Georgia Tech ranks seventh nationally in scoring defense, allowing just over 10 points a game.
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Coming into its ACC opener, Clemson (3-0) is the defending conference champion and expected to challenge again for a national title. His touchdown-to-interception ratio is exactly the same as through three games previous year (7-3), which isn’t a good sign for a player who should have progressed in the offseason. Defensively, Clemson football is yielding 12.3 points per game against the opposing team. Central (7:30 p.m. Eastern).
The first key to Clemson football picking up a victory is fairly simple: Win the battle in the trenches.
No. 5 Clemson pays a Thursday night visit to Georgia Tech, as the Tigers try to keep (or find?) a rhythm for the second quarter of their season.
“We’re very confident”, Watson said Monday. “Yes you want to play fast, but you’ve got to be efficient too”, co-offensive coordinator Tony Elliott said.
Live streaming for Clemson-Georgia Tech is available via Watch ESPN.
While all the focus is on the Georgia Tech offense and Paul Johnson’s deadly triple-option attack, it’s actually the defense that has carried this club so far. Watson was adamant that no one had panicked, but yet he apologized to fans before last week’s game for the “negative energy” he felt he brought to the Troy outing. Tigers quarterback Deshaun Watson said he has tried to get Leggett involved, but it hasn’t worked out. Twelve ACC teams will be in play during the fourth week of the 2016 season. It’s a part of why we get to see such wonderful death marches (though not so much since 2015), but also why the team is prone to calling timeouts to save delay of game penalties (again, more so in 2015).
The Tigers finished with a season-high 555 yards.
He caught five passes for 31 yards and a touchdown in the game as Clemson won, 39-3. Clemson will be without WR Hunter Renfrow, who will miss about a month with a broken hand.
The Tigers may be coming in as a 10-point favorite, but that’s a shaky proposition in this scenario. “The way the games haven’t gone, we haven’t run as many plays as possessions, but it’s worked out OK; the bottom line is the point total”.
The Tigers dominated this fixture past year, tallying 537 total yards in a 43-24 victory at home, while holding Georgia Tech to 230 total yards, including 71 yards as a team on the ground.
“They’re going to come in here with a bunch of cats”, he said. “‘We’ll have to get way better because this is the best team we’ve played by a mile, and that’s not a knock on the other teams”. Through three games, he seems more like the Thomas of 2014 and less like the stress-ridden player from a year ago.
While everyone thinks of Florida State as Clemson’s primary rival in the ACC, the Yellow Jackets have given the Tigers just as much trouble as FSU has in recent years.
I have no doubt in my mind this will happen. “I was telling some of guys, ‘We hadn’t won down in Atlanta since the last time I played'”. Deshaun Watson has not looked Heisman like in the 1st 3 games. “I felt sorry for our quarterback (Justin Thomas)”.
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Information from the Associated Press was used in this report.
