Nolan James Jr.

Aeneas went nine for 29, 3.2 yards per carry.

Nolan James, six for 29, 4.8 yards per carry, two touchdowns.

Is there anything to read into here? Are you concerned? Sure.

What are your thoughts about these running backs?

It's like, dude, what are you doing? That was a drive killer.

But Nias' first run, I believe it's his first run, had a nice cutback.

Nolan James had a couple nice cutbacks.

When these guys cut back, they can move.

Yeah, he looked good.

I thought Nolan James looked good for the most part as well today.

I think both of those guys looked real sharp today.

I felt bad for Javion Osborne because he didn't have anywhere to run.

Defense played great.

Don is a first-rounder.

Nolan James is quick.

Some small things to clean up, but overall solid performance.

And I don't think right now the run game is designed to play to the strengths of their players, that being the offensive line and your top back.

I thought Nolan James Jr. today looked very comfortable running the football, mainly because I think he's more comfortable running the mid-zone concept.

That is not in Aeneas Williams' bread and butter.

I talked about this this summer in a show.

And you're still running the offense like you have Jeremiah Love and Jadarian Price.

That's unfair to Aeneas Williams.

That's unfair to Nolan James Jr. That's unfair to your entire backfield.

And you're an offensive line that's 316, 305, 310, 325, and 325 across the board.

But yeah, he got involved, and you saw a lot of...

Carr's anticipation with some of his throws too just getting the ball to him right as he got open and yeah I think those things are really good to see I know there's going to be some concerns about the run game I've looked at the four horseman lounge a little bit so that's already a topic of discussion but when you have a guy like C.J. Carr kind of you know dicing up the defense I think that helps a lot and Nolan James I think he his numbers may not look amazing but you got to remember he had two one yard touchdown runs so I think he was a little more efficient than even the box score suggests with him too

Tim, I was going to interject on the running game.

I thought Aeneas Williams looked like he played a game three days ago, not six days ago.

But he had a different burst than the other guys had.

We can't take too much.

Nolan James did his job today.

He had very few opportunities.

Walton eight carries for 48 yards.

His longest was 15 Nolan James.

He of course he had the two touchdowns.

So we'll take those, but six carries for 29 yards.

I didn't have it on my bingo card that we were going to see more sophomores on offense and sophomores on defense.

I mean, we saw James Flanagan on offense, Nolan James on offense, obviously the blacks, the starter.

I mean, I saw Jerome Bettis Jr.

for a couple snaps as well.

I think it's actually very different than those two guys.

Agreed.

I think Jonas Walton is more similar to Aeneas and Nolan James than Kedron

Young is.

Notre Dame recruited him.

So their game plan, like Eric said, was bet that you can stop the run with a six-man box, play shell coverages, and again, like Eric said, hope cj car gets impatient he didn't and i i know a lot of fans would have liked to see cj car be like drake may in the thursday in the opener forcing it downfield when it wasn't there but they were so thrilled with his performance especially in the second half taking what the defense gave him checking it down do you know what you've talked all offseason about how good the receiving backs are at the ace williams and nolan james jr especially james just dump it down to them, let them make plays, hit the dig to Jordan Faison.

What Gino Guidulli told me was that that was really the only option for a deep shot, the dig to Faison and a little bit to Micah Gilbert because they were playing cover three, cover four.

The corners were playing so far back that that was the window that was open, not over the top.

Karnak.

Exactly.

I thought, you know, with the limited views that we really saw of him, Nolan James out of the backfield I thought was –

It was a flash.

yeah so i think him and bubacar will be make the d line better than they were

I like this change-up back that they have, Nolan James.

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, I mean, the running back recruiting has been great, so I wasn't too— I mean, I didn't think they would be quite as good as Love and Price, but I thought Nolan James is more of like a B. John type, and he's Williams, and then Keidron Young, you can use that short yardage, big fullback type guy.

Okay, well, anything

else? I was excited that Kenny Minchie played well, but that defense just wasn't good enough, I think, in their cupcake.