Battle of the Palouse!
Welcome to week four of our blognositcations here at the WSU Football Blog. I’m sure you’re all riding high after the boys in crimson secured something we haven’t had around these parts (football, or basketball) in a long time… a win streak. That’s right, we are in the midst of a win streak. In a refreshing change to the recent past an FCS team came to Pullman last weekend and looked totally outmatched. Gawwwwwd that felt good. Now we turn our attention to rivalry week on the Palouse and a clash with the Vandals.
Bask in the tradition!
On paper, this game looks only slightly more suspenseful than last week. However, the Vandals did their best to add some intrigue by hanging with a tough Northern Illinois team in the Kibbie last weekend. With a large homecoming crowd and a late start, this could be a rowdy affair and Amieable and I are desperately trying to square away our business here in Utah so we can have our butts in a seat at the Page sometime before closing on Friday night. So who will be making the “Losers’ Walk” on the Palouse this year? Lets get to the picks to find out…
Longball’s Locks:
Timing has never been kind to the University of Idaho, and the timing of the resumption of the Battle of the Palouse is just flat out unfair to the Vandals. Just a few years ago Rob Akey had Tom Cable’s recruits riding high on the hog while Paul Wulff’s boys were having trouble executing their pre-game warm-ups without turning the ball over. Its hard to imagine that a 2009 version of the Battle of the Palouse would have resulted in anything but a record setting day for the Vandals. But this is 2013, and whoa nellie, have things changed. The Vandals are in year one of the Paul Petrino rebuild and so far things have looked a bit like those early Wulff years at Wazzu. Meanwhile, Leach has his team playing with confidence and, as importantly, competence, and they have been further hardened by a brutal early slate of road games. Last week the Cougs showed they can take care of business against an overmatched opponent with an emotional edge. I expect to see a very emotional and perhaps even a closely contested first 20 minutes, but by the end of the first half the Cougs will begin to pull away and after a dominant 3rd quarter it will be time to give our reserves some reps for the 2nd week in a row. Not a laugher, but not a lot of doubt either…
Cougs 44, Vandals 21
And now, the rest of the story:
UW 55, Idaho St. 7 – The Bengals travel to Seattle and I hope they enjoy Pike Place Market and the EMP because they are going to have a miserable experience during the game.
Utah State 28, USC 24 – The Aggies may be as good as the Cougs on defense and are better on offense, so USC better be ready for this one. I’m taking the Aggies in a stunner that shouldn’t really stun anyone. One more nail in Lane’s coffin.
Stanford 35, ASU 33 – A knock down, drag out brawl between two teams with designs on winning their division. ASU is anxious to prove to the world they are worthy after being gifted a win last week when all kinds of fail occurred on the final play of the game. Still, at home Stanford will be just a bit too much.
Beavs 40, San Diego St. 24 – The Beavs are starting to gel after a huge road win in Salt Lake last weekend. The Aztecs aren’t good.
BYU 35, Utes 28 – Homefield advantage is just enough to give BYU revenge in the Holy War.
UCLA 58, New Mexico St. 21 – UCLA is for real and New Mexico State should be FCS.
That’s it for this week, folks. I hope to see you all at Homecoming, and Go Cougs!
SeanHawk Sez:
Happy Football Friday on Thursday Cougs. As usual I hope all is well with you and yours.
So as I dig through pictures to try and put up on these kinds of posts, I'm realizing something – as you get older, as a husband and father, you find that you just don't have many pictures taken of YOU anymore! It's different for you millennials or whatever it is they call you these days, what with your endless selfies and the like and the idea that every single thing that you do is important enough to take a photo and share it with the world (….now get off my lawn!). But trust me when I tell you that the older you get, the kids are on the receiving end of the photos and you just kinda/sorta drift into the background (hooray fatherhood!).
Anyway, I did think this picture was appropriate given the shifting of the seasons. I really noticed it the other morning, where not only is it darker and darker later and later in the AM, but you could really feel the "chilly" starting to arrive. But who am I to bitch, for this was one of the greatest summer seasons I can ever recall around the great NW!
