It is difficult to describe the difference in feeling after the two trips to Ohio our football team has taken. After the first, I feel like "despair" would be the best word to describe the mood, at least on this board. Now, after the second, optimism seems to be the most prevalent opinion.
Personally, I think I was really overlooking how incredibly young we were. I also forgot my coaching 101 - young teams, if coached, can improve more than veteran teams - often spectacularly. It is easy to do when invested as a fan. Guilty.
The future is bright if we can keep teams from buying our players. We have only 2 senior starters on offense (Dean and Hufford), 2 on Defense (Vaughn and Tampa) and the Place Kicker. We have others like Nikkel, Porter, Simmons, Remsberg, etc who are depth and/or Special Teams players.
We have at least 8 true or RS Freshmen starting or sharing snaps. At key positions. 2 TE, QB, OL, 2 RB, LB, LS, plus Sophomores on the DL, LB, S, OL, 2 RB, and P/H.
We are really only veteran laden at CB, but have young players getting quality snaps.