Honestly, that first game was obvious fool's gold: a first game that we all thought meant we could have been a likely top 15 team. Maybe we also almost won because neither team had much time to practice (plus Franks instead of Trask played), but we seemed like a better overall team with a ton of hope to maybe finish 11-1 this year based on that game and our eventual schedule.
We even saw Enos with an immaculate first drive to that game and thinking he just needed to focus on that creativity the rest of the year. Maybe Jarren was the issue being his first start ever and/or the O-line being real green.
The way this team derailed though, losing to mediocre UNC because our idiotic ST coach couldn't figure out Baxa sucked by then (or Baker incapable of stopping 4th and 17 with a true FR qb or our cbs getting routinely roasted), and then squeaking by CMU, it just seemed downhill (with some ups and downs) onwards and no attempt to adjust to having a green offensive line, etc. That first game gave the idea so much more was going to happen this year and looking back even though Enos didn't adjust to our O-line or to having any sort of flow to the playcalling there's no way we should have lost to at least four teams the way we did this year based on that first game.
It's not remotely the same team post-La. Tech that we were against UF.