The soccer team jumped out to a good start this weekend, beating VCU 2-1 on Friday and blanking Florida International 3-0 yesterday. Marcus Tracy had game winning goals in both games, Austin da Luz has a goal and an assist, Evan Brown has a goal and two assists, and Lyle Adams has one goal. Akira Fitzgerald has started well in goal, allowing one score and coming up with six saves. I look forward to seeing the team, 2-0 and ranked #1 in the nation in action first hand Friday night against UCLA.

Deacons Direct has a report on the Deacs who made final rosters in the NFL (sorry if there's something new at the top - can't link directly to posts on DD yet).

Dan Collins checks in with an early week report on how the guys are feeling about the Baylor win and their early thoughts on Ole Miss.

Here are some quotes from Art Briles following Thursday's loss.

Ron Green thinks it's already time to look towards basketball season in the ACC. Thanks, Ron, but I'm still having fun here.

Heather Dinnich showing Wake some love...not that she wouldn't do it anyway, but at this point she doesn't have much choice.

Late this morning I should have my week 1 blogpoll ballot up for your consideration, and this evening I'll have a detailed breakdown of the Baylor game ready as well.

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I know it is much easier for me to wake up early and travel this morning after a win than it would have been after a loss. Still, time is short, so I'm quickly going to dump a few links and get out.

Since you may not have had a chance to see it, here's my initial post-game offering. More is likely throughout the weekend.

Dan Collins, Associated Press, Dallas paper, photos from Waco-trib, and I can't get to their article without registering but I know its there. I gotta run for the airport, so those of you who find other links can leave them in the comments and I may be back with more this afternoon.

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For a season opener, Thursday night’s 41-13 victory over the Baylor Bears leaves little to complain about. No matter who the opponent is, a convincing road win to open the season can’t do anything but help a team.

It wasn’t a perfect showing, but it was pretty dang good. Riley Skinner had an excellent start, completing 27 of 36 passes for 220 yards and three touchdowns. He found D.J. Boldin more than anyone else – seven times for 33 yards, but had the most success throwing to Ben Wooster (six catches, 90 yards, one touchdown) and Chip Brinkman (three catches, 29 yards, two touchdowns).

The rushing game struggled, although the final total of 165 yards wouldn’t show it. Were it not for C.J. Washington’s two carries for 63 yards on the final drive of the game, that number wouldn’t have been nearly as impressive. Josh Adams carried the ball 14 times for 37 yards and a touchdown, and Brandon Pendergrass’s 14 rushes only went for 34 yards and a touchdown. Neither had a run longer than 10 yards, and averaged 2.6 and 2.4 yards respectively.

Sam Swank looked very solid, making field goals of 40 and 42 yards, all five extra points, and causing three touchbacks on eight kickoffs. His punting was pretty solid, too, averaging 39 yards and putting three of four punts inside the 20, once all the way down to the four.

It was great to see Skinner avoid throwing any interceptions, however four fumbles (two were lost) aren’t going to cut it in the future against stronger opponents.

Defensively, Aaron Curry led the way, making seven tackles and half a sack. He made some great hits and just looks like a leader on the field. Hunter Haynes, Chantz McClinic, and Boo Robinson all recovered fumbles, and Alphonso Smith and Alex Frye had their first interceptions of the season.

Baylor’s offense could never get much going. They were held to 94 rushing yards and 156 passing yards. Freshman quarterback Robert Griffin showed some promise for Baylor, but with Art Briles’ new offensive scheme and his lack of experience he just wasn’t able to get anything going.

Obviously there’s a lot more to a football game than statistics and numbers, so let’s take a look at the questions I asked in Wednesday’s preview:

Will we see a noticeably different defensive scheme this year?
I’m going to have to review the film to give a good answer to this question, but my quick answer is that it’s not all that different, just better. I didn’t see anything in the actual scheme that stuck out to me as “different,” but I did see some very effective play from the defensive line, linebackers, and secondary – in other words, everyone. We all know this, but I’m going to say it anyway: Alphonso Smith’s technique is flawless. His defense on the pass to the corner of the endzone was absolutely perfect, and that wasn’t the only example. His heads-up interception was great as well. Still, I’m not convinced the defensive scheme is any different.

