Riley Skinner enjoyed his summer.
Skinner spent six weeks in his hometown of Jacksonville, Fla., training, golfing and visiting the beach. The veteran quarterback returned to Wake Forest energized — and with a nice tan — to help extend the Demon Deacons’ school record eight-or-more win bowl seasons to a fourth consecutive year.
After years of relying on defense, Skinner wants to make sure the offense pulls its weight this season.
“We were fairly inconsistent last year with the scheme we had and the way we played each Saturday,” said Skinner, the winningest quarterback in Wake Forest history with 26 victories as a starter.
“We need to help our defense out since they’ve been bailing us out of stuff for years, game after game. We have a lot of guys who can do it, who can play. Not to say we have it all worked out — we still have a lot of kinks to figure out — but I think it’s going to be an offense that’s going to be balanced, that’s going to be mixed and it’s not going to be focused around one receiver or one running back. I think we are fortunate enough to have depth, which we didn’t have last year.”
Actually, the Demon Deacs had a number of problems on offense last year despite winning eight games.
They were all over the map, emphasizing the pass early and the run late but never settling into a rhythm. The offensive line and receivers underachieved and injuries played havoc with the rotation. The offense needs to evolve after averaging just 21 points and 208 yards a game last year.
Bottom line, Skinner, who enters his senior season as the most efficient passer in school history and has a shot at several career records, needs help.
“Riley’s aged over the last five years a lot better than I have,” laughed head coach Jim Grobe.
“Yeah, he’s special. I hope we can help him. Last year our offense didn’t support him very well. The other 10 guys, we stayed banged up on the offensive line, our running backs stayed banged up, our wide receivers were shaky at best. Overall, we just didn’t support Riley very well. I am hoping this group will give him more support because he’s capable of really doing some great things for us if those other 10 guys come around.”
While Skinner doesn’t boast Heisman Trophy-like …
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