At least out in Palouse (15 miles away). Let the legend begin!!!

I don't know if Kent can ever dig out of this. There is no talent there. None.

Well, as I mentioned this early this week, I have yet to see the media or the general public get jacked or excited about this game. In fact, most people out there have no idea that tonight is the the Apple Cup.
You wouldn't think there is a game, if you go to the Seattle Times or KOMO News. Nothing. Maybe an article here or there, but this week, we've seen a lack of hype.

Heck, when was the last time you had Christmas Lights on your roof, during an Apple Cup? That's a first.

Anyways, non-related is a funny spoof article from Blanchette, painting a picture.
I like how Mike Leach is taking a swig (Dasani) from a bottle of water!



This post was edited on 11/29 9:18 AM by M-I-Coug

Taking a time out with the coaches

Washington State is close to offering Chattanooga (Tenn.) Notre Dame running back Auston Banks, I'm told. The 5-foot-9, 180-pound athlete, who can play both running back and inside receiver at the next level, does not yet hold any offers but is close to offers from Northwestern, Oklahoma, Arizona State, South Florida and several others.

Banks is teammates with top Washington State cornerback Kareem Orr, a Louisville commit who has an official visit set up to Pullman for January 16, 2015. Coach Joe Salave'a was recently in Tennessee checking out the high rising prospect. It will be interesting to see how this offer would impact Orr's recruitment. Orr has recently said that Washington State is a serious player in his recruitment.

Link: https://washingtonstate.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=1709700

Also, here's some storylines to follow: https://washingtonstate.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=1709712

because my wife was in labor with our first child. Both she and baby girl are doing great and being very patient while I learn how to do this whole "Dad" thing. Feels weird I have to say, but I'm adapting. Hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving weekend, and if I'm lucky, we'll win the Apple Cup and I'll get to watch it. Life is good.

Cougar great Steve Gleason will be inducted into the Washington State University Athletic Hall of Fame in an in-game presentation, which will occur between the first and second quarters of this year's Apple Cup, Washington State Director of Athletics Bill Moos announced today.

"Steve is a tremendous Cougar and his induction Saturday night into the Washington State University Athletic Hall of Fame is well deserved," said Moos in a press release, which is linked below. "With a sold out Martin Stadium for the Apple Cup, I can think of no better setting to highlight Steve's accomplishments than in front of a fan base that has admired him for so many years."

Link: https://washingtonstate.rivals.com/wire.asp?SID=1089&CID=76189


This post was edited on 11/25 6:37 PM by Britton Ransford

My wife's grandmother just passed away, and we aren't going to be able to make the game Saturday. I have 2 tickets in section 26 available for free to whomever wants them. I live in Lewiston/Clarkston area and can meet whoever wants them. PM me if interested.

Edit: Also, an A parking permit is included
This post was edited on 11/28 1:42 PM by Suudy

This post was edited on 11/28 2:09 PM by Suudy

no difference from last year so far, the team can't shoot, period

In the OSU game, Falk ran several times for nice gains and first downs. Falk only ran once for 3 yards against ASU (as far as I could tell), was he told to stay in the pocket? It was almost as if ASU knew he wouldn't run, therefore didn't respect that aspect of his game. I hope Leach understands that he needs to utilize all of Falk's talents this Saturday.

Why do I feel that the masses aren't jacked, as much as they have in the past? I know it's early, and the hype hasn't really started, but why do I feel that for some reason, people don't care as much as they used to?

If you live in the Seattle area, you'll notice in the past three years, our corporate job centers, (Amazon, Boeing, Microsoft) have brought in thousands of employees from out of state. BTW, we actually lead the nation in jobs. Do the new folks to our area care? No. It's a different world now. The perception of our in state rival to me, isn't as big as it was just a couple of years ago. Maybe I'm wrong?

You always hear that Oregon and Oregon State are also northwest rivals. Twenty years ago, there was no such talk. The UW rival is Washington State, not Oregon.

I suppose if we were 8-3, instead of 3-8, the hype and and noise would be there. It just seems different this year? Any why does UW play 13 games this year, and we have 12? Anyone?

Alabama's Amari Cooper, Colorado State's Rashard Higgins and West Virginia's Kevin White were named finalists for the Biletnikoff Award, which honors the nation's top receiver, the organization announced on Tuesday.

Washington State receiver Vince Mayle, a redshirt senior, was left on the outside looking in despite being tied for the No. 1 in the country with 101 receptions and No. 2 in the nation in receiving yards with 1,404. His nine touchdowns are tied for No. 12 nationally.