How will Steed Lobotzke balance the pass and run?
This one went almost exactly how I expected. I’d have to go back and look at some numbers from last season to see how different the pass/run numbers actually were (given the fact that the offense ran the ball a lot in the fourth quarter to kill the clock there may not actually be a statistical difference), but it was clear that this offense is going to rely on the passing game. Riley Skinner is definitely up to the challenge, and although they weren’t particularly consistent, the receivers showed a lot of promise. D. J. Boldin looked great, but had a case of the drops, particularly on plays that required him to jump to catch the ball – he just couldn’t hang on when he hit the ground. Chip Brinkman wasn’t flashy, but he was definitely effective when it mattered. Ben Wooster is definitely a go-to target for Skinner and does a good job getting yards after the catch. If it weren’t for a few very unnecessary drops and the fumble by Marshall Williams this group would have been nearly perfect.

In pass protection the offensive line did a very good job. They only allowed one sack and I was pretty impressed. When it came to opening up holes for the running backs, however, things started to break down. There just wasn’t a significant enough push to really get anything going. If they’re having those kinds of problems with Baylor’s defensive line I don’t want to imagine the problems they could have with teams like Clemson. Josh Adams and Brandon Pendergrass have the ability to do some really good things this season, but I think they’re going to need some more help to really have outstanding seasons. Even though it was with and against the second string, C.J. Washington was probably the most impressive running back on the field in his two carries. It will be interesting to see if that performance leads to any first team carries next weekend. He definitely made the most of the opportunity.

All of that is a very long answer to the question, but I think the takeaway is that the offense should and will rely heavily on the passing game this season, and the talent is there to make that strategy work.

How many true freshmen will actually play?
This one’s easy. Two.

Joe Looney and Andrew Parker both got playing time early and fairly often. I’ll pay closer attention to them when I’m able to go back to the film, but neither did anything to really stand out positively or negatively. As expected, Kenny Okoro and Chance Raines did not play.

Is it safe to let Alphonso Smith return kicks?
For tonight, yes. I’m still not entirely convinced, but I’m becoming more and more agreeable to this idea, particularly because I understand that you can’t not do things that will help the team just because you’re scared of an injury. As I expected, Alphonso Smith was effective, and nearly looked like he would break a big one in the second half. I’m sure he will sooner rather than later.

Reflections on my prediction:
I predicted a 30-10 victory, and I was happy to see the offense greatly exceed my expectations. I had predicted a defensive/special teams touchdown (which didn’t happen) so the offense actually scored 18 more points than an I predicted. The defense did about what I expected, and I have no complaints there, although I’m sure the defense was glad they didn’t have to face Robert Griffin later in the season when he had a few more games of experience under his belt. If Wake continues to exceed my expectations like this throughout the season, they’ll have a pretty incredible year.

I know that's a lot from me, but what are your thoughts on the game right now? How does this one make you feel as we look towards the rest of the season?

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I'm leaving Houston momentarily for Waco and am looking forward to the game. Unfortunately, though, a live blog is going to be impossible tonight due to Big XII rules and my roll helping the Old Gold & Black cover the game. Such is life for someone in my position right now. We can maybe talk more about this over the weekend, but I'll leave it at that for now.

As I said earlier, though, Scott Wortman's live blog will probably be pretty good (I guess you get permission for such things as the opposing athletic department), even though it won't be interactive. Anyway, enjoy the game and I expect to be back afterwards with a happy report on the game.

For a few afternoon links, check out this from Heather Dinich and for you gamblers, Scott from Las Vegas checks in with this.

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The day we've all been waiting for is finally here. In just over 12 hours Wake Forest will be kicking of the 2008 football season and I couldn't be happpier.

Gameday means previews and other fun things like that, but something more interesting than any preview is (in my opinion) this inside look at the life of the team in the 36 hours leading up to a game. Scott Wortman with Wake's media relations department is doing a great job with it.

On to the previews...Associated Press previews from the Baylor side, the Wake side, and a little extra on the coaches.

Locally, North Carolina media say the defense is the key, Wake has less knotheads, and the players aren't letting the rankings get to their heads.

