Throughout this season, Syracuse has had the difficult task of facing off against a number of efficient quarterbacks. In week three, it was Central Michigan's Cooper Rush. Two games later, it was South Florida's Quinton Flowers. Three weeks after that, it was Florida State's Sean Maguire. And just last week, it was Clemson's Deshaun Watson.
For the Orange, the results haven't always been pretty. In total, those quarterbacks threw for nine touchdowns and only two interceptions against Syracuse. Last week, Watson shredded Syracuse's secondary for 358 yards through the air.
This week, SU and its secondary will face another tough test across the field at quarterback. The Orange will meet NC State quarterback Jacoby Brissett in Raleigh, where the Orange and Wolfpack will face off at 12:30 p.m. ET. As always, live play-by-play of the game can be heard on 88.3-FM WAER.
Against Syracuse last season at the Carrier Dome, Brissett went 20-for-32 for 186 yards through the air, a touchdown and no interceptions. This season through 10 games, he's eclipsed 2,000 yards passing while thoriwng for 15 touchdowns and just two interceptions.
At 6-foot-4, 235 pounds, Brissett is especially difficult to tackle, something SU defensive coordinator Chuck Bullough expanded upon on Tuesday.
"He makes a lot of plays that way. You get somebody to him and they can’t get him down. And I’m talking about Florida State, Clemson (players) — they’re bouncing off him. You’re going to think, ‘Oh, we got him.’ And then he’ll escape.”
Syracuse head coach Scott Shafer, meanwhile, went as far as to compare Brissett to current Pittsburgh Steelers quarterback Ben Roethlisberger, against whom Shafer coached when he was a defensive coordinator at Northern Illinois and Roethlisberger played quarterback at Miami University (Ohio). Against Shafer and Northern Illinois in 2002, Roethlisberger threw for 525 yards and four touchdowns.
"(Brissett) reminds me of Roethlisberger in that he obviously has a big frame. He keeps his eyes down the field when pressure is coming at him in the pocket, and he does a good job holding onto the ball until the last second, and then hitting the open man. Comparable to one of the great players who's had a great career in the NFL, obviously."
And if Syracuse's defensive linemen and linebackers can't bring Brissett down even if they get to him, then it will likely be up to Syracuse's secondary to stop the versatile quarterback. And so far this season, SU's secondary hasn't been great.
Through 10 games, opposing offenses have a 48.4% passing success rate, a statistic that measures the percentage of times a team has an completion of at least half the necessary yardage on first down, 70 percent of the necessary yardage on second down and 100 percent of the necessary yardage on third and fourth downs. Syracuse's 48.4% mark ranks it 120th among all Football Bowl Subdivision teams.
Perhaps because of shortcomings like that, Syracuse has in recent weeks made a change in the secondary. The Orange have been using redshirt freshman Cordell Hudson at cornerback in the place of Julian Whigham.
On the first play of the game last week against Clemson, Deshaun Watson completed a 64-yard pass to Charone Peake, who beat Hudson on the play. But both Shafer and Bullough praised how Hudson bounced back for the remainder of the game.
"He came back and battled the whole game," Bullough said. "It was like it didn't happen. You never know with young guys, what they're going to do, whether they'll go into a shell. He didn't."
Against NC State and Jacoby Brissett, Syracuse will likely need more of the same from Hudson.