By Luke Fletcher ｜ Atlanta, Georgia

Georgia Tech got the win over Mercer. That is the good news. The bad news? Many of the same problems that have plagued the Yellow Jackets this season were still on full display. Georgia Tech survived Mercer at home, but this was hardly the type of performance that should make anyone feel better about where this program is headed. If anything, Saturday reinforced concerns that have been building since the Colorado game: Georgia Tech is struggling at the line of scrimmage, and the offseason changes to the coaching staff and roster may have been far more significant than many around the program wanted to admit.

Justice Haynes Should Have Been Done by Halftime

Start with Justice Haynes. Haynes finished with 141 rushing yards, which looks perfectly respectable in the box score. But against Mercer, the expectation should have been domination. Haynes should have been approaching 100 yards by the middle of the second quarter. Georgia Tech should have built a comfortable lead, gotten its starting running back out of the game and allowed the backups to handle most of the second half.

Instead, Haynes had to remain involved for much of the game.

That is not a criticism of Haynes. It is a criticism of what is happening in front of him. Georgia Tech’s offensive line continues to look like the weak link of this offense. The Jackets have a running back capable of changing games, but too often he is being asked to create production rather than simply take advantage of what the offensive line gives him.

And that brings us back to Colorado.

If Georgia Tech had consistently controlled the line of scrimmage in that game, Haynes should have had the opportunity to put together the kind of performance we eventually saw against Mercer. Instead, the Jackets struggled to establish the type of physical identity that was supposed to define this team.

Putting up 141 against Mercer doesn’t erase that problem. It may actually highlight it.

The Defensive Front Isn’t Any Better

Then there is the other side of the football. Mercer rushed for 207 yards and averaged nearly five yards per carry.

Let that sink in.

This wasn’t Georgia, Clemson or one of the ACC’s massive offensive lines coming into Bobby Dodd Stadium. This was Mercer, a FCS team, and the Bears were still able to consistently generate production on the ground against Georgia Tech’s defense.

Afterward, Brent Key acknowledged the obvious: “Still a major work in progress in stopping the run,” Key said.

That assessment may be accurate, but Georgia Tech cannot afford for stopping the run to remain a “work in progress.” Key has built his identity around toughness, physicality and line-of-scrimmage football. Those are supposed to be foundational principles of the program.

Yet right now, the biggest questions surrounding Georgia Tech are on the offensive and defensive lines.

That is a major concern.

Georgia Tech’s Offseason Gamble Is Looking Bigger

There is also a larger conversation that Georgia Tech supporters need to be willing to have. The program went all-in on Brent Key. Key is a Georgia Tech graduate. He understands the school. He understands the culture. He genuinely cares about the program.

But nostalgia cannot determine whether football decisions were correct.

Georgia Tech lost far more than an offensive coordinator when Buster Faulkner left Atlanta. Faulkner’s departure was part of a much broader offseason change that included coaches such as Geep Wade and Norval McKenzie, along with players who followed Faulkner out of town.

Those losses mattered.

Saturday offered a painful reminder. While Georgia Tech was struggling to put Mercer away at Bobby Dodd Stadium, Colorado (the team that exposed several of Tech’s problems earlier this season) was being dismantled by Northwestern.

Meanwhile, Faulkner and former Georgia Tech personnel were making an impact against Auburn. That contrast is impossible to ignore. Georgia Tech supporters could look at the Mercer score and say the Jackets won.

That’s true.

But anyone watching the larger college football landscape Saturday had reason to ask a much more uncomfortable question: Did Georgia Tech underestimate just how important Buster Faulkner and the staff around him were to the program’s resurgence?

This Wasn’t Just About Buster

That question shouldn’t be reduced to whether Faulkner was a good play caller.

It is bigger than that. Georgia Tech lost coaches who were heavily involved in developing players, building relationships and creating the offensive identity that helped make the Jackets dangerous.

Then came the roster consequences. When players who could have remained on the Flats instead chose to follow Faulkner, that should have been viewed as significant evidence of the relationships he and his staff had built.

Now those departures are being felt. Georgia Tech didn’t simply have to replace an offensive coordinator. It had to replace an ecosystem, and so far, the transition has been rocky.

The Most Concerning Part Is the Identity

Georgia Tech can fix play calling. It can clean up penalties. It can improve execution. What is harder to fix in the middle of a season is an identity problem. Key wants Georgia Tech football to be physical.

Fine. Then Georgia Tech has to be physical.

Against Mercer, Haynes should have been running through enormous holes behind an offensive line that overwhelmed an FCS opponent. He should have been watching most of the second half from the sideline after doing his damage early.

Instead, Tech needed him deep into the game. Defensively, Mercer should not have rushed for 207 yards. Those aren’t minor details. Those numbers strike directly at what Brent Key says Georgia Tech football is supposed to represent.

A Win That Created More Questions Than Answers

Georgia Tech beat Mercer, and a win is always better than a loss, however beating Mercer (a FCS program) cannot be the standard. The standard has to be whether Georgia Tech is developing into a team capable of competing consistently with the better programs on its schedule.

Right now, there are legitimate reasons for concern. The offensive line isn’t controlling games. The defensive front isn’t stopping the run. Justice Haynes is being forced to work far too hard for yards that should come much easier against an opponent like Mercer, and hasn’t had a breakout game vs a P4 opponent yet.

And the offseason departures involving Buster Faulkner, Geep Wade, Norval McKenzie and several players look increasingly important. The most uncomfortable possibility for Georgia Tech and the boosters, is that the they miscalculated what drove its recent improvement.

Maybe it wasn’t simply Brent Key rebuilding Georgia Tech. Maybe the combination of Key, Faulkner, Wade, McKenzie and the players they assembled was what made the formula work.

Georgia Tech chose which part of that formula it wanted to keep. Saturday’s win over Mercer did very little to prove that it kept the right pieces.

Georgia Tech won the game. The questions surrounding the program only got louder. Go Jackets!