarterback and a backup center. I don't think we're the first, nor will we be the last.
Hard for me to just check out when these kids are still fighting. We just need to be goldfish as Ted Lasso teaches us because dwelling on the loss and frustration will not help us get over that hump to success. However, fixating on it could certainly doom that goal. We aren’t getting blown up by 35 every game with players phoning it in, we just haven’t been able to close. You don’t raze the house and start over; you fix it up where it needs fixing. It seems easier to tear it down and start over. Fire Satterfield, fire Tyra, get rid of “Little Miss Sunshine” and things will be better, right? They won’t. Starting from scratch seems like a good idea only because you don’t remember how much pain and effort was put into the foundation of getting to where you are now. We have a good foundation; we just need to fix up a few things. I think we can do it because the kids are still fighting and we are closer to getting there that we feel.
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