“I thought he threw the ball well across the board,” said Patenaude. “He made good on-target throws, he knew where he wanted to go with the ball. He played with a much better sense of himself. He does throw that deep ball really well. He threw a lot of balls to the edge of the defense. We protected really well, so he got a good look at a lot of throws. I think he missed two targets the whole game.”
The performance was light years from the previous week against Pitt, when he went 3-for-13, for 57 yards (51 coming on another long touchdown pass to Brown), didn’t complete back-to-back passes and saw the offense go three and out five times. He’d be relieved by Lucas Johnson to start the second half before coming back in to finish the game in the fourth quarter.
Johnson actually played a big role in Graham’s turnaround, assisting in the pregame prep for Virginia, then the in-game adjustments.
“[Johnson’s] impact in helping James Graham prepare throughout the week, and then staying with him throughout the game and helping him through it was really cool,” said Collins.
Graham put in another solid week of preparation in getting ready to make what will likely be his sixth-straight start this Saturday against Virginia Tech at Bobby Dodd Stadium. Once again, he’ll be going up against a top-flight defense, this one directed by legendary VT defensive coordinator Bud Foster.
Tech will have its hands full with the Hokies, especially junior linebacker Rayshard Ashby, who ranks in the top five in the ACC in tackles and tackles for loss (13, tied for fourth) and is four-time ACC Linebacker of the Week. He’s the centerpiece of Foster’s defense.
Patenaude has great respect for Foster, Ashby and Co.
“You’re going to see 11 guys within 10 yards of the ball. They are going to crowd the ball and it allows the linebackers to be run-through guys and be uber-aggressive because the safeties are right behind them,” he said. “Their scheme allows [Ashby] to be really aggressive, run through. He runs through people, he jumps over people. We’re going to have to find him in the run game, put a body on him and it’s going to be different schematically against these guys than it’s been the past few weeks.”
By Saturday, Graham will have seen plenty of Foster’s unit on film, continuing what has become his game-week tradition. He believes in the process and the growth of the offense that is starting to manifest itself on the field, and will soon do so on the scoreboard.
“You look back maybe six weeks ago, we were just stuck in a hole,” he said. “We worked our way out of it, practicing, executing what the coaches called and preparing, repping it, repping it, watching film, and going in, locking in and doing what coaches are calling.”
Patenaude believes.
“If we block and throw and catch and run pretty well, we’re going to be pretty good against everybody that we’re playing,” he said. “At this time of year there’s not a lot of secrets. It’s about execution. You’re just trying to figure out what are the things that fit who they are and you embrace the challenge and you go get ‘em.”
Collins likes the way Graham is going after it, embracing every challenge and becoming a tone-setter.
“You see the pure and simple example of James Graham, self-admittedly not preparing to play the game at as high a level as he wanted to, then turning around a week later and diving into the process and investing in the process, and then having success as a result of it,” he said. “More and more guys are doing it and doing it at a high level. At first, it’s hard to learn but the more and more it happens, there’s more evidence and more data that supports if you do this, this, this and this, you’re going to get to college football Saturday and play at a high level. Collectively, that’s happening more and more.”
Graham is hungry for more and can’t wait to see how that manifests itself — and how few push-ups he’ll need to do in the future.
“We got better than last week, we played a lot better,” he said. “We’re just going to keep growing as a unit.”
