Associated Press
WINSTON-SALEM ó Stanley Arnoux remembers Wake Forest’s not-too-distant days as a doormat perhaps better than anybody, so the fifth-year linebacker helped gather his teammates together for a players-only meeting.
The message: The Demon Deacons could slip back into sub-mediocrity even quicker than they rose to relevance.
“We’ve got to get back to having a unified team again, having one big family ó offense, defense, special teams, all together,” Arnoux said Tuesday.
For a program that was built on its meticulous attention to detail, the little things haven’t clicked at Wake Forest over the past few weeks, and that has led to its worst stretch in a single season since before its breakout 2006.
The late-game heroics that have defined the Demon Deacons during the past two seasons have largely been absent, and for most of the season, so has the perennially productive ground game ó that is, until they all but abandoned the pass during their latest loss. Special teams have been an adventure with their record-setting kicker injured, and the senior-laden defense hasn’t produced as many turnovers in key moments.
As a result, they’ve managed just two touchdowns in ACC play and have dropped two straight and three of four for the first time since their last losing season, a 4-7 finish in 2005.
Now they’re looking to find their way again and start playing Wake Forest football again.
“Just doing the things and making the plays on both sides of the ball, in all three aspects ó the kicking game, the running game and defense, we’re not used to (struggling),” running back Josh Adams said.
The Deacons (4-3, 2-2) insisted they cleared the air during Monday night’s 20-minute closed-door meeting ó led by linebackers Arnoux and Aaron Curry, defensive lineman Matt Robinson and QB Riley Skinner ó and are on the same page entering their critical five-game November stretch run.
Wake Forest threw it just eight times while running out of the I-formation for much of its 16-10 setback at turnover-free Miami. Grobe is stressing the need for more balance after Riley Skinner was just 3-of-8 passing for 57 yards in that game while Adams rushed 21 times for a season-high 111 yards.
But Duke coach David Cutcliffe said the tape of that game indicated a possible return to the run-first style Grobe’s teams used before he embraced the spread in ’06.
“What we saw was a move toward what’s been the basic philososphy of Wake Forest football: to be physical and run the ball,” he said.
Yet the Demon Deacons insist there’s no sniping or finger-pointing between one of the ACC’s stingiest defenses and the league’s lowest-scoring offense. Wake Forest is giving up just 16.4 points per game ó but is only scoring 17.4.
“That’s not acceptable here,” Robinson said. “It’s easy to question things in hindsight, but we’re all in this together.”