Here's a look at the statistics for the three finalists and Mayle:

-Amari Cooper: 90 receptions, 1,349 yards, 15.0 yards per catch, 11 touchdowns
-Rashard Higgins: 77 receptions, 1,447 yards, 18.8 yards per catch, 15 touchdowns
-Kevin White: 98 receptions, 1,270 yards, 13.0 yards per catch, 9 touchdowns
-Vince Mayle: 101 receptions, 1,404 yards, 13.9 yards per catch, 9 touchdowns

I don't think anyone is going to disagree with Cooper and Higgins as finalists, but if you look at the stats, these are the top four wide receivers in the country and the receiver left out, Mayle, has more receptions, yards, yards per catch and as many touchdowns as the receiver that was included, White, who just so happens to play in the same offensive system.

Granted, I don't know whether the voters were able to take into account last weekend's games, so that could have hurt Mayle's chances, as he put up Biletnikoff Award winning numbers against Arizona State, finishing with 15 catches for 252 yards.

(For what it's worth, the fan vote that conducted, which allowed the fans to have some say in the process, had Mayle with a higher percentage of the vote (11%) than White (7%).)

What do you think?



This post was edited on 11/25 4:15 PM by Britton Ransford

Alright, so it's Apple Cup week and for this week's Ask The Insider, I'm asking you guys to provide the questions. Since UW is probably the Cougars' most familiar opponent, I'm not going to spit out the regular "Who is Shaq Thompson and what kind of impact can he have on this game?"

So, post the questions you want to know and I'll ask this week's insider those questions and then we'll eat some Turkey tomorrow and then you'll be able to read about the things you want to know about the Huskies on Friday and then the Cougars will beat the Huskies on Saturday and then we'll all just point and laugh at all the UW stickers making the drive back to the west side.

OK, go.

Is a much better offensive coordinator than head coach? This is not meant to be critical of Mike just an observation. Some people are destined to be CEO's and some are destined to be the CFO for example. Comparing coach to Saban, Miles or any number of top tier coaches would be unfair in my opinion but I think my initial observation has some merit, at least in some circles.

Good God, is he hurt now? I sure as Hell hope that they're just resting him.

Tacoma (Wash.) Lincoln linebacker Jusstis Warren tweeted tonight that he picked up an offer from Washington. The 6-foot-3, 225-pound linebacker has quickly become one of the Cougars' top targets and it'll be interesting to see where his recruitment goes from here.

that I may not agree with, and that simply may be my problem. Against ASU I believe 35 points came as a result of turnovers. I know our head coach is an offensive guy through and through, but I believe virtually every coach I have seen or know would say "you just can't turn the ball over 5 times on the road". Instead, the press conference was about our reaction to the turnovers.
Turnovers by nature are momentum changers. That is why they call it "fickle ole mo".

How about not putting the defense in those situations. Would I rather have Kelly who threw the ball 25 times and scored 52 points, or Halliday/Falk who through it for 600 yards and 31 points? Even when our QB plays a perfect game against Cal, we lose when we score 59 points.

Saturdays game made me think about Price and his recruiting philosophy, and what he did different, even with in game management.

When Price became successful, the first thing he did was hand over the roster to his defensive coach and he got first choice. Price's philosophy when it came to recruiting may have been get the best available athlete (save the QB) on campus and we will figure out where to put them. Leach might be more position specific when it comes to recruiting.

There were numerous offensive guys Price went after that made the switch to the defensive side of the ball. Aside from Larue, have we seen that happen? Maybe Leach's offense is so specific in what they need the players he recruits fit his system and fit that side of the ball. Cracraft and Bartilone come to mind.

But getting back to philosophy, maybe his offense is so dynamic when it gets the right people in the system that defense and turnovers is almost an after thought.

If I have a complaint it is the following-for a young team (which it has perpetually been) he is constantly putting it precarious positions. Instead of burning clock against CU in 2012 (which helped define the season) he said they should be mentally tougher. Instead of figuring a way to cut down the turnovers (IE don't chuck in 60 plus times a game) they need to mentally tougher. In my 30 plus years of watching Cougar football, I have only seen it once where we had five turnovers and come out on the winning end...and that was 2003 against the Beavs at home.

According to Jacob Thorpe of the Spokesman Review, right tackle Cole Madison, running back Gerard Wicks and Sulaiman Hameed all participated in drills at the Cougars' practice today. Vince Mayle was not at practice, however, Mike Leach said the Cougars' star receiver would likely play this weekend. You can read Thorpe's full practice report at the link below.