One quick housekeeping item – the Yahoo pool, remember? Here's the details in case you forgot:
2) The group ID is: 14820
3) The password is: gesser17
And now, my picks for the week:
UW 77, Idaho St. 11 – I'm surprised that Idaho State is going to show up but hey, I guess they need the money. They'll be pounded for 3 hours and then slide off into the sunset with a nice fat check and a swat on the ass for their troubles? Hopefully it was worth it, but this thing will be over by the middle of the second quarter.
USC 31, Utah State 20 – With apologies to my good friend Longball who is leading with his heart on this one, I just think USC has figured something out all of a sudden. The running game will be tough (remember they did rush for a decent chunk of yardage vs our Cougs, and that was with a ZERO at QB). But I will say this – IF Utah State wins? Lane Kiffin will be out of a job by the middle of the day on Sunday. NO WAY he survives a loss to a non-BCS team.
Stanford 28, ASU 17 – Bare knuckle MAN fight in this one, and Stanford with their monster line and power running game take the air out of the ball and conversely slow down ASU's quick-hitting offense. But I do think Stanford opens things up a bit on O as they start to get away a little bit from the conservative act.
Beavs 45, San Diego St. 20 – Funny how things can change after, you know, teams get a few games under their belts? A lot of people left these guys for dead after the EWU loss, and many Cougs were quickly checking the OSU game as a W. But Mike Riley and the Beavs, well, they're "doing it again", you know what I mean? Early upset loss, left for dead, then they circle the wagons and come out firing.
BYU 30, Utes 27 – I do not like BYU, and I do not like Utah either. I don't care what happens and in my own self-serving interests, I would rather see the Utes lose and keep taking hits as we look towards their visit to Pullman later this year.
UCLA 47, New Mexico St. 17 – After the amazingly emotional W at Nebraska last week that was an absolutely brilliant performance by the Bruins, I think they might have some difficulty getting up for this one. But after they kind of slog through the first half, they'll turn it on late and run away with it.
Finally, Cougs – Vandals. I'll be brief – Idaho isn't very good. Yes, they played much better last week against Northern Illinois, which as a team is no pushover themselves. And maybe they are turning a bit of a corner under Paul Petrino and the new offense. AND, there is no doubt that the Vandals will be jacked-n-pumped for this one. But they've been on the receiving end of two blowouts (40-6 to North Texas and 42-10 to Wyoming), and while there was a lot of back slapping after hanging in there last week, Northern Illinois still hung 45 on them in the Kibbie Dome.
In other words, while they scored a lot more points last week? They still can't stop anyone, and all three games have seen the non-BCS opposition score 40 or more in each of their first three games. After what we saw the Cougs do through the air last week, how Connor Halliday spread that ball around to so many different players and effectively spread it to different places, how can we not love this matchup??
And by the way, did anyone catch some of what the Cougs have been saying this week? They certainly don't sound like a team that is convinced they can just roll out the jerseys, wave to the adoring Homecoming crowd and just automatically get the W. For maybe in years past this is a scary game that we might blow, but I don't think there is any doubt that this game fully has the attention of Mike Leach and company. As Leach and others have said this week, we haven't won anything and we aren't in a position to be able to overlook any opponent, and that is more than just coach-speak, no matter the point spread.
One more thing – after the game on Saturday, Damante Horton on the post-game show was asked about the upcoming game with Idaho. He sounded very serious and the tone in his voice kind of changed as he said they look forward to this week's game. When asked if they worked out with Idaho much over the summer, well, Horton said quickly and sternly "…NO, we didn't work out with Idaho AT ALL over the summer." Obviously there is some bad blood here after what happened with Mansell Simmons and that crap that went down in the offseason, and there seems to be a feeling that the Cougs have been waiting for this one. In other words – IT'S ON!
In the end, Halliday does what he did last week and the defense brings the noise. Cougs 51, Vandals 16.
All for now, and of course, GO COUGS!
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