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Eastern Carolina v.s. N.C. State
Location: Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium, Annapolis, Maryland (🤢)
Kickoff time: 5:45 ET
Television Network: ESPN
Vegas Line: Pack -6
Weather: Spotty showers, 46 at kickoff, getting colder
Who else could it be?
Growing up a State fan in eastern North Carolina is not for the faint of heart.
You get enough ragging from Duke and UNC fans. Then there’s this other group of people. They’re wearing purple a lot of the time, but when it gets really cold, they’re wearing light blue. What’s that about?
As an eastern Carolina kid, the ECU rivalry always dug at me. There was the issue of proximity, of course. But having to hear 💩 from people that cheered for two different teams? Not my favorite.
To me, it's important that State made a bowl. Not for the extra game or “championship” opportunity, but the practices it offered, continued chemistry opportunities, so on and so forth.
I immediately groaned when I saw that State was matched up against the Pirates. I suppose it makes sense that your "reward" for an incredibly disappointing season is a matchup fraught with disappointment potential.
It’s no secret that these two fan bases don’t like each other. The Pack ended their series with ECU in 1987 when ECU fans rioted and destroyed pretty much everything in sight. One could argue that ECU’s biggest win in program history was against N.C. State in the 1992 Peach Bowl, when they came back from a 17 point deficit with ten minutes left.
The dynamic certainly continues into baseball season - with a notable skip over basketball season - where midweek matchups become serious fodder for smack talk. I know ECU fans were thrilled to beat State twice in mid-week games; I know State fans were thrilled to make it to Omaha again.
Anyways pettiness aside: opt-outs, a rivalry factor, and a neutral site game, you’re likely going to get some sort of chaos outcome. At least it'll be entertaining, right? 😅
Change in Greenville
This season has been all about change for ECU. In some ways, it’s hard to look at this team and understand “what is true” about who they are at this point.
First, the head coaching position. Mike Houston was let go in late October after a 45-28 loss to Army. He left Greenville with an overall record of 27-38, and a horrific 15-28 record in one of the worst conferences in the country.
The Pirates recently took the interim tag off of coach Blake Harrell’s title. This will be his first time as a head coach in his 23 year career. Prior to landing at ECU, Harrell was a DC at several FCS programs. It will be interesting to see if he can build a program in Greenville.
Second, the quarterback position, which…getting this wrong tends to impact things like #1.
Jake Garcia started the year for the pirates and graded out as one of the worst quarterbacks in the country. A borderline top 100 recruit at one point, the former Missouri and Miami transfer just did not have it.
Katin Houser seized the job in early October and didn’t give it back. He finished the year strong - more on that later - and helped guide ECU to a 4-2 finish to the regular season.
Thirdly, roster churn. The Pirates lost 1st round talent Shavon Revel for the year in September to a torn ACL. They’ve since seen several key players enter the transfer portal:
CJ Mims (DT): ECU's "1B" nose tackle with 339 snaps, 72 PFF grade (transferred to UNC)
Zakye Barker: an all conference LB with 610 snaps, 67.9 PFF grade (SMU)
Isaiah Brown-Murray: ECU’s other starting corner with 830 snaps, 73.1 PFF grade (VT)
Chase Sowell - WR and leader in receptions and yards per game (Iowa State)
Winston Wright - WR and overall receptions leader on the team (NFL draft)
That's a lot of moving parts.
ECU's Offense
As we just touched on, Former top 100 quarterback Jake Garcia started the first 6 games of the season. It went horribly:
In a last ditch effort to save his job, Mike Houston pivoted to Michigan State transfer Katin Houser. Houser couldn’t win his first start against Army - which was Houston’s final game as head coach - but he finished the year strong.
With the aforementioned switch to Katin Houser, this offense has come to life. This is a team that is more effective through the air than the ground. He’s thrown for 1,859 yards, with a 18:9 TD/INT Ratio in 6 games.
ECU’s advanced stats profile on offense is mixed:
41st in adjusted EPA/play (State is 74th)
11th nationally in yards per dropback (8.36)
67th in line yards created (how effective is an OL at creating rushing yards)
61st nationally in points per drive
Bringing these numbers to life a bit: this is a spread offense that loves tempo. They’re consistently snapping the ball with 28, 30 seconds on the play clock.