Link: http://www.spokesman.com/blogs/sportslink/2014/nov/25/wsu-practice-no-sign-vince-mayle/

Washington State continues to recruit the Southeast region and recently offered Louisville cornerback commit Kareem Orr out of Chattanooga (Tenn.) Notre Dame. The three-star cornerback is high on Washington State and says he'll take an official visit to the Palouse on January 16.

Orr, who also holds offers from Oklahoma, Arizona State, Cincy, Indiana and several others says he's also going to unofficially visit Bloomington (Ind.) as well as a trip to see the Sooners and Sun Devils before making a final decision. Here's an article from SoonerScoop.com on Orr's recent recruiting surge.

Link: https://louisville.rivals.com/content.asp?CID=1708458

check out this video.
This post was edited on 11/25 12:09 PM by longtimecoug

This post was edited on 11/25 12:55 PM by M-I-Coug

This post was edited on 11/25 12:57 PM by M-I-Coug

1929

Looks like the snow could go either way. Friday's forecast sounds almost balmy, with a high of 50 degrees. On Saturday, they're predicting that the temps are dramatically dip down to a high of 29. It's the precipitation that the various weather sites disagree about. Some forecast snow, but others (such as weather underground) are saying it's just going to be cold and dry.

Washington State recently extended an offer to Atlanta (Ga.) Westminster defensive end Russell Ude. The 6-foot-3, 264-pound strongside defensive end is rated four-stars by Rivals and is committed to California.

In addition to Washington State and Cal, Ude holds offers from Louisville, Miami, Michigan State, Mississippi State, Missouri, Oregon, Penn State, UCLA, Washington, Wisconsin and several others. Prior to committing to California in late October, Ude was seriously considering Miami, Oregon, UCLA and Missouri.

Coach Joe Salave'a is leading Ude's recruitment and was recently in Georgia to visit the top flight defensive prospect.

The DL looked like it was a different team in the second half, both in pass rush and stopping the run.

....I hate you DirecTV. Can some friendly fellow Coug briefly recap the 4 interceptions and fumble for me? All I heard is that the first (?) int was tipped by the D-line (?). Bad reads, bad throws, tips, great defense, receiver fell down.........???

Thanks in advance.

Washington State head coach Ernie Kent was semi available to the media today and took about three questions before getting on a plane for Alaska. The Cougars' head coach talked about Josh Hawkinson and previewed what to expect from Thursday night's opponent, UC Santa Barbara.

-Kent said that academics will be a little lighter during this week's road trip as opposed to the first road trip of the season to UTEP and TCU. Dead week and finals aren't for another two weeks, but it's still going to be a demanding trip in regard to playing three games in three days, he says.

"At the same time, three games in three days is going to be hard on anybody's body," Kent said. "Particularly with the travel for all of us teams coming up there. This is where your depth, your bench is going to be huge and obviously with our style of play will be huge, because we have to make sure we have the energy to get through the three days."

-On Josh Hawkinson, Ernie Kent says that now that Josh Hawkinson has kind of made a name for himself and team's now have film on him, he's going to have to make some adjustments to his game. However, he did note that it's going to be a good thing for the rest of the team that he's going to demand attention from opposing defenses.

"I hope they do have to pay more attention [to him] because that's going to open up the perimeter game more .... a lot of teams will play behind [him] instead of your guards," Kent said. "Now they can't play behind him because he can score; he can score inside, you can move him to the outside and now imagine a 6-8 or 6-9 guy having to chase him off of a screen the way he shoots the ball.

That's going to be difficult to do. It's going to be tough adjustments that teams are going to have to make because he's not just a low-post player. He can shoot threes, he can control the break, we can bring him off double-teams and he frees your up over the floor because now you have buckets everywhere with that smaller lineup you put on the floor. Now, we have give guys on the floor that can shoot the three and that's kind of what we've been moving towards.

"I'm not saying we're moving away from Junior or we're going away from Jordan, because they're going to be very important also to allow us success, but I think it will be hard to key on Josh when you have DaVonte and Dexter and Que and they're evolving their games at the same time, it just adds to your offensive firepower and we definitely need some more of offensive firepower."

-On UCSB, Kent says that they force a lot of turnovers and are very good defensively, but they're also a sound offensive team with a top player, Alan Williams, on the inside that will pose some problems in the paint.

"They're a very good defensive team, they're a very patient offensive team and have a potential pro inside, who is going to be very tough for us to shutdown and handle," Kent said. "And they shoot the ball well, so it's going to be a tough matchup for us but I'm sure they're looking at us and seeing some things that they're going to have to deal with us, as well."