Down in Texas, debuts don't often work out for new Baylor coaches, and an interactive preview looks nice. I'm guessing it's not worth it to register to read more from the Waco-trib, but if you're desperate here's their Baylor page.

A reader, Allan from South Carolina, reminded me to mention Matt Gfeller, the R.J. Reynolds high school player who died in a freak football accident last Friday. It's a very sad thing to have happen, and my thoughts and prayers have been and continue to go out to the Gfeller family. Here's a story on Matt, and I've heard Reynolds is planning to go ahead and play Friday night and would like to pack the stands in Matt's honor. If you're not otherwise occupied Friday night and are in the Winston-Salem area it would be great for you to head out.

Back to happier things...here's a video preview predicting a Wake Forest victory tonight.

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The time has finally come for Wake Forest to kick off its 107th season of football, and it’s a good thing because I don’t think I can wait much longer.

The Details:
Date: Thursday, August 28, 2008
Time: 8:00 p.m. EDT, 7:00 p.m. CDT
Location: Floyd Casey Stadium, Waco, Texas
TV/Radio: FSN, ISP Radio Network. More details here

The Demon Deacons are 0-4 all time against Baylor, having lost 31-0 in their last meeting – a 1961 matchup in Waco. Another historical record that doesn’t bode well for the Deacs is their 0-11 record all time in games played in the state of Texas. I don’t put a lot of stock in things like that, particularly when much of the data is over 50 years old, but it’s always interesting to see.

As most everyone probably knows by now, Baylor enters the 2008 season with a new coach, Art Briles. Briles is apparently some sort of offensive guru, and based on what he did at Houston, the Wake defense is about to see a pretty interesting and somewhat unique offensive scheme. As far as I can tell, Briles doesn’t really call a single play, rather he gives the offense options, and they have to all read the defense to determine which option is the best (If I got that all wrong you can let me know, Baylor fans).

Though that may sound daunting for some visiting defenses, it sounds like the type of scheme that takes a considerable amount of time to implement effectively. I think it will be at least three weeks before the Baylor offense really has the chance to start clicking. Given the experience and talent Wake will have on the defensive side of the ball, I wouldn’t want to be a young Baylor quarterback trying to figure out which play is most likely to work – the results could be disastrous.

Add to all of this the fact that no one outside of the team knows who the starting quarterback is going to be (heck, I’m not even sure the team knows who its quarterback is), and you’ve got the recipe for a shaky offensive night for the Bears.

Wake’s offense isn’t without its fair share of question marks. Is the offensive line ready to step up in a real game situation? Will the receivers continue to impress like they have for the last month of practices? I don’t expect to see the Deacon offense put a huge number on the scoreboard this week, but it should be enough to get the job done.

I’ve got some other questions going into this matchup as well:

Will we see a noticeably different defensive scheme this year?
The last two seasons under Dean Hood Wake has played conservatively on defense, utilizing a “bend but don’t break” attitude that puts an emphasis on avoiding big plays. That doesn’t mean they didn’t try to make plays on the ball (obviously they did), but it wasn’t a very aggressive scheme. Under Brad Lambert I think we may see a slightly more aggressive defense; one that brings more pressure and allows the guys to react instinctively as the play develops.

How will Steed Lobotzke balance the pass and run?
I don’t know the actual statistics, but for the last couple of years Lobo has run a fairly conservative package that focuses on possessing the ball and maximizing field possession by using lots of rushes and short, accurate passes. With the questions at offensive line, the preseason success of the wide receivers, and the continued improvement of quarterback Riley Skinner, I think we may see a heavier emphasis on the pass game. Particularly if the Deacs struggle to move the ball on the ground early, Lobo might try letting Skinner air it out a little bit.

How many true freshmen will actually play?
The season’s first depth chart, which includes four true freshmen, reveals some interesting things. For one (and Grobe made this clear yesterday), OG Joe Looney and TE Andrew Parker will not be redshirting. Furthermore, center Chance Raines and CB Kenny Okoro will be traveling with the team, but Grobe may try to keep them off the field and redshirt them if possible. Redshirt freshman Dennis Godfry, who moved to the offensive line less than a week ago, is already number two on the depth chart at right guard – not a good indication for the line’s depth.

