Trying to digest what happened last season based on statistics is not effective in my opinion.

The first half of our schedule was much tougher than the latter half. These games just so happened to correspond with a freshman quarterback sharing time with another and an offense trying to run 2 systems. Defense was terrible and a coaching switch was made.

The second half of the season did see less quality opponents but it also saw an increase in offensive and defensive productivity.

I guess my reason for optimism isn't stat based, rather its how I "felt" the team was playing and how they looked. The looked more in sync and the intensity increased.

While I'm not ready to say we are going undefeated or going to produce a Heisman winner this year, its hard to say that this team isn't going to be way better than the team on the field last year.