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Here is a game-by-game recap of each team in the ACC conference to catch you up from last weekend’s action, including Key Players, Injuries, and Players to Watch.
Miami at Florida State
Game Recap: Florida State remains undefeated with the 29-24 victory over the Miami Hurricanes. Florida State dominated the ground game as they rushed for 248 total yards compared to only 20 rushing yards for Miami.
Key Players: Florida State’s Dalvin Cook showed no signs of slowing down after his injury scare last week as he rushed for a 72 yard touchdown on his very first carry—making that 2 weeks in a row that Cook has scored on his first attempt. Cook finished the day with a dominant 222 rushing yards, including a career-high 140 yards before contact as he had some wide holes to run through. Everett Golson didn’t put up huge fantasy numbers here with 291 yards and a touchdown. His key target was by far Kermit Whitfield as he hauled in 9 receptions for 95 yards. Whitfield had not exceeded 4 targets in a game yet this season, so his 9-catch performance certainly surprised us.
Quarterback Brad Kaaya player very well for Miami in the losing effort as he finished with 405 passing yards and 3 touchdowns. Kaaya was throwing the ball downfield very well as he completed more passes of 15+ yards than all 4 teams Florida State has faced this season. Kaaya spread the ball around well as 10 different players caught at least 1 pass. Wide Receiver Stacey Coley returned from injury with a bang as he led the team with 7 receptions for 139 yards and a touchdown, while Rashawn Scott was not far behind with 6 receptions for 108 and a touchdown. While Joseph Yearby’s touchdown streak lives on (this time thru the air), he was statistically insignificant as the rushing game was absolutely shut down.
Key Injuries: None
Players to Watch: Florida State faces off against Louisville this week. Louisville shut down the powerful NC State rushing game last week, so Dalvin Cook may be in for a challenge with that matchup.
Miami takes on Virginia Tech, a team with a very stout secondary—so look for Kaaya’s upside to also be limited here. We should see Joseph Yearby bounce back as the Virginia Tech defense allows nearly 190 rushing yards per game.
Georgia Tech at Clemson
Game Recap: Clemson improved to 5-0 as they rolled past a reeling Georgia Tech team that has now lost 4 straight. Clemson amassed over 500 yards of total offense via a very balanced attack that included an efficient passing game and powerful running game led by Wayne Gallman. Georgia Tech struggled from the start with their 3rd play of the game resulting in an interception as the Yellow Jackets fell 26-3 in the 2nd quarter.
Key Players: Deshaun Watson threw for his most yards in any game this season as he finished with 265 yards and 2 touchdowns. Wayne Gallman had a great day as we thought he might, rushing 13 times for 115 yards and 2 touchdowns. This marks Gallman’s 3rd straight game over 100 yards. Tight end Jordan Leggett continued to impress as well with his best game of the year catching 4 balls for 56 yards and 2 touchdowns. Leggett now has scored in 3 straight games with a total of 9 catches, 105 yards, and 4 touchdowns. The Clemson defense turned in another solid performance as well, holding Georgia Tech to only 71 rushing yards and not a single rushing touchdown.
Georgia Tech really struggled moving the ball. Patrick Skov only had 2 carries for 4 yards while Marcus Marshall received the majority among running backs with 11 carries for 45 yards.
Key Injuries: Georgia Tech running back Broderick Snoddy is questionable to play this week as he has missed the last 2 games with a hand injury.
Players to Watch: Clemson welcomes the #1 defense in college football this week—the Boston College Eagles. This is a very tough matchup, so outside of tournament plays, we will not be on many Clemson Tigers.
It does not get much better for Georgia Tech this week as they face Pittsburgh’s #6 rushing defense. We are not watching for any of the Yellow Jackets here.
NC State at Virginia Tech
Game Recap: The Virginia Tech defense showed up in this game as they dominated NC State in a 28-13 victory. Virginia Tech’s offense was nearly non-existent outside of the 2nd quarter as well, racking up 3 touchdowns all within a 12-minute stretch with only 2 field goals outside of that quarter. NC State started strong going up 10-0, but Jacoby Brissett found himself under too much heat to get them back into the game as he was pressured on 14 of his 29 drop backs leading to a sub-50% completion rate for only 113 passing yards.
Key Players: The 2nd quarter was very good to both Brendan Motley and Isaiah Ford as they connected for 3 total touchdowns for the Hokies. Ford has been the go-to receiver all season, and this game was no different. He only had 39 yards, but we saw he most certainly is a priority in the passing game as he got all 3 looks in the red zone for the touchdowns. Outside of this quarter, Motley looked like his normal self as he still finished the game with a 50% completion rate and only 158 total yards (102 of them came in the 2nd quarter). Isaiah Ford continues to put up consistent fantasy scores. Even with his yards and receptions down, he certainly made up for it in this game with the 3 touchdowns. Running back Travon McMillan also looked great in this game as he averaged 8.7 yards per carry for 96 yards and a touchdown.
On NC State’s side, there really was nothing going. Matt Dayes was held to only 66 yards on 14 carries with their only touchdown going to Jumichael Ramos.
Key Injuries: None
Players to Watch: For Virginia Tech, we will continue to watch their WR1 Isaiah Ford as he consistently performs and has been underpriced.
