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Mediocre at Best: Performance by WFU quarterback Skinner not up to his usual standards
Journal Photo by Bruce Chapman
Quarterback Riley Skinner (second from left) avoided a sack by throwing an incomplete pass.
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Published: September 7, 2009
Getting a great game from a talented and accomplished senior quarterback is no luxury this season for Coach Jim Grobe of Wake Forest.
As Saturday's 24-21 loss to Baylor reaffirmed, it's a necessity.
Riley Skinner, the most extraordinary quarterback in Wake Forest football history, was only ordinary at best in the first game of his fourth season as a starter.
In his defense, he was running for his life much of the game, and one of his three interceptions bounced off the shoulder pads of receiver Jordan Williams into the grasp of a Baylor cornerback.
All that said, Skinner, the Deacons' all-time leader in completion percentage and passing-efficiency rating, generated all of 142 yards of offense. He completed 20 of 31 passes and was sacked three times.
The performance was not good enough to overcome the Deacons' four turnovers, compared to one by the Bears.
"That not the way you want to start the season," Skinner said. "We've got to limit those mistakes.
"It's not Wake Forest football to have four or five turnovers in a game."
Wake Forest's untested defense played about as well as expected. Both defensive tackle John Russell and cornerback Brandon Ghee said that the Deacons should have tackled better, but the defense did give Wake Forest a chance by holding the Bears scoreless over the final 20 minutes.
The offensive line, recalibrated around the return of senior tackle Chris DeGeare from academic suspension, was shaky in the first half and erratic in the second. The most conspicuous statistic of the day may have been the Deacons' total of 49 yards rushing from their tailbacks and fullbacks.
The Deacons' best chance was for Skinner to take over the game. He tried, perhaps at times too hard. "He made a couple of poor decisions today," Grobe said. "Hindsight's 20-20. He's trying to do what we want him to do.
"There were a couple of times when we were either locked down in coverage or we had poor protection and he tried to make something out of nothing. There are times when the best thing you can do is take a sack and punt the football.
"We'll learn from today and get better."
Grobe's game plan -- designed to control the ball and the clock -- was obvious from Wake Forest's offensive sets in the first half, before it fell behind 24-7 by midway through the third quarter and had to resort to a familiar shotgun spread attack. The Deacons ran some wishbone and they ran some flexbone that has become so associated with Coach Paul Johnson of Georgia Tech.
At times the formations produced the desired results, especially when they freed slot backs Devon Brown and Chris Givens for nice gains against the grain.
Grobe said afterward that the Deacons will continue to mix up their formations going into next week's home game against Stanford. But he made it clear that as long as Skinner is on the field, the game plan will be, for the most part, designed around his abilities.
"That's what we're trying to get back to, multiple-set stuff, a lot of different things to look at," Grobe said. "Our counter plays have been pretty good against our defense out of those (wishbone and flexbone) sets and really it's no different than being in the slots. It gives you that look.
"But trust me, Riley is not a wishbone quarterback."
■ Dan Collins can be reached at 727-7323 or at dcollins@wsjournal.com.
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