Hello Followers. Hope you are doing great!
As for me, time is really, really short today. So, I’m going to get straight to the “analysis” of our upcoming game against Oregon.
First, as the title of the post suggests, this game represents the last of the big “sorting” contests for me. I mean, if Oregon wins on Saturday and wins handily, we will know that (a) Oregon may not be as bad as some of us think they are; and (b) WSU will probably find itself sitting at or near the bottom of the Pac-12 North at season’s end.
On the other hand, if WSU steals one on Saturday, we’ll know that (a) WSU is pretty decent and SHOULD be headed to a bowl (especially with a follow-up win against OSU next week in Pullman) and (b) That Oregon is going to have “one of those years.”
Now, to get a sense of what is going to happen on Saturday, I want to quickly revisit my four “keys to Victory” for WSU this season, as they played out against CAL last week.
- Luke Falk over 400 yards passing? NOPE
- WSU over 100 yards rushing? NOPE
- WSU over 35 points scored? NOPE
- WSU at +1 or better in TO margin? NOPE
So, if you had told me prior to the CAL game that we would go 0-4 in those keys, I would have said that we would have lost that game to the tune of, say, 51-17. Instead, we lost a game that we really should have won by a lousy SIX stinking points. Don’t know about you all, but that makes me think that our little WSU team might turn out to be a pretty darn good football team if it can put a “good” game together in all three phases.
“NOT SO FAST MY FRIENDS”
But just when I started to think that the Cougars might be truly ready to turn the corner, I looked at a few key stats from CAL’s victory over the Huskies in Week 4. And when I looked specifically at the turnover margin in both those games, I got a little uneasy. Specifically, CAL wound up being +3 in turnover margin against UW and was +2 against us, yet still only managed to win each game by 6 stinking points!
What that says to me is that CAL, for all of its talent and accomplishments, may turn out to be one of those 5-0 teams that winds up losing 5 of its last 7 . And if so, we may look back on last Saturday’s game at season’s end and realize that we kicked one against a team that wasn’t very good at all.
NOT SO FAST MY FRIENDS PART DEUX
But when I look further down the box score of the CAL-UW game, I can’t help but notice the total yards for Washington in that game: 259. And while I realize that Washington lost a lot of ton of yards in that game because of stupid TO’s (some of which weren’t really forced,) the fact they held a Pac-12 team well under 300 yards. And the fact that they held us well under 450 is nothing to sneeze at. Even so, we still should have scored 31-38 points in that game even though our stats were comparatively down!
So, in the final analysis, I am still tempted to think that we might be pretty good (not good, pretty good)—although this weekend certainly stands to change a lot of perceptions about us, CAL, AND Oregon. Which is why I am so darn excited to see the outcome of this weekend’s games (actually, I’ll see basically none of them since I will be “in Stadium” for the homecoming game and festivities re: Alabama-Arkansas).
We’re gonna learn a lot!
The Keys To Victory
Will Luke Falk Throw for Over 400 Yards? YES. I know its going to rain, but I think he gets close to 500 in this one. I’ll say 487.
Will WSU rush for over 100 Yards? NO. But I think that if we’re going to win Wicks and Harrington are going to need to be around 125 combined in total offense.
WILL WSU Score Over 35 Points? YES. And we better, because we’re not going to play a defense the rest of the way (save maybe Colorado) that is more poised to get torched by us than Oregon.
Will WSU be +1 or better in turnover margin? YES. I think we’re going to be +1.
Prediction
For the past several years, my “prognostication magic” has waned a bit. In fact, this year I’ve been downright terrible. So, part of me is ready to look at my phone on Saturday night and see that Oregon laid a “We’re not dead yet world” beatdown on our Cougars to the tune of say 41-24.
But, at the end of the day, the game of football often comes down to match-ups. And as I’ve said all week, I just don’t think the Ducks match up well with us if Vernon Adams is not able to play at 100%.
Cougs end a decade of futility against the Quack by winning 38-31 in a game that will have us all shaking in our boots until the clock shows triple zeros.
Elsewhere:
UTAH 31 CAL 30. This game is going to be a really, really good one. CAL can’t stop the run so Booker is going to have a HUGE day. At the same time, CAL has shown that they can defend the pass a bit, so my sense is that Travis Wilson is going to struggle. Meantime, Utah will stuff CAL’s running game, but I remain ill-convinced that Utah’s secondary is very good against the pass. So, this one is going to come down to the very end where I think Utah will come up with just enough pressure on a final drive to inhibit Goff from stealing one in Salt Lake.
USC 42 Washington 13. It’s amazing that Vegas has both the Cougs and Huskies as 17 point dogs given that the Cougs have a great chance of winning in Eugue while the Dawgs have no chance in LA. I think Sark and company pound the Dawgs in this one. One thing is for sure: We’re going to know a lot about the defenses of each team after the game tonight.
Arizona 24 Oregon State 21. This game has yuck fest written all over it. And frankly, I think we all should be rooting REALLY HARD for the Beavs in this one, since a Beaver victory would do much to destroy the confidence of Arizona while allowing us to focus squarely on the Beavs!
Arizona State 41 Colorado 21. Even though I picked ASU to win last week, I felt like I lost when they beat UCLA. The reason? I think ASU is about ready to get things rolling in a major, major way. Remember, they looked awful at the start of last year too before putting together another 10 win season. DAMN YOU TODD GRAHAM!!!
National Game of the Week:
Michigan 31 Northwestern 24. This just in: Jim Harbaugh can coach. And if you were asking me to bet on it, I’d put them in a National semifinal at years end. They’re the best team in the Big 10 right now.
Okay that’s all that I got. Let’s go BEAT OREGON!
And Go Cougs!
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