Where does WSU fit in next year?

[CougEd]

Who takes over for River Cracraft? His worse two games of the year were against EWU and Boise, and he played well in the next 8, and he was injured in the last three. His impact to navigate through the eight man zone defense was critical. When Tuel held onto the ball in 2012, he had the similar hesitation as Falk had parts of the season. The slot receiver is so important to this offense because they have no one that will beat the defense deep, do 9 play 80 yard drives are imperative. And the only way that happens if you have a clutch third down receiver.

After review we should be an 8 win team again next year. The lack of speed does surprise me on both sides of the ball. The lack of recruiting at DT concerns me. They have enough to get through next year, but they need big kids on campus now. How many DT have we actually signed the last three years that made it to campus. This is what happened to Doba after the Holiday Bowl and that was the beginning of the end. Do I think WSU will hit 3-9 in the near future? Maybe in 2018.

I look back on the 2016 and see that WSU did have some good fortune on their way to the 8 straight wins. UCLA we got the back up QB, Arizona, ASU, OSU as well. We got Stanford early.

OSU I would guess will be slightly improved. Oregon rebuilding. Cal rebuilding. Stanford maybe regaining a little back from previous years and righted the ship. Dawgs lose some key members so a top three finish next year assuming Falk comes back should be about where they end up. Seattle could be for the Pac 12 north again.

 

[chugspig]

7-5

 

[dgibbons]

7-5

I'll say competing the division title. The unbalanced schedule can be a little rough, but we were on the good side of it the last two years.

 

[Fab5Coug]

Who takes over for River Cracraft? His worse two games of the year were against EWU and Boise, and he played well in the next 8, and he was injured in the last three. His impact to navigate through the eight man zone defense was critical. When Tuel held onto the ball in 2012, he had the similar hesitation as Falk had parts of the season. The slot receiver is so important to this offense because they have no one that will beat the defense deep, do 9 play 80 yard drives are imperative. And the only way that happens if you have a clutch third down receiver.

After review we should be an 8 win team again next year. The lack of speed does surprise me on both sides of the ball. The lack of recruiting at DT concerns me. They have enough to get through next year, but they need big kids on campus now. How many DT have we actually signed the last three years that made it to campus. This is what happened to Doba after the Holiday Bowl and that was the beginning of the end. Do I think WSU will hit 3-9 in the near future? Maybe in 2018.

I look back on the 2016 and see that WSU did have some good fortune on their way to the 8 straight wins. UCLA we got the back up QB, Arizona, ASU, OSU as well. We got Stanford early.

OSU I would guess will be slightly improved. Oregon rebuilding. Cal rebuilding. Stanford maybe regaining a little back from previous years and righted the ship. Dawgs lose some key members so a top three finish next year assuming Falk comes back should be about where they end up. Seattle could be for the Pac 12 north again.

The DT thing seems to be a constant concern for people, but look at the roster and the listed sizes for Lyric Bartley, Danny Bender, Hunter Mattox & TJ Fehoko (assuming he can come back). Those are your future DTs.

 

[dgibbons]

The DT thing seems to be a constant concern for people, but look at the roster and the listed sizes for Lyric Bartley, Danny Bender, Hunter Mattox & TJ Fehoko (assuming he can come back). Those are your future DTs.

Fernandez might bulk up some too. He's kind of tweener.

What concerns me is that Joe seems to work guys in even if they're a notch below the starters. Fehoko and Mattox could have been injured, and Fehoko obviously had his off the field issue. But the lack of snaps is a concern.

 

[CougPatrol]

I think we'll take a step back in the conference W/L record, and finish with 7, maybe 8 wins.

I think we'll (finally) start the season 3-0 or 2-1 at the worst. USC and Utah return to our schedule in place of UCLA & ASU, so spitting those games is likely the best that we'll do.

 

[Fab5Coug]

Tough to predict W/L without knowing how the schedule looks exactly, but I believe we start with Montana St & Boise at home, then a bye, then Nevada at home. Conference schedule should be CU, Stanford, OSU & USC at home & Zona, Cal, Oregon, Utah & UW on the road. That, according to fbschedules.com, at least.

I know it's a little ironic to predict a FCS win to open the season, but good Lord, if we can't beat Montana St...

Then I like us to get, at least, 1 of Boise & Nevada.

Don't have much hope for SC, and frankly, I'm never predicting an AC win again.

CU graduates a ton of guys off that D, and their starting QB.
Furd was rolling to close out the year, but loses McCaffrey.
OSU should be better, but will they be good enough.
Hopefully Zona & Cal are garbage again, especially with Cal losing their QB.
Oregon is still a bit of a mess and will be in a transition year.
Utah is a tough place to play.

