COUGS vs. Golden Gophers. Overall record, Washington State leads the series, 3-2.
Great news.
Great news.
Washington State to play Minnesota in Holiday Bowl
- Thread starter M-I-Coug
- Start date
Minnesota runs the ball 65% of the time and has the 32nd ranked defense. Should be a great game. The Big-10 was solid this year.
Great reward for a nice season. From New Mexico Bowl to Sun Bowl to Holiday Bowl. The program is moving in the right direction!
Glad Cougar
Glad Cougar
Bah! My wife had two hotels, a rental car, and flights prepped (but not purchased) for every possible bowl destination. Of course, she is addicted to travelling and loves to obsess about it.
Someone in Wichita is addicted to traveling?
I think of Wichita as being a great place to vacation from. It's a good place to live and raise a family but it's central location in the country means that we can get to either coast via air travel in just a few hours. My wife tries to take advantage of that on a regular basis.
I was hoping that the Cougs would start playing Big 12 teams in football because of Leach's connections but the KSU one is a long way out yet. It's easy to drive to most of the Big 12 locations from here. Lubbock is the worst one by far. I'm just excited to be going to a bowl game where it will be enjoyable to make the trip. The last two bowls have left a little to be desired.
Hey WSU folks, I'm a Gophers fan. I really look forward to this game. You may not know it, but Mike Leach is an unpopular guy here in Minnesota. We have nothing against WSU, but Leach embarrassed our Gophers in the 2006 Insight Bowl, leading to the firing of our coach. There will be revenge on the line in San Diego!
Interesting historical note! Didn't know that. It will be a well fought battle that I think both sides will need to be focused and ready to play.
If you don't mind me asking, what do you guys see as your strong point... and week point?
For us, obviously our QB and OL are pretty strong and while our D, over the whole season, has been better than the past, our losses are, in part, due to our D. The stereotype holds pretty true with the Air Raid... O side good. D side bad.
Our strengths are the standard Big Ten fare: line play, linbackers, running backs.
Funny thing - the last few years we've had great defensive backs. We've been sending one or two to the NFL every year. But our defensive line stunk. This year, although we'll probably send two more DBs to the NFL, it's our D-line that has excelled.
Quarterback play - senior Mitch Leidner was an above-average QB as a junior last year, but he's been below-average as a senior. Maybe the high expectations got into his head, or maybe having a new OC messed him up. One thing Leidner does really well is pass on blitzes. Do the Cougars blitz much? I can hope! Leidner is a big, tough kid. He could play LB or TE, he's got that kind of body - he likes to run and he takes a lot of punishment. That's a problem for us, because our 2nd string QB is a walk-on who's rumored to be leaving school after this year, and 3/4 string are a couple of redshirts, so there isn't much behind the starter.
We have two fantastic halfbacks, Rodney Smith and Shannon Brooks. The fans have taken to calling them Slash and Bash - Smith is slash and Brooks is bash. Smith is a flashy runner, spins a lot, can slip through the line untouched. Brooks is a very physical kid, likes to stiff-arm and run people over.
In the receiving corps we have one good receiver, Drew Wolitarsky, and a whole lot of unrealized potential. Wolitarsky is a big, strong kid - not awfully fast, but good on his feet. The best of the rest is Rashad Still, a basketball player at heart. He has amazing physical tools, but hasn't put it all together. Still is equally likely to run the wrong route, fumble a catch-and-run, or bust a 60 yard touchdown.
Tight ends are very important to the Gophers, but our best (Lingen) has had a couple of significant injuries and is unlikely to play against WSU. Backing him up is a 6'10" TE from Indiana named Wozniak. Woz has iffy hands and blocks like a backup, but intriguing potential. He will catch one or two passes in the bowl game.
On the D Line we have some good bodies, but the star of the line is Steve Richardson. He's variously claimed between 5'9" and 6', but he's a credible 300# with muscle on top of muscle. His 7 sacks this year don't begin to convey what he means to the defense - your boys will be double teaming him on every play.
The coaching staff needs to figure out our offense, but our defense is currently above average, and stacked with young talent. True freshmen Antoine Winfield Jr, Kamal Martin, Carter Coughlin, and Taiyon Devers, RS freshman Winston Delattiboudere, and sophomore Blake Cashman have made a lot of noise this year. Our defense will be very good in coming years.
I could go on, but I'm getting sleepy. I hope this is all helpful.
