The season of recalibrated expectations comes for everyone, eventually — even Clemson, at this very point last fall, after the loss at Pittsburgh. It is the moment when whatever plans were made in August are officially moot, and nothing pushes a team further down the spiral than losing its quarterback.
That’s particularly acute at N.C. State, where there was never a real backup plan for Devin Leary, now out for the season after surgery to repair a torn pectoral muscle.
Grad transfer Jack Chambers is a wonderful story but does not appear to be an ACC quarterback — he wasn’t even first-team all-Big South last season — and the play-calling at Syracuse certainly confirmed that was the staff’s assessment. Freshman M.J. Morris is clearly talented and just as clearly not ready to take over, while Ben Finley is in uniform but apparently taking some kind of gap year.
So: Apres Leary, le deluge.
None of that would have mattered if the preaseason ACC player of the year had remained healthy. But the one position where the Wolfpack had absolutely zero margin for error is the one where a single freak injury ended up sinking their season.
Even after the loss at Clemson, all was not lost. There was still a back road to the Atlantic Division title, with a lot of help, but still. A historic 10-win season was still well within reach. But losing at Syracuse put an end to the former (not that Clemson appeared inclined to play along, anyway) and the way N.C. State struggled to move the ball in the dome offered very little to suggest the Wolfpack could make it through the rest of the schedule unscathed to get to double digits.
Virginia Tech and Boston College appear well within reach of even a weakened Wolfpack, but Wake Forest, Louisville and North Carolina certainly will be a more difficult challenge.
This week off does come at a good time, with extra time to prep Chambers or Morris for what should still be a raucous Thursday night home game against the struggling Hokies; if ever there was a get-right game on the schedule, this is it. If the quarterback of choice — more likely, both in rotation — gets a good enough handle on the playbook to connect downfield, yet another recalibration of expectations would be in order.
But the Wolfpack wasn’t exactly slinging the ball deep with alacrity when Leary was under center, thanks to a receiving corps that beyond Thayer Thomas has been below average at best, so it’s hard to imagine that getting much better even with the extra week of practice. More likely, the Wolfpack will try to grind it out with the same array of screens, swings and short passes it used against Syracuse, to limited effect. Twelve of Chambers’ 18 completions were for fewer than 10 yards; only one was longer than 18. Morris only threw the ball once.
The defense showed even before Leary went out it could win games almost on its own. Now N.C. State is sort of a college version of the Carolina Panthers: solid on defense, decent offensive line, some ability to run the ball and a great void at quarterback, even if N.C. State’s coaches showed slightly more confidence in Chambers than the Panthers’ did in P.J. Walker.
It will be especially difficult for this group, which rallied around this season after the Holiday Bowl disappointment, to accept that whatever it hoped it was going to accomplish is almost certainly out the window. N.C. State invested too much to see it slip away like this. There are other interim goals still on the table: Even with a third loss along the way, a bowl win would get the Wolfpack to 10 wins; the opportunity to play spoiler against North Carolina would never be taken lightly.
But without Leary, the Wolfpack is clearly not the same football team it thought and believed it was and hoped it could be. That happened last year, when the defense was torn asunder by injuries, leaving the Wolfpack unable to capitalize on its long-awaited win over Clemson. And it was clear at Syracuse that it has happened again this season, for different reasons.
N.C. State rallied a year ago and got within a cancellation of 10 wins. If the Wolfpack can accept the loss of one dream, there’s still another to embrace.