I would predict 7 wins with that schedule (MSU, Nevada, CU, OSU, Zona, Cal & UO) with a good shot at an 8th (Boise, Furd or Utah).

Of course, this all assumes Falk is back, and there is not a glut of majorly impactful injuries.

 

[95coug]

Before dealing with who takes over for Cracraft, let's think a little about schedule.

There's no denying that we benefited from scheduling this year. We caught most of our conference opponents at the right time - Oregon before they gave up on Prukop. Stanford with a down year on both lines. UCLA without Rosen. ASU was MASH unit by the time we played them. Oregon State, Arizona, and Cal just weren't that good.

Would it have mattered? Maybe not. Prukop didn't give up 300 yards rushing to our offense. Stanford's lines weren't great all season, they finished 6-1 because after losing to us their schedule turned mostly soft. UCLA lost to Oregon and ASU with Rosen playing, so maybe he doesn't matter. Hard to say how good ASU was at full strength, because they didn't play anyone early - although they only beat UT-San Antonio by 4 in week 3, so that doesn't speak highly of their strength. Regardless, we played each team before they really had a chance to adjust, and capitalized while staying mostly injury-free.

Now look at things the other way - through Cracraft. He has two sub-par games against EWU and BSU, and we lose. He gets hurt and we go 0-3. If we're so reliant on one guy, and so thin that that guy - who isn't even our #1 receiver - leads to 5 losses, then we didn't deserve 8 wins.

Also consider that there were chinks in the armor through the season. We spotted Oregon State 21 points to start that game, and had to come back to beat them (twice). We gave up almost 500 yards to a 2-5 team. Also remember UCLA - we had that game under control, went into the 4th with a 3 score lead, but ended up needing takeaways on the bruins' last 2 drives to hang on & win by 6. And even banged-up ASU, we had a 31-14 lead late in the 3rd, and 37-21 with 10 minutes left, and ended up needing first downs to run it out and win 37-32.

Bottom line, we really weren't that strong this year. We finished 8-4 because the conference as a whole was down with us. We should have beaten EWU, and probably should have beaten BSU. But we also probably should have lost to UCLA and ASU. I'm not going to say we would have beaten CU with Cracraft, although I think he would have made it closer. We certainly wouldn't have beaten UW, unless Cracraft was going to play defense too. I think we probably would have won the bowl game with him.

I think Sweet and Lewis are the odds-on favorites to take Cracraft's spot, although neither of them has so far showed the same ability to find the holes in the D. If not one of them, then it'll probably be someone we haven't seen on the field yet. There's still always Morrow/Williams/Harrington, too. Morrow and Williams can both catch the ball - although I like the way both of them run, and kind of prefer to maximize their touches. Switching to receiver might be the only way Harrington finds his way back on the field

As for next season, right now we have 7 home games again: MOntana State (Sep 2), Boise State (Sep 9), and Nevada (Sep 23), Colorado, Stanford, Oregon State, and USC. We travel to Arizona, Cal, Oregon, Utah, and UW. Not sure yet what order we play the conference season in.

Montana State was not good this year, 4-7 overall, and one win was against Western Oregon (D-II).
Boise State could be tough, they get most of their team back.
Nevada was 5-7 this year, the 4 FBS teams they beat had a combined record of 10-38. They also beat Cal Poly (4th place Big Sky) in OT. Only one of their losses was by less than a TD.

Colorado will take a step back. Liufau was an important part of their offense, and they lose a big portion of their D.
Stanford doesn't lose a ton on offense, lots of depth on D. REplaces 2 OL. I think they end up a little better than this year.
OSU improves, they don't lose much to graduation.
USC will be tough. They lose both tackles, that's about it.
UA loses 3 top receivers and most of their linebackers. Probably don't improve.
Cal loses a lot on offense, and in their secondary. Moving backward.
Oregon loses nothing on D, one OL and some TEs. They'll be better.
Utah loses half the OL and DL, most of their secondary, and their RB. Backward.
UW loses both guards, both corners, their best safety and receiver. Backward.

WSU loses 2 WR, 2 OL, NCB, S. Should be better on D, might be worse on O. I don't see us replacing both Marks and Cracraft that easily, and Sorenson & Middleton were probably our most reliable OL. Luani was our best DB by far. Looks like a small step backward, but I'll wait until I see what we have redshirting this year.

 

[Fab5Coug]

Before dealing with who takes over for Cracraft, let's think a little about schedule.

There's no denying that we benefited from scheduling this year. We caught most of our conference opponents at the right time - Oregon before they gave up on Prukop. Stanford with a down year on both lines. UCLA without Rosen. ASU was MASH unit by the time we played them. Oregon State, Arizona, and Cal just weren't that good.

