Wake Forest Athletics
A Special Season
2/23/2020 5:46:00 PM | Football
Deacons compile lengthy list of accomplishments in 2019
This story was originally published in the February 2020 issue of Gold Rush.
By Steve Shutt
The list of honors accumulated by the 2019 Wake Forest football team is long, and the accolades are numerous. School records were plentiful, and accomplishments were ample.
Where should we begin?
Wake Forest won the Big Four Championship in 2019 by posting wins at home over North Carolina, NC State and Duke. It marked just the eighth time that the Demon Deacons have swept their three in-state ACC foes in a series of rivalries that have all been played at least 100 times.
Wake Forest earned a fourth-straight bowl bid for the first time in school history. The eight wins put the 2019 Deacons among the eight teams in the 118 years of Wake Forest football to win eight or more games in a season.
The Deacons appeared in the nation's top 25 polls for the first time in a decade and made their debut appearance in the College Football Playoff rankings with a No. 19 ranking in early November.
Wake Forest placed a school-record 14 players on the All-ACC team, including a trio of first-teamers in placekicker Nick Sciba, wide receiver Sage Surratt and defensive end Carlos "Boogie" Basham Jr.
Sciba set an NCAA record by making 34 consecutive field goal tries, including 23 in a row in 2019 alone. That accomplishment earned him multiple All-America honors. Surratt was on track for a record-setting campaign until a season-ending injury sidelined him for the final four games of the season. Basham recorded 11 sacks, the second-most by a Deacon defender in school history.
Left tackle Justin Herron set the school record for the most starts in a career. Running back Cade Carney finished seventh in career rushing at Wake Forest, and Surratt set a new marker by earning four ACC Player of the Week awards. As a team, the Deacons broke or tied nearly 100 records in 2019.
Wake Forest jumped out to a 7-1 record, rolling through ACC foes North Carolina, Florida State, Boston College and NC State en route to an amazing start. The invitation to the New Era Pinstripe Bowl, an ACC Tier I bowl, was met with great acclaim.
Injuries depleted the squad as the season wore on. Veterans Luke Masterson and Justin Strnad were lost midway through the season, and injuries hit again late in the year when Nate Gilliam, Nasir Greer and Rondell Bothroyd missed the New Era Pinstripe Bowl.
Yet, in the end, in a testimonial to the caliber of program that head coach Dave Clawson and his staff have built, there was disappointment. A 27-21 loss to Michigan State in Yankee Stadium on Dec. 27 left the Deacons wanting more.
"I think the telltale sign of our program is we're not happy," Clawson said immediately following the game. "We're disappointed we didn't get double-digit wins, that we didn't win our fourth-straight bowl game. I think we're past the point of just being happy to get to a bowl. I think these guys have changed the culture and expectation level of our program."
The trip to New York City was part business trip, part pleasure excursion. The staff and student-athletes were able to take in the Christmas Spectacular at Radio City Music Hall, visited the 9/11 Memorial and One World Observatory. Side trips to Times Square and the whole "Christmas in New York" atmosphere were experiences that most of the current Deacons had never enjoyed. A bowl game in New York City during Christmas was an experience that will never be forgotten.
As for the game: The Deacs came out attacking on their first possession making many believe that this would be similar to many of the regular season wins. Kendall Hinton grabbed a 29-yard scoring pass from Jamie Newman. After a MSU field goal, a fluke interception and touchdown return by a Spartan defensive lineman put MSU up 10-7.
The Deacons regained the lead in the second quarter when breakout freshman wide receiver Donavon Greene made an acrobatic one-handed catch in the end zone, a catch that was the No. 7 Play of the Day on that night's SportsCenter. Greene's catch put the Deacons ahead 14-10.
After MSU went ahead 17-14, the Deacons regained the lead when a wide-open Jack Freudenthal scored on a 44-yard pass from Newman. A late MSU field goal left the Deacons with a 21-20 halftime advantage.
The second half, however, did not go the Deacons' way. On their five second half possessions, the Deacons punted three times and lost the ball on downs twice. After Michigan State missed a chip-shot field goal with three minutes left and Wake Forest trailing by six, there wasn't a soul in Yankee Stadium that didn't believe the offense would engineer another late game-winning drive, just as it did in the 2017 Belk Bowl win over Texas A&M and the 2018 Birmingham Bowl victory over Memphis. But the drive stalled, and the Deacons' hopes were dashed.
"I was proud of the way we hung in there," Clawson said. "We made enough plays to stay in the game, but not enough plays to win the game.
"We did a lot of good things this year. We didn't finish the way we wanted, but we'll get back to work in a couple of weeks and attack 2020 with a vengeance."
The New Era Pinstripe Bowl marked the end of an era for the Demon Deacon seniors. Recruited on the heels of back-to-back 3-9 seasons, the 2019 senior class became the third-winningest class in school history with 30 wins. It was also the highest-scoring class in the history of Wake Forest football, putting up over 1,500 points in the four years.
"I think the seniors changed the culture of our program," Clawson said. "We now have a locker room and a team that expects to win football games. We've been to four consecutive bowl games for the first time in the history of the school. We've had four consecutive seven-or-more win seasons for the first time since World War II.
