Gravley's Pig Pickin' Oct 25

What an interesting week for football in the triangle. We begin with North Carolina hosting Wake Forest. How will the Tar Heel players respond to the firing of their coach?? Will they still listen to the lame duck coach or will they rally to win for Coach Bunting? Before the firing of Bunting I thought Wake would just run all over the Heels. It's a pretty uneven match-up of the ACC's 4th ranked rushing offense (Wake gains 144 yards per game) against the league's worst rushing defense (Carolina surrenders 205 yards per game).

NC State has to, needs to, and had better get a win at Virginia. The Pack is 0 for their last 4 in Charlottesville and haven't won there since 1994. Since losing at Southern Miss, NC State has shown extreme toughness and a never quit attitude. Just put a handle on the football and quit those game changing turnovers! Virginia is playing better but State is the better team.

Duke steps out of conference play for 2 straight weeks of home games. Vanderbilt visits Wallace Wade this Saturday followed by Navy on November 4th. After scoring only 13 points in their first 4 games, the Devils have been getting on the board much better the past 3 games....13 points at Bama, 24 against FSU and 15 posted against Miami. Vandy's marquee win in a 3-5 season is a 24-22 win at Georgia.

East Carolina travels to Southern Miss in a battle for 1st place in Conference USA's East division. The Eagles are 2-1 in league play, ECU and UAB are 2-2. Against NC State we saw how physical the Golden Eagles can be. Their only losses of the year are at Florida, at CUSA's best team Tulsa and at Virginia Tech. Hattiesburg can be a haunting place for opponents. A win by the Pirates would be their best to date. These 2 teams have developed quite a rivalry although it's been lopsided. In the last 10 games of the series, Southern Miss is 9-1 against the Pirates.

Enjoy the pig this weekend!
Jeff