2014 ACC Team Preview – Wake Forest

As College football season rapidly approaches, I wanted to take a brief look at each team in the ACC as we say goodbye to Maryland and welcome Louisville into the fold. The main focus of these previews will be on the schedule for each team, and projecting their performance against it. I will also take a look at the projected win total for each team and predict how they will fare against it.

The power numbers are of my own creation, I’ve adjusted my numbers from the end of last season based on a confluence of factors to estimate the lines for every game on the schedule. These number ratings are only a starting point for me, and will adjust as games are played and we gather actual data on the season.

Wake Forest Demon Deacons (4-8 in 2013, 2-6 ACC)

Final 2013 Power Rank: 88

Preseason 2014 Power Rank: 101

Projected Record: 3-9, (1-7 ACC)

Projection: Dead last in the ACC Atlantic

2014 mini-preview:

After years of overachieving here, Jim Grobe’s Wake Forest teams had stagnated the last several seasons (5 consecutive losing years) and he stepped down. Grobe was a great game coach who had tailored everything about the program to his style of football, but over the last couple of years things started to change as he tried to steady the ship. Grobe adjusted his offensive and defensive schemes several times over the past few years and even started to play true freshman in an attempt to overcome the Wake’s biggest hurdle, a massive deficit in overall talent.

Not only does new coach Dave Clawson inherit what may be the weakest overall roster in the league (Boston College is the only team close), but he is short on experienced playmakers after losing several key players like do-everything reciever Michael Campanaro & NT Nikita Whitlock. QB Tanner Price is also gone, and while he struggled last season (54.4% completions, 12-10 TD-INT ratio) 4 year starting QBs can be difficult to place. All signs point to a rebuilding year in Winston-Salem in 2014

Schedule

	WAKE FOREST	64.2	101
Location	Opponent	Power	Opponent Power	Power Spread	Win%	Loss%
A	LOUISIANA-MONROE	58.1	115	-3.1	0.57	0.43
H	Gardner-Webb	50.0	N/A	-17.4	0.93	0.07
A	UTAH STATE	76.3	57	16.2	0.12	0.88
H	ARMY	60.4	111	-7.0	0.7	0.3
A	LOUISVILLE	78.8	48	18.1	0.05	0.95
A	FLORIDA STATE	105.3	1	46.1	0	1
	BYE	0.0		0
H	SYRACUSE	72.8	68	5.4	0.35	0.65
H	BOSTON COLLEGE	71.1	72	3.7	0.38	0.62
	BYE	0.0
H	CLEMSON	86.5	24	19.1	0.03	0.97
A	NORTH CAROLINA STATE	73.5	66	13.3	0.17	0.83
H	VIRGINIA TECH	83.0	38	15.6	0.12	0.88
H	DUKE	80.4	42	13.0	0.17	0.83
	BYE	0.0
Projected Record					3.59 wins	8.41 losses

5Dimes Team Total: 3.5 (Over -170/Under +130)

Play: Under 3.5 Wins (Risking 1 unit to win 1.3 units)

If you add up Wake Forest’s win% projections, the number is actually slightly higher than the 3.5 posted total. However in real life, you cannot win a fraction of a game. We look at their expected results based on these numbers and see the following breakdown:

Extremely likely wins	(20+ point favorites):	0	games	0.00%	of games
Big Favorites	(10-20 point favorties):	1	game	8.33%	of games
Solid Favorites	(4.5-9.5 point favorites):	1	game	8.33%	of games
Coin Flips	(4 point favorites to 4 point underdogs):	2	games	16.67%	of games
Solid Dogs	(4.5-9.5 point underdogs):	1	game	8.33%	of games
Big Dogs	(10-20 point underdogs):	6	games	50.00%	of games
Extremely likely losses	(20+ point underdogs):	1	game	8.33%	of games

Wake is a solid underdog or worse in 8 of their games, and only has 2 games where I think they should expect victory. For them to go over 3.5 wins, they must win both of those games and either sweep both the coin flip games (at Louisiana-Monroe, vs Boston College) or steal one of the games where they will be a solid underdog (at home against Syracuse is the most likely candidate). It’s also worth considering that their 3 easiest games come in the first four games, when Wake will be still adjusting to the new coaching staff and all the personnel loses. While I respect Dave Clawson for the work he has done at his previous coaching stops, he doesn’t have a lot to work with here and the result may be a team who just isn’t flexible enough to adjust to his schemes. The absolute best case scenario for Wake Forest this season is 4-8, and if everything goes wrong 1-11 would not be all that unbelievable.