Houser is a one or two read max quarterback. In the (albeit limited) sample size of film I watched, I did not see him attempt a full-field read. He is mainly looking to one side of the field, progressing through two reads, and tucking the ball from there. His average time to throw is 2.28 seconds this year, which is very, very quick.
Former N.C. State wideout Anthony Smith is a favorite target of Houser’s. Smith is more track athlete than complete wide receiver. With an average depth of target at 18 yards per target, he's getting downfield more often than not. With Chase Sowell and Winston Wright sitting out, it'll be the Smith show.
Another reason to pump the brakes on ECU's offensive renaissance: these wins and points have come against the very worst of the FBS. Here’s ECU’s scores against their opponents’ SP+ overall and defensive rankings:
56-34 win vs. Temple (#126 overall, 123 defensive)
49-14 win vs. FAU (#113, 103)
38-31 win @ Tulsa (#129, 131)
40-28 win @ North Texas (#95, 122)
20-34 loss vs. Navy (#65, #67)
FEI has ECU's opponent's defensive rating at 131 out of 134 teams in the country.
Is ECU turning the corner offensively, or is this a story of playing athletes that will go pro at something over than division 1 football? The answer is probably “yes.”
Watching how interim DC Freddie Aughtry-Lindsay chooses to handle this offense will be interesting. Does he deviate from Tony G's barbell of drop 8 and cover zero? Four of Houser's picks that I watched came against zone coverage as he was moving off of his first read, and he's getting the ball out quickly.
Another thing to watch here: does Davin Vann play? State cannot get a pass rush without him in the game. I don't think much of ECU's offensive line, but if Vann sits out, I'm not sure State gets home to Houser with frequency.
ECU's Defense
ECU’s Defense isn’t all that exciting. They base out of a 3-4 look and employ a bigger nickel that can still contribute in coverage. I’ve already covered the roster churn this team has seen, but it’s especially impactful on this side of the ball.
The defensive line has some larger bodies that mainly…exist. Their linebackers aren’t particularly athletic. They are easily influenced by motions and shifts. The Pirates do bring pressure quite a bit, which has been effective at disrupting opposing offenses - ECU boasts the 29th highest havoc rate in the country.
The weakest link by far in this defense is its corners. Without Revel and Brown-Murphy starting at quarterback, ECU’s remaining corners - particularly #11 - often look lost in coverage and struggle with physicality. Their two starters on Saturday will be their 2nd and 6th worst graded players per PFF that have played more than 100 snaps.
ECU’s defensive stat profile is another mix of “meh”:
82nd in expected points added
106th in EPA per dropback
23rd in yards/rush allowed
Again, the problem with pulling signal from these numbers is that ECU plays in a dumpster fire of a conference, and they avoided playing Tulane and Memphis, 2 of the top 3 teams in the league.
State should be able to put points on this team, especially by:
Running zone, especially wide. I don’t think this team can consistently stop State’s front five moving laterally and running Hollywood.
Picking on ECU’s corners. It will be a revolving door I’m sure, but Grimes, Rogers, Collins, and the outside WR crew should be able to have their way with this bunch.
State shouldn't have to do anything crazy on Saturday to put up 35+ points. Your guys are better. Do the things you do well, and force a depleted G4 team to try and respond.
Models + My Prediction
As I'm typing this, State is a 6 point favorite in Annapolis.
College Football Insiders has State winning by ~10.5:
FEI has State winning this one 30.9 - 21.3, with a .742 win probability.
So why the 4-5 point gap between projections and Vegas?
Models this time of year are even less reliable than they usually are. If you wanted to create an equation for the weirdest possible outcome of a college football game, it’d probably look something like this:
Bowl game + opt-outs/injuries + rivalry game + coaching turnover = craziness
Lucky us. This game has all of these elements!
It's quite simple in my eyes. If State plays clean - limited turnovers, fewer drops, no dumb penalties - then they'll win this game by at least 14.
The problem? Not keeping things clean is why State couldn't beat Wake, Syracuse, and Georgia Tech this year. Games in which State finished with a higher postgame win expectancy than their opponents.
Despite the aforementioned factors that could make this one weird - and against my better judgement - I think State cleans this one up by 10+. ECU has struggled against real football teams, and with several playmakers gone, State will have the talent advantage at every spot on the field. Give me State 34-21.
Famous last words, right?
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