Washington State Cougars at Nevada Wolf Pack.
Welcome to Friday Cougs! Finally, we’ve reached gameday and a chance for our Cougs to redeem themselves from last week’s horrendous defensive performance and eventual fourth quarter collapse. The Cougar offense was nothing short of efficient, but watching the game again (and it wasn’t all that easy to find the strength to do) there’s no doubt that several plays and plenty of points were left out there to be made.
This week Halliday and Co. don’t necessarily have to throw more touchdowns or score more points, but the Pack must be forced to play from behind this week which means the “O” needs to get it going early. When Nevada plays from ahead, they become a lot tougher to beat because they work that pistol read option to death.
Obviously, after what we watched Paul James and Rutgers do to us last week, having to stop the run isn’t something that I’m looking forward to as a fan.
I am pretty excited about the defensive changes that Mike Breske decided to make this week in the secondary and the return of Cyrus Coen however. I think they will make a much bigger difference than people realize in all phases, though it’s not like they thrust the Cougs into the top half of the conference defensively or anything like that. This team could still struggle mightily with youth and inconsistency.
I am less worried about Nevada than I was about Rutgers, because this team finds more ways to lose than WSU does and I think it will happen again tonight. Seriously though, like Mike Leach said last week, this University and team needs to start expecting greater results, greater performances, greater attitude and greater effort.
This is an opportunity for the Cougs to continue the culture change at Washington State University and make a statement on national television that they’ve made major strides. If they were to lose this one, I would be really worried about the rest of the season, but I don’t expect that to happen at all. I do expect a double-digit beat-down from a focused and angry team.
GO COUGS!