Is it safe to let Alphonso Smith return kicks?
The depth chart lists Phonz as the starter for both kick return and punt return. While he’s definitely a playmaker and I understand the desire to give him touches, the increased potential for injury worries me. I think this is one of those decisions that will turn out to be incredibly smart or will be looked back on as the downfall of the 2008 campaign. Either Phonz will dazzle in the return game, or he’ll go down with an injury – a major blow to the team. I don’t think there’s an in-between; if he stays healthy I can’t imagine him not doing some pretty special things. I guess that kind of upside is worth risking the potential injury, so I guess I’m going to have to trust the coaches on this one.

Do you have different answers to one or more of these questions? Leave a comment and tell me what you think.

Final Prediction: Wake’s offense struggles early and only manages a couple of field goals in the first half, but a touchdown on defense or special teams sends Wake to the locker room with a 13-3 lead. The offense gets its act together in the second half and the Demon Deacons leave Waco with a 30-10 victory and a respectable start to the 2008 campaign.

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One of Old Gold & Blog's most popular features from the 2007 football season is back for 2008 - 5 Good Questions. I'm excited we're getting to do this again since it means a football game is so close.

For those who don't know, 5 Good Questions is a weekly feature during football season where I ask five questions of someone who publishes a blog about Wake's opponent that week.

Unfortunately, no one is publishing an independent blog about Baylor, so I had to go to plan "B". I ventured over to BaylorFans.com and convinced one of its more prominent posters, Chaise Moody, to join me. He did an excellent job, and his answers to my questions follow a brief introduction from Chaise.

Chaise Moody: Hi and thanks for letting a Baylor Fan participate in your weekly Q&A.
We look forward to personally welcoming all Deacon fans to Waco, though we realize fuel costs and distance may make it difficult for all to be here that would like to come. Congratulations to Wake Forest on your past seasons' success and best wishes to the Deacons this season (except this Thursday evening, of course).

1. Art Briles hasn't even coached a game at Baylor yet, but the fans seem to be pretty high on him. How has he changed this program already, and what do you expect from him long term?

CM: Baylor Fans have been long-suffering in our pursuit of Ws in Big XII play. With conference foes such as Texas, Oklahoma, and Nebraska (or yeah, Kansas & Mizzou), many perceive Baylor as a 'have not' program, but that is not true. We have the resources to compete at the highest level.

You may be surprised to learn that only one Big XII school has won more conference championships in all sports than Baylor. We just suck at football and that is because we have been challenged in the 'hiring competent football coaches' department. Times have changed.

Thee University (as we irreverently call ourselves) is building a $34 million dollar indoor-outdoor football complex on campus next to the Brazos River. You realize that our stadium – Floyd Casey Stadium - is in Beverly Hills, a mile+ from campus, don't you? For those wanting to map the location: http://baylorbears.cstv.com/school-b...y-stadium.html

The stadium seats 50,000, though the south end zone is covered by a large "This Is Bear Country" tarp that comes off for really big games and capacity can be increased –SRO (Standing Room Only). We average about 38,000 attendance typically. More than half of Baylor's student body of 14,000 will show up and the crazy gold-shirted group right behind your bench is "The Baylor Line". This spirit group used to be made up of freshman men and it got so unruly on visitors that the administration inserted females into the group and voila', instant date bait behaving. You'll find Floyd Casey Stadium to be one of the neatest in the Big XII.

To answer the first question about Baylor's new coach, one has to be familiar with the State's major religion - football. As they say, we don't live in the state of Texas, we live in the State of Football.

Art Briles is 52 yrs old and already a legend for winning in this State. He has taken down-trodden programs time and again and made them winners. He started coaching in 1979 and has been a coach in this State ever since.

His last job was head coach of the University of Houston, where he took a program that had been a perennial bottom dweller (ahem) and made them winners Year 1. Let's just say we're confident he will get it done in Waco, too. Art's bio: http://baylorbears.cstv.com/sports/m...les_art00.html

2. Usually it's important for teams to have a quarterback. Which is going to be, Robert Griffin, Blake Szymanski, or Kirby Freeman? Why?

