Demon Deacons need to upgrade pass defense
Wake Forest hasn’t showed the knack for slowing down teams in all facets at the same time and for the defense that’s a major concern.
The biggest black mark on the season so far as come with pass defense. Tulane torched the Demon Deacons for a couple of big plays in the opener and then Boston College kept racking up major yardage through the air.
That came from a run-oriented opponent.
“Defensively, right now, we’re not playing well in the secondary. Every touchdown they scored was an explosive (one),” Wake Forest coach Dave Clawson said. “It’s just all explosives. They had 69 plays for 524 yards. (They had) five or six touchdowns on explosive plays.”
Five of Boston College’s touchdown came through the air in a 41-34 victory last week.
Now No. 8 Notre Dame arrives as Wake Forest’s next opponent and the Irish figure to display a more balanced offense at the outset.
Clawson has made the pass defense a priority after what happened in the Boston College game. The Demon Deacons gave up scoring passes of 27, 35, 29, 71 and 40 yards.
“Now that we’re in ACC play and going against the caliber players we’re going to see — our eyes aren’t in the right place,” Clawson said.
“We just looked undisciplined back there and it’s a problem that we have to get fixed, because we’re three weeks into (the season) and it’s not getting better, it’s getting worse.”
Teams are aware that the Demon Deacons can be physical along the line of scrimmage on defense. That means they’re willing to look down field, and there are openings against the Wake Forest defense.
Clawson said the problems are coming in a variety of ways. In part, defensive backs are just getting out of position, while that tends to lead to the Wake Forest players being outrun in the secondary.
“The guys were jumping and looking back and we’re not keeping on eyes on our man,” Clawson said. “It happens over and over and over — it’s frustrating. It’s a very fundamental technique and skill that we’re not getting corrected. This has been a two-year problem.”
Notre Dame put up points in a variety of ways in last year’s home victory against Wake Forest, so there’s more concern for the Demon Deacons.
Some of this attention on the defensive snafus might distract from the offense, which has quarterback Kendall Hinton available this week after serving a three-game suspension for violation of team rules.
Hinton probably would have been the starting quarterback at the beginning of the season, so now it will be interesting to see if he displaces true freshman Sam Hartman, who has dazzled at times and made rookie mistakes in several situations as well.
