Spotlight #1: Miami WR Tommy Streeter
Spotlight #2: Duke WR Donovan Varner
1st quarter
14:50: Streeter takes a screen in space, takes for a solid gain against soft coverage.
8:04: Streeter draws defensive holding in the end zone. Kind of a poor call by the refs. Looks like the defensive back just won the battle with the bigger Streeter.
7:19: Streeter way overthrown in the end zone.
6:18: Varner on an end around for a few.
3:50: Streeter well covered by two guys deep over the middle, incomplete, good job by Matt Daniels, Duke’s safety and best defensive player coming over to help in coverage.
1:58: Travis Benjamin almost has a great deep touchdown, blows top off the defense and catches it in the end zone in stride, but just drops it. Never had possession.
0:02: Lamar Miller with his first good run of the night. He’s always been a slow starter when I watch him. He even didn’t get the start this week in favor of Mike James for that reason. Daniels on the tackle. Kid has been around the ball all game here.
2nd quarter
14:54: Streeter targeted deep in the end zone, blanketed by double team, incomplete and inaccurate.
14:11: Streeter targeted in the end zone again, draws pass interference. He’s a popular red zone target. PI offset by a penalty on another Miami player.
5:52: Streeter wide open in space for his 2nd catch, 20 yards against soft coverage, good run after.
2:09: Streeter snatches a high ball in stride and a good run after the catch.
0:42: Streeter has one on one on the outside in the fringe of the end zone. Harris takes snap, looks Streeter’s way, hits him in stride perfectly, ball bobbled a bit, originally ruled a touchdown, challenged, play stands, but not confirmed. Could have easily been ruled that he didn’t have complete control of the ball in his hands before going out of bounds. Needs to show a bit surer hands.
3rd quarter
13:28: Varner with his 1st catch of the game and a big one on a crossing route out of the slot, breaks one tackle after the catch on a long route, rakes it for 7-8 yards after the catch, 30 yards total.
6:33: Varner targeted out of the slot over the middle, just out of his reach, wants a flag.
2:43: Varner takes one short, nothing happening, 1 yard on the ball in the flat.
0:53: Varner over the middle in space, takes it for the 1st on 3rd and 10 after the catch.
0:25: Varner short for a few.
4th quarter
10:45: Streeter doesn’t get turned around quick enough to make the sideline catch for the first against tight coverage.
9:49: Ray Ray Armstrong with a pick on an inaccurate deep ball.
8:56: Lamar Miller breaks loose for an explosive long touchdown, huge hole, untouched. Daniels takes a bad angle. He also just whiffed on a tackle on Miller’s first touchdown, a shorter goal line run to the outside.
8:02: Spence with another huge hit. He may be undersized, but he puts everything into his tackles. Duke player hurt.
0:00: Tommy Streeter is one of college football’s breakout stars. The 6-5 receiver had only had 6 catches for 156 yards and a score in 2 seasons coming into this game, but this season he has 46 catches for 811 yards and 8 touchdowns and has recently made the surprising decision to hire an agent and skip his final year of eligibility in order to turn pro. He’s reportedly a very hard worker and that’s a huge part of the reason behind his breakout year, but you have to wonder about him because he is such a one year wonder.
Streeter definitely showed a lot of promise in this game, but he also showed himself to be far from a finished product. He had 4 catches for 62 yards and a score. Two of his catches were in space against loose coverage for a good gain. The third was an impressive catch which he got the ball in stride despite the fact that it was high over his head and took it for a good amount of yards after the catch. He showed dependable hands to make a tough catch, but on his 4th and final catch, he was targeted in the end zone and bobbled a catchable ball on a play that could have easily been ruled an incomplete. Replay didn’t show conclusive evidence either way so it stood as called, but was not confirmed.
The knocks on Streeter don’t stop with shaky hands or even at his inexperience and lack of proven track record. He was a frequent end zone target in this one, but only came down with 1 touchdown that wasn’t necessarily a touchdown. He struggled to fight through double teams and got outphysicaled in the end zone, a big no no for a 6-5 215 receiver. He also failed to display great run blocking ability. He needs to become more physical. He could have been a 1st rounder had he returned. Right now, he looks like a 3rd rounder. He’s a great athlete, a hard worker, and flashes dominance often, especially in a 7 catch, 176 yards, 2 touchdown performance against Virginia. He’s shown the ability to get open against two potential high picks at cornerback, Virginia Tech’s Jayron Hosley and Virginia’s Chase Minnifield, but he needs work.
Miami’s offense is losing another young playmaker to the NFL early and that is running back Lamar Miller, a redshirt sophomore who has also signed with an agent. Miller didn’t get the start in this one and once against didn’t really start getting it going until the 2nd quarter, showing once again that he is a slow starter, but there’s something to be said for someone who can start slow and still rush for 147 yards and a pair of scores on 20 carries.
Miller has 1272 yards and 9 touchdowns on 227 carries on the season at 5-11 210, but he needs to work on getting north and south more, rather than dancing around so much in the backfield. He’s also a slow starter and not proven to be able to handle the load. He’s got fresh legs, but only 335 college carries could hurt him going forward as you don’t know how he can handle the load. He’s speed over power and needs to work on becoming a more powerful runner. He reminds me of Felix Jones.
Miller scored twice and on both of his scores there was a mistake by Duke safety Matt Daniels, typically a much surer player. Daniels whiffed on a tackle on the goal line on one and take a bad angle on the 2nd on a long, untouched touchdown. Other than that, Daniels seemed to have a good game. The Duke defensive leader had 11 tackles in the game, 126 on the season, after 93 and 75 the years prior, but he needs to prove he’s more than a box safety to get drafted any higher than the mid rounds. 6-1 210 is a little small for a box safety.
Duke’s other player of interest for draft purposes is receiver Donovan Varner. Varner is one of two talented receivers for Duke, along with Conner Vernon. Vernon, a junior, is the bigger of the two (6-1 195) and the more productive (70/956/5, already Duke’s all time leading receiver), but Varner has some buzz of his own. The 5-9 175 pound receiver has 61 catches for 713 yards and 5 touchdowns on the season and is actually Duke’s 2nd all-time leading receiver. In this game, he had 4 catches for 54 yards and a 6 yard carry, doing most of his damage out of the slot. He didn’t seem that spectacular, but he’s been productive on not the best passing offense and he knows how to get open and has dependable hands despite his size, so he could get drafted late and catch on somewhere as a depth receiver.
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