Edit: here's a link to our roster: http://www.gophersports.com/sports/m-footbl/mtt/minn-m-footbl-mtt.html
And some player highlights:
Rodney Smith:
Shannon Brooks:
Mitch Leidner:
Funny thing - the last few years we've had great defensive backs. We've been sending one or two to the NFL every year. But our defensive line stunk. This year, although we'll probably send two more DBs to the NFL, it's our D-line that has excelled.
Quarterback play - senior Mitch Leidner was an above-average QB as a junior last year, but he's been below-average as a senior. Maybe the high expectations got into his head, or maybe having a new OC messed him up. One thing Leidner does really well is pass on blitzes. Do the Cougars blitz much? I can hope! Leidner is a big, tough kid. He could play LB or TE, he's got that kind of body - he likes to run and he takes a lot of punishment. That's a problem for us, because our 2nd string QB is a walk-on who's rumored to be leaving school after this year, and 3/4 string are a couple of redshirts, so there isn't much behind the starter.
We have two fantastic halfbacks, Rodney Smith and Shannon Brooks. The fans have taken to calling them Slash and Bash - Smith is slash and Brooks is bash. Smith is a flashy runner, spins a lot, can slip through the line untouched. Brooks is a very physical kid, likes to stiff-arm and run people over.
In the receiving corps we have one good receiver, Drew Wolitarsky, and a whole lot of unrealized potential. Wolitarsky is a big, strong kid - not awfully fast, but good on his feet. The best of the rest is Rashad Still, a basketball player at heart. He has amazing physical tools, but hasn't put it all together. Still is equally likely to run the wrong route, fumble a catch-and-run, or bust a 60 yard touchdown.
Tight ends are very important to the Gophers, but our best (Lingen) has had a couple of significant injuries and is unlikely to play against WSU. Backing him up is a 6'10" TE from Indiana named Wozniak. Woz has iffy hands and blocks like a backup, but intriguing potential. He will catch one or two passes in the bowl game.
On the D Line we have some good bodies, but the star of the line is Steve Richardson. He's variously claimed between 5'9" and 6', but he's a credible 300# with muscle on top of muscle. His 7 sacks this year don't begin to convey what he means to the defense - your boys will be double teaming him on every play.
The coaching staff needs to figure out our offense, but our defense is currently above average, and stacked with young talent. True freshmen Antoine Winfield Jr, Kamal Martin, Carter Coughlin, and Taiyon Devers, RS freshman Winston Delattiboudere, and sophomore Blake Cashman have made a lot of noise this year. Our defense will be very good in coming years.
I could go on, but I'm getting sleepy. I hope this is all helpful.
Edit: here's a link to our roster: http://www.gophersports.com/sports/m-footbl/mtt/minn-m-footbl-mtt.html
And some player highlights:
Rodney Smith:
Shannon Brooks:
Mitch Leidner:
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Regarding the last post, I agree the tRBs Rodney Smith and Shannon Brooks are very good. They are not as good as Laurence Maroney and Marion Barber were, but they are very good. I think Shannon Brooks is especially impressive and needs more carries.
They have two more years left, so maybe they will reach those levels of greatness.
Most fans I know do not call them "slash and "bash". In fact the two players do not like that name at all.
It suggests that one is more of slasher and the other more of a plodding power back, which is not Brooks at all. They consider themselves to be interchangeable. I do think that Brooks finishes runs much better and finds ways to quickly cut to the open spot and explode downfield. Smith catches the ball very well, is fast, and has some less decisive spin moves and jukes that sometimes work and sometimes lose big yards. Both probably have about the same top end speed.
Beth Mowins of all people is the one responsible for that cute name, and as far as I can tell everyone hated it and wanted it to go away after she used it repeatedly during the two games we had to suffer through that she called this year.
They have two more years left, so maybe they will reach those levels of greatness.
Most fans I know do not call them "slash and "bash". In fact the two players do not like that name at all.
It suggests that one is more of slasher and the other more of a plodding power back, which is not Brooks at all. They consider themselves to be interchangeable. I do think that Brooks finishes runs much better and finds ways to quickly cut to the open spot and explode downfield. Smith catches the ball very well, is fast, and has some less decisive spin moves and jukes that sometimes work and sometimes lose big yards. Both probably have about the same top end speed.
Beth Mowins of all people is the one responsible for that cute name, and as far as I can tell everyone hated it and wanted it to go away after she used it repeatedly during the two games we had to suffer through that she called this year.
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