On Saturday afternoon, the Boston College football team marched into Dallas to face off against the #14 SMU Mustangs for a brand new ACC match-up that was also a rematch of last year’s Fenway Bowl in Boston. BC started QB Grayson James this week after Thomas Castellanos was benched and left the program for the transfer portal in the middle of the season. Asking a new starting QB to take on one of the best teams in the ACC was certainly a challenge, and he performed admirably, but ultimately it resulted in a 31-28 SMU victory.
The game started out hot for the Mustangs as they drove down the field fairly easily on their opening drive and looked to open up the scoring. They stalled in the redzone, though, unable to punch it in for a touchdown, and then a shanked field goal left the game at 0-0. A lucky break for the Eagles. But the Mustangs quickly worked their way down the field once again on their following possession and tossed a screen pass for a touchdown to take a 7-0 lead. Then a failed 4th down conversion for BC was followed by another SMU scoring drive, kicking a field goal to make it a 10-0 score after one quarter.
With a clearly compromised punting and kicking game, Boston College drove down the field using all four downs and managed to punch in a touchdown with Kye Robichaux to cut the lead to 10-7. But after that long and deliberate campaign, it didn’t take much time for SMU to strike back. The Mustangs completed multiple 20+ yard passes and drew a pass interference penalty in the endzone, resulting in another quick TD to expand their lead back to 10 points.
Grayson James started to settle in on the following drive and completed some great passes to get into SMU territory, including one into a tight window to Jeremiah Franklin on 4th down and then a 32-yard strike to Reed Harris to bring the Eagles into the redzone. He capped it off with a 13-yard strike to Kamari Morales for a touchdown to bring the lead back down to 3 points, 17-14.
The end of the first half after that drive was a rollercoaster. With under two minutes left, Kevin Jennings threw an interception and an SMU defender got flagged for unnecessary roughness, putting BC in prime position to take their first lead of the game. But Grayson James threw an INT of his own at the goal line, and then SMU broke out for a huge run to get into BC territory. They kicked a field goal as time expired and SMU took a 20-14 lead into halftime.
The Boston College offense continued right where they left off at the half, as Grayson James continued to push the ball downfield and ended up running it in himself for a BC touchdown to take a 21-20 lead. But Kevin Jennings and the SMU offense came right back and blew the top off of the BC secondary for a 40-yard TD down the sideline to take their lead back. Then added on another field goal with their next possession to make it a 31-21 lead.
From there in the fourth quarter, things started to get a little chippy. An SMU defender got flagged for taking a shot at a BC player’s head. Then both sidelines were complaining about late hits on their players and neither got flagged. BC responded by running the ball down the throat of SMU, with Kye Robichaux and Jordan McDonald carrying the ball over and over all the way down into the endzone to cut it to a 31-28 SMU lead with 6 minutes remaining in the game.
SMU started to move the ball down the field on their next drive, but a couple of missed long passes ended up giving BC the ball back with about 4 minutes remaining. BC converted an early 4th & 1 attempt as they drove down the field, but SMU starting blitzing and Grayson James wasn’t able to find his receivers in time. Two sacks in a row on 3rd and 4th down ended BC’s drive and the game. SMU scored a final touchdown to put the nail in the coffin and came out with a 38-28 victory.
Takeaways
- Grayson James can throw the football! It wasn’t always perfect, but James was making some solid passes downfield, sometimes even 20+ yards past the line of scrimmage. He was a big improvement over what Thomas Castellanos had been doing the past few weeks and it allowed Bill O’Brien’s offense to be much more diverse in its playcalling. Fans should be optimistic about BC’s chances in these last couple of games of the regular season if the offense continues to look like this.
- The BC secondary continues to get shredded and depleted. SMU certainly has a dynamic passing attack, and they took full advantage in this game. With a few players going down with injury, including Owen McGowan who is out for the year, the roster is pretty thin in the defensive backfield. So when the BC defensive line couldn’t generate consistent pressure, SMU had plenty of time to toss some long throws to open receivers.
- What the heck was that last drive? SMU kept bringing the blitz but the BC playcalling had no answer. On the third down sack, when it was clear that SMU was ready to blitz, there were no checkdown options for Grayson James. With his 4 receivers deep and multiple defenders in his face, James had no options and was forced to take a sack that basically ended the game.
- We got the score right! That’s a first for BCI this season.