CM: Great question, and I agree. Who really knows who will start at QB for Baylor? Coach Briles has been known to wait until the last minute to name a starter – and he is not afraid to choose the true freshman. He brought Kirby Freeman home from The University of Miami (which Kirby says was a complete disaster) for his 5th year and many thought when that occurred that Coach planned to start Kirby who would "mentor" the child protégé – Robert Griffin. However, I believe we will see Blake Szymanski as the most likely to start. As an aside, Blake has a hot girlfriend and she has one of those annoying little pamaranians that often gets photographed sitting on Blake's lap – yeah, it appears that Blake is whipped. Some have suggested the dog gets more face time than Coach Briles.

Why Blake? If you read all the Fan websites, there are many reasons. Experience is probably the bottom line. In any event, without much hesitation, Coach will change QBs if we turn the ball over or fail to score in the redzone or cannot sustain drives – anything that shows lack of leadership to victory. We may change QBs even if the starter does produce, who can say?

3. What area is Baylor's biggest strength? Biggest weakness?

CM: Baylor's greatest strength may well be our LB corps, much like WF(?) We have a number of big, fast, strong, instinctive, ugly LBs who like to hit. Greatest weakness is our lack of depth perhaps, but also our lack of success - our lack of knowing how to finish the job. We had OU, Nebraska and A&M on the ropes 2 seasons ago, but our lack of maturity permitted us to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. It was painful to witness. Injury played a role in prior years' losses, also.

4. What will be the key to a Baylor victory against Wake?

CM: The key to victory against WF is simple: "2 –we're in, 3 -we win". I'll explain if need be after the game, hopefully I'm in a jovial mood. (Ed. note - I have no idea what this is, so I'm looking forward to the explanation)

5. The fun part...what is your prediction for the final score on Thursday night? What will Baylor's record be at the end of the season?

CM: Final score? Come on, you don't expect me to bite on this one, do you? Sure this is all for kicks and giggles, but no way. I will say that I hope both teams play to their full potential, there are no injuries, and Baylor wins. Ha!

Baylor's end of year record? 6 wins minimum, baby! See how reasonable and rational we are down here in Bear Country?

Looking forward to seeing y'all who are able to make the trip. Oh, and we don't really allow public drinking in/near the stadium but you can drink so long as you don't show the beer or stumble around. We try to maintain that Baptist image over here, you know. I admit I have not been to an ACC game so I am unfamiliar with your gameday – pregame, but you'll find Baylor's pregame to be quite entertaining. People watching is fun, too.

There are tons of friendly folks and beautiful people here so come on down!

Excellent work, Chaise. Thanks for joining us.

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I was able to talk to both Jim Grobe and Riley Skinner about the preparations the team is beginning to make for the Baylor game. For Jim Grobe, the transition is not particularly easy:

Zach Smith: How does your thinking and planning have to change now that you're working specifically towards Baylor?

Jim Grobe: Well it's game plan stuff. It's a tough change, actually. We've really for the majority of the summer been going against each other, so it's been Wake Forest against Wake Forest, so we've been seeing a lot of things we do offensively, they've been seeing about all our defensive package, and it's really been hard because it's hard to focus on any one thing.

Now we've got to completely shift gears. In just about a week's time we've got to get ready for Baylor's schemes offensively and defensively. So it's a tough turn around and that's the deal. We've got to really kinda try to completely forget what we've seen for two weeks and start focusing just on Baylor.

ZS: Having Art Briles as a new coach there, what do you look at to figure out what it is you need to be preparing for, since you haven't seen him there before?

JG: You try to look at the things that he did in Houston and that the staff did, but that's a problem for us because he didn't bring all of his staff with him. I think he only brought a couple guys with him from Houston. His defensive coordinator stayed. So you just try to look at some of the things they did at other schools, where some of the other coaches came from.

You try to get little bits and pieces as you can of things that they did at their other schools, but the problem is they're going to get to Baylor and have a completely different group of athletes and you have to assume they're thoughts will change a little bit, so we've got to go to Baylor and basically figure them out when they start the game. You know, it's not a good feeling for coaches.

Starting on the road is always tough. All your mistakes are magnified; every turnover that you have, every bad kicking game play, every big play that the opponent has, the home crowd is into it and it makes it tough especially on young players. Then you throw in the fact that we're not really sure what they're going to do it makes it a really tough opener, in addition to having really good players with a really good coaching staff.

