Areas of optimism this season?

[WPBCANE]

Can't say this enough that we have elite coaching!! Will feel better playing the top dogs with CMR at the helm. Is it September yet? GO CANES!!!!

 

[NJshoreCane]

I'm too worried about all our deficiencies to be excited about anything. Gonna take a couple years to get this thing turned around to the point where we can start expecting Coastal titles.

UNC took several years under Fedora before it fielded a very good team that is the Coastal top dog.

I like Fedora and I agree that he has fielded a very good team but the stars were aligned very well for them in '15.
Looking at their schedule, back to back blowouts against us and Duke at home and the ACCCG loss to Clemson were the highlights of their season. They had zero wins vs. teams that finished in the top-25.
It doesn't take much to be the Coastal Top Dog these days. UNC was 6-7 in '14.
I expect us to contend for the Coastal this season and next, even with our deficiencies. That's not a reach.
I'll expect us to win Coastal titles, 2018 and beyond.

You're getting ahead of yourself. 4 years should be the standard for getting a Coastal title. You guys are looking for miracles expecting so much so soon.

A lot hinges on that home game vs UNC at home.
As I mentioned in another post, the schedule balances out well with UNC, GT and Pitt playing FSU or Clemson on the Atlantic side. Duke goes to Louisville.
VT has an advantage with Syracuse and BC for their crossovers but they have questions too. Their game @ UNC is big as well.

More so schedule than where we are as a team is the reason I think we'll contend.

Where do you have us? 8 wins?

 

[IMissCoker]

No more of that "6 seconds" bs

No more turning us into PSU south

No more Goldilocks throwing players under the bus

No more staring at the TV and predicting a TD scored on us by simply looking at the defensive alignment

No more ties on the sideline

No more of that northeastern arrogance….Goldilocks and No'D thought they were the smartest football people to overstep foot in this state

No more of a coach that never wanted to be here in the first place

No more of a coach that doesn't understand the culture, the kids, and what makes the machine tick

A mediocre waste of skin is set for life (walked away with millions)….it's enough to make me want to throw up

 

[Cane1996]

Cutting down on penalties is huge for me. How many touchdowns were called back last year because of penalties?

How many of those penalties were real? We had more TDs called back on ticky tack calls than any season I can ever recall. I've seen several seasons combined not have that many TDs called back.

I recall the 2010 season being particularly bad with biased and awful calls by the ACC refs. Remember the phantom clipping call on what should have been the winning TD against Maryland? Instead of a comfortable victory, Morris had to come in and throw a hail mary for a TD to win the game.

Maybe the ACC refs were trying to get our lousy couches fired lol.

 

[3G Cane]

Cutting down on penalties is huge for me. How many touchdowns were called back last year because of penalties?

How many of those penalties were real? We had more TDs called back on ticky tack calls than any season I can ever recall. I've seen several seasons combined not have that many TDs called back.

I recall the 2010 season being particularly bad with biased and awful calls by the ACC refs. Remember the phantom clipping call on what should have been the winning TD against Maryland? Instead of a comfortable victory, Morris had to come in and throw a hail mary for a TD to win the game.

Maybe the ACC refs were trying to get our lousy couches fired lol.

I remember that Duke Johnson had to score like five times against Wake before they give him a touchdown and even then they reviewed and tried to find a way to negate it. There were plenty of dubious calls over the past five years that almost made me think they were trying to help get our crappy coaches fired, now that I look at it in hindsight but at the time I was steamed.