Would it have mattered? Maybe not. Prukop didn't give up 300 yards rushing to our offense. Stanford's lines weren't great all season, they finished 6-1 because after losing to us their schedule turned mostly soft. UCLA lost to Oregon and ASU with Rosen playing, so maybe he doesn't matter. Hard to say how good ASU was at full strength, because they didn't play anyone early - although they only beat UT-San Antonio by 4 in week 3, so that doesn't speak highly of their strength. Regardless, we played each team before they really had a chance to adjust, and capitalized while staying mostly injury-free.

Now look at things the other way - through Cracraft. He has two sub-par games against EWU and BSU, and we lose. He gets hurt and we go 0-3. If we're so reliant on one guy, and so thin that that guy - who isn't even our #1 receiver - leads to 5 losses, then we didn't deserve 8 wins.

Also consider that there were chinks in the armor through the season. We spotted Oregon State 21 points to start that game, and had to come back to beat them (twice). We gave up almost 500 yards to a 2-5 team. Also remember UCLA - we had that game under control, went into the 4th with a 3 score lead, but ended up needing takeaways on the bruins' last 2 drives to hang on & win by 6. And even banged-up ASU, we had a 31-14 lead late in the 3rd, and 37-21 with 10 minutes left, and ended up needing first downs to run it out and win 37-32.

Bottom line, we really weren't that strong this year. We finished 8-4 because the conference as a whole was down with us. We should have beaten EWU, and probably should have beaten BSU. But we also probably should have lost to UCLA and ASU. I'm not going to say we would have beaten CU with Cracraft, although I think he would have made it closer. We certainly wouldn't have beaten UW, unless Cracraft was going to play defense too. I think we probably would have won the bowl game with him.

I think Sweet and Lewis are the odds-on favorites to take Cracraft's spot, although neither of them has so far showed the same ability to find the holes in the D. If not one of them, then it'll probably be someone we haven't seen on the field yet. There's still always Morrow/Williams/Harrington, too. Morrow and Williams can both catch the ball - although I like the way both of them run, and kind of prefer to maximize their touches. Switching to receiver might be the only way Harrington finds his way back on the field

As for next season, right now we have 7 home games again: MOntana State (Sep 2), Boise State (Sep 9), and Nevada (Sep 23), Colorado, Stanford, Oregon State, and USC. We travel to Arizona, Cal, Oregon, Utah, and UW. Not sure yet what order we play the conference season in.

Montana State was not good this year, 4-7 overall, and one win was against Western Oregon (D-II).
Boise State could be tough, they get most of their team back.
Nevada was 5-7 this year, the 4 FBS teams they beat had a combined record of 10-38. They also beat Cal Poly (4th place Big Sky) in OT. Only one of their losses was by less than a TD.

Colorado will take a step back. Liufau was an important part of their offense, and they lose a big portion of their D.
Stanford doesn't lose a ton on offense, lots of depth on D. REplaces 2 OL. I think they end up a little better than this year.
OSU improves, they don't lose much to graduation.
USC will be tough. They lose both tackles, that's about it.
UA loses 3 top receivers and most of their linebackers. Probably don't improve.
Cal loses a lot on offense, and in their secondary. Moving backward.
Oregon loses nothing on D, one OL and some TEs. They'll be better.
Utah loses half the OL and DL, most of their secondary, and their RB. Backward.
UW loses both guards, both corners, their best safety and receiver. Backward.

WSU loses 2 WR, 2 OL, NCB, S. Should be better on D, might be worse on O. I don't see us replacing both Marks and Cracraft that easily, and Sorenson & Middleton were probably our most reliable OL. Luani was our best DB by far. Looks like a small step backward, but I'll wait until I see what we have redshirting this year.

Oregon also loses their entire coaching staff. Never underestimate the significance of a transition year to a new coach. Heck, even Leach couldn't improve on Wulff's record that first year.

 

[dgibbons]

Oregon also loses their entire coaching staff. Never underestimate the significance of a transition year to a new coach. Heck, even Leach couldn't improve on Wulff's record that first year.

And you have to figure there will be some "culture change" issues at Oregon, in addition to scheme changes. The Ducks were soft as warm butter.

 

[ElComanche]

Damn if Sweet and lewis are starters next year,the cougs are in trouble. Leach needs to put some guys with better athletic ability out there.The stuff about playing every one s favorite cute little possession receivers will not beat improved PAC 12 teams .The bigger and better D backs completely shut guys like that out, He needs to find some speed and talent on the field.Sometimes i think he wants his team to run the patterns and look good during the practice sessions .Perhaps he may be better served by putting more talent out there and coaching them up.