NC State faces Wake Forest this week. Wake has a very good defense; however their rankings were definitely bolstered after the 3-0 victory this past week against an atrocious Boston College offense. This Wake Forest team allowed 30 points to Syracuse and is actually allowing more rushing yards per game than passing—so they should be vulnerable to a Matt Dayes bounce-back.
Virginia at Pittsburgh
Game Recap: Pittsburgh’s hot start with 17 points in the first quarter in addition to a late defensive stand ended up being enough to hold off Virginia in their 26-19 victory. This marks Virginia’s 12th straight road loss in a game where they simply could not convert scoring opportunities.
Key Players: Pittsburgh’s rushing attack was led by both Chris James and Qadree Ollison. James had a nice 48-yard run which vaulted him to a team-high 94 rushing yards on the day. Qadree Ollison struggled with only 3.8 yards per carry for his 49 yards. Ollison did get in the end zone, but he also fumbled on the Virginia 1 yard line which cost him another touchdown and potentially some playing time going forward since this job is obviously still a battle. Tyler Boyd again hogged most attention in the passing game as he caught 7 balls for 54 yards and a touchdown. This was definitely a mediocre day for the high potential wide receiver, but the receptions certainly give us confidence in him going forward as the next best option doesn’t even have double digit catches on the year.
Virginia struggled, as we have been accustomed to lately. Matt Johns only completed 17 of 33 attempts for 209 yards, 1 touchdown, and 1 interception. Running back Taquan Mizzell had decent numbers with 87 total yards of offense and 3 receptions, but he failed to find the end zone as WR1 Canaan Severin had Virginia’s only offensive touchdown. Severin struggled on the day outside of that touchdown; he only had 2 receptions for 28 yards before his 32-yard touchdown reception late in the 4th quarter.
Key Injuries: None
Players to Watch: Virginia should see more scoring opportunities against Syracuse this week, but we doubt this game appears on any DFS slates. If it did, we still would not be very interested in this offense.
Pittsburgh visits Georgia Tech in what should be a very slow tempo game with a couple of run-first offenses. Tyler Boyd did have 9 receptions for 137 yards against the Yellow Jackets last season, so that shines light on what already was a relatively favorable situation in a game that Pittsburgh should be expecting to compete for the win. The Pittsburgh running game seems to still be in question, so we would rather avoid it this week.
Duke at Army
Game Recap: Duke easily handled Army in a 44-3 steamrolling. The Blue Devil defense held Army to only 168 total yards, including a first half shutout while the Duke offense gave them a 27-0 lead going into halftime. Duke then proceeded to put the game away with their 215 total rushing yards, led by a combination of 5 players each with at least 6 carries.
Key Players: Duke really only had one stand-out fantasy performance by Jela Duncan, who carried 8 times for 78 yards and 2 touchdowns. His stats were really bolstered by one 43-yard touchdown in the 2nd quarter. Duncan is 3rd on the depth chart, so we can’t count on any big numbers from him going forward. Shaun Wilson and Shaquille Powell were the primary backs, but neither was effective as they carried a combined 14 times for only 43 yards. Thomas Sirk only had 197 yards and a touchdown in addition to 53 yards rushing. In addition to losing time late in the game, Sirk actually lost a touchdown opportunity early in the game to backup Parker Boehme as they brought Boehme in to at the Army 3 yard line on 2nd down allowing him to run in the for touchdown. Boehme finished the day with 2 rushing touchdowns and 26 rushing yards.
Key Injuries: None
Players to Watch: Duke is on bye this week, but visits Virginia Tech in their next game. Duke has not fared well against top tier defenses, managing only 9 points against Boston College and 10 points against Northwestern. We will not have much faith in them as they take no another stout defense in Virginia Tech.
Syracuse at South Florida
Game Recap: Syracuse kept this game relatively close, but ultimately fell 24-45 as South Florida’s offense dominated with nearly twice as many total yards on offense than Syracuse. The Orange started awfully as they only managed a field goal in the first half. Their offense got going with 3 touchdowns within their first 4 drives in the second half, but late turnovers and bad defense ultimately led to the disappointing loss.
Key Players: In his return from injury, quarterback Eric Dungey passed for 232 yards and 2 touchdowns in addition to rushing a team leading 17 times for 31 yards and another touchdown. These were very respectable numbers considering what Dungey might have been priced if this game were on a slate. Outside of Dungey, nobody else on this offense is worth mentioning since their rushing game is atrocious and the passes were spread out all over the receiving core.
Key Injuries: None
Players to Watch: Syracuse faces Virginia next week, and as we said before, we don’t expect that game to be on any DFS slates. We will be keeping an eye on Eric Dungey going forward however, as he could represent a very intriguing punt option due to his tendency to carry the ball in addition to slinging it around in the passing game.
Boston College at Wake Forest
Game Recap: This game had absolutely no fantasy relevance as Wake Forest shut out Boston College in a 3-0 victory, the lowest scoring game I have seen in a while.
Key Players: None
Key Injuries: None
Players to Watch: Look for Wake Forest to bounce back against a slightly more forgiving North Carolina team. We will have our eyes on the usual targets in Kendall Hinton and Cam Serigne. North Carolina is weak against the rush, allowing over 230 rushing yards per game—so while Wake Forest doesn’t have much talent at running back, we could see some serious upside for Kendall Hinton to use his legs here.
We are not interested in anyone from Boston College’s offense against Clemson this week.