The coach-speak refrain "I'd rather win ugly than lose pretty" is just ringing in my ears since we escaped Furman. True, we looked just plain awful in the first half, but bore down and found a way to win the ballgame. And going into a bye week fresh of a W (over ANY-dang-body) with a now-winning record feels a heck of a lot better than going into that long break with an L hanging over our heads. Some positives to focus on as we move forward:

-- Ryan Willis. Yes, Willis. Lord knows he's had his struggles (and some denizens of Lane Stadium unfortunately chose to remind him of this by booing him on Saturday), but the guy has borderline phenomenal stats this year. Three games in, he's 62 of 96 passing for a sterling 65% completion percentage, to go with an elite 145 QB rating. He's thrown 7 TDs ,but unfortunately has the 4 interceptions. At this point, Willis is what he is: a gunslinger who will make lots of plays but also occasionally turns the ball over. It's clear Fuente isn't benching him, so let's just hope for more Good Ryan the rest of the way.

-- "Big Play Tre" Turner lived up to that nickname and more. Go back and watch the replay of Tre's 29 yard TD run in the 4th quarter. That was a thing of beauty: most guys would've been knocked out of bounds by that initial hit, but Tre made one hell of an athletic move to stay in bounds.

-- We found a tailback. Keshawn King lived up to his dazzling HS highlight reel, giving Tech its first 100+ yard rusher in a game in what seems like forever. Encouragingly, the O-line came storming out in the 2nd half and blew Furman away. Hopefully another glimpse of what's to come for a very young O-line group.

-- The entire defense. They are worlds improved from last year's rock-bottom performance. Belmar was a nightmare for Furman's QB, harrassing him all day. Chamarri Conner showed up in a big way, making several huge hits and key plays. Dax looked like he finally got in a groove. The secondary just completely clamped the Paladins down, allowing a grand total of 63 passing yards, no TDs and one INT on the afternoon. That's a pretty good day's work for Caleb Farley, Reggie Floyd and the gang.

-- We get a bye week to rest up and get everyone healthy. Remember, our best offensive weapon (at least based on 2018 stats) Damon Hazelton, has yet to see the field in 2019. If we can suit him up vs Duke, that will give us a major weapon for the Blue Devils' secondary to deal with. Hopefully we can get Tyjuann Garbutt back going, and possibly a couple of the other guys who've been nicked up back ready to go for the ACC home opener.

Anyway, there's my dose of optimism for this Monday.
[Post edited by Zanderhokie at 09/16/2019 07:45AM]