Don’t Blame Bennett

So this is a bit of a confession of mine. I absolutely love the Ian Furness Show on Sports Radio KJR here in Seattle. As an outside sales rep who spends countless hours every afternoon behind the wheel of my automobile, I consistently catch Ian’s show. As you may know, Ian is a Wazzu alum who has had his own shows in Utah and Portland prior to his arrival a couple of years ago at the UW Flagship station. His weekday show from 1-3 features lots of Cougar content, and regular appearances by Coach Ball and Coach Walden, means I am always tuned into the show. Rarely do you find me disagreeing with Furness, but if you want to hear about something I disagree with him on, read on.

So earlier this week, like I am every afternoon, I am listening to the Furness Show, and he starts talking about how #25 for both Wazzu and UW cost their teams over the weekend. I was laughing to begin with, as I know that Benedict Bishop is #25 for the UW, and he muffed a kick off early in the 3rd quarter in Lincoln after the Huskers had gone ahead 27-17.

Benedict’s muffed KO was recovered by Nebraska at the UW 1 yard line and from there, the momentum tilted in favor of the Huskers and the game was decidedly over.

Hahaha, Bishop, I’d imagine most Cougs found this miscue hilarious. I sure did.

Then Furness began discussing an error by #25 for the Cougs. I was sitting in my car dumbfounded, trying to rack my brain to figure out who that was. Then I remembered #25 scored a TD the week before against UNLV, and it was none other than walk-on Bennett Bontempts. It wasn’t until the miscue was discussed further that I realized they were talking about the running into the kicker penalty assessed against the Cougs early in the third quarter, after we’d forced a three & out by SDSU. While we were up by ten at the time the penalty was assessed and the Aztecs scored almost immediately after the first down was awarded, shifting the momentum in their favor. The call to block the punt and the fact Bontempts ran into their punter is not what cost us the game.

So Furness, even though I love you and your show, BACK OFF

Why don’t we talk about the myriad of miscues by Marshall Lobbestael? Those interceptions and fumbles were incredibly costly. Is it because of his fantastic early season numbers that he isn’t taking more heat for two ABSOLUTELY INEXUSABLE fumbles in Aztec territory? After All, a leopard can’t change it’s spots. To quote Dennis Green, Marshall is who we thought he is, and that is a very mediocre QB.

Why doesn’t Todd Sturdy take some heat for his horrendous play-calling? Excluding sacks, we passed the ball 42 times, compared to only 20 rushes. While I do not have the official game log in front of me, I would imagine no more than six or seven of those rushing plays came in the second half. This was baffling to me considering we were averaging well over four yards per carry from the running backs. This lack of offensive diversity, coupled with poor execution and some uncharacteristic drops by our WR’s meant we were unable to sustain any sort of drives. No sustained drives means your defense spends way too much time on the field, and the time of possession in this game (36 minutes to 23 minutes) absolutely killed our defense.

Anyways, enough of my rants, but please, don’t blame the play calling or a walk-on for Saturday’s melt down at San Diego.  At least we have Colorado and UCLA on the horizon.

Go Cougs!