ZS: Does the fact that it's a Thursday night game play into that at all? Does it make it more difficult? Less difficult?

JG: It probably turned out to be a little bit better for us only from the standpoint that we've got plenty of time to get ready for the first game and then a little more time with the long flight back to get ready for Ole Miss. So I'd say playing Thursday, playing Saturday, probably doesn't matter as far as playing Baylor, but having a couple extra days to recover from a long trip will give us a chance to kind of catch our breath before we start getting ready for Ole Miss.

ZS: With school starting next week, how does that affect the players and their schedules and how they manage football and school and all that stuff? (Ed. note: terribly worded question)

JG: It will probably affect the young guys a little bit. The young guys are a little more flighty. They get all the new students back on campus and they go just a little bit crazy. The older guys have been around the block a couple times. I wouldn't think it would affect our older guys much at all.

It's a little bit of a transition only because with practice and lifting and meetings and those type things, we've been doing that without anything going on for a few days now, and we'll go back after classes start and do practice and be lifting in the afternoons, so it's a change. But because we're primarily relying on older players I think it's a little bit easier.

For Riley Skinner, the transition comes as a welcome change:

ZS: Now that you guys are starting to prepare for Baylor, how does your mindset and your preparation have to change? What are you doing differently now?

Riley Skinner: You know, it’s a lot more fun. We’re not going against our same team every day any more. We’re still practicing against them but we’re going against Baylor defense. We do a lot more scout team now with the other guys. Now in the quarterback room we’re game planning, seeing how our routes are going to work against Baylor, not compared to earlier this summer we’re scheming against how we can beat our defense.

So we’ve made a bunch of changes. We’ve dropped plays, we’ve added plays, and I think we have a pretty good package going in for them right now.

ZS: Do you think the last few weeks have prepared you well enough to be doing all that this week?

RS: Oh yea, definitely. We feel really good right now where we’re at. We’re getting all our guys back health-wise that have been banged up a little bit. Everyone’s understanding the offense really well. I think we had a really good preseason with just the player-oriented workouts. We made sure we got our offense down, got everybody on the same page, and that’s helped us a bunch because everyone’s kind of firing on all cylinders right now.

Looks like it's not just the fans who are ready for some football. I don't think anyone in the Wake Forest community can wait for Thursday night.

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If you're the observant type, it only takes a minute at practice to notice that a pretty significant change is occurring. The various stickers and logos have been added to the players' helmets, a clear indication that we must be getting close to seeing some real football.

This afternoon's practice lasted just over two hours and was conducted only in shells. The team started with some individual work and a lot of special teams. Instead of working on the standard special teams units, some "special" special units were in use (confusing, huh?).

Swank and the punters were working on stopping 35 yard punts just shy of the goal line and Brandon Ghee and the return team were working on blocking punts, plus just about every other special teams unit got some work.

The team also spent a significant portion of the day working on redzone offense and defense. It's important for them to get this kind work in, as things get a lot more cramped down there and things look different than they do when there's plenty of field to work with.

The ball-catchers (WRs and TEs) had a rough day. Not only were they dropping balls, but they were consistently getting in trouble for running the wrong routes. There was clearly confusion - sometimes receivers nearly collided. I noticed Andrew Parker and Ben Wooster had particularly bad days, with several drops each.

The lack of concentration in catching balls would have been enough to make the coaches mad by itself. The wrong routes receivers ran only made them even angrier. Several times I heard coaches remind players that these mistakes could potentially cost them the game next week at Baylor. It got bad enough for the coaches to make all receivers stop and do pushups for awhile.

Riley Skinner's passing looked crisp and accurate. Josh Adams and Brandon Pendergrass were both running well.

Matt Woodlief came up with an impressive interception during red zone 7 on 7. All of a sudden he had an arm in the air tipping the ball to himself for a pick. Devon "Y'lou" Brown was the only receiver I noticed making any impressive catches.

Aside from the helmets, the biggest indication of the transition from preseason to regular season was the amount of time dedicated to scout time. At least half of the practice was spent preparing specifically for Baylor.

As far as I'm concerned, it's about time.

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