Wyoming names RFr. as starting QB
- Thread starter ScottHood
- Start date
Their defense is supposed to be good but they don't have a lot of size on the d-line. Only two guys above 280 in weight. Cougs o-line has to do something here.
Wyoming plays at NM State on Sat. Cowboys have named RFr. Tyler Vander Waal as starting QB
Didn’t know they played a game before we did.
Would love to see us pound their D Line into oblivion with Williams and Borghi...then when they are worn down and committing bodies to the box wreck them with the pass.
Hopefully QB1 can figure out this is the path to points and stats...guess we will find out cuz guaranteed Wyoming’s gonna drop 8 and dare us to run it.
Leach teams in the WSU era have typically started the season slow. Combined with a new q.b. going against a veteran D playing their second game has me nervous.
I look at it from a different perspective. If we were the first game on their schedule they would be focusing all summer on stopping the Air Raid. Instead of one week to prepare for us, they have all summer to focus on us. Now they can not do that because they can not overlook their first opponent. I believe one reason Leach's opening game record is so bad is because of this phenomenon.
The flip side is that teams usually improve the most between the first and second game of the season.
Or that WE had all summer to prepare for the first game, as well. This is one area that's a sore spot for me. I just don't get this.
Well let's review the openers and all the things that happened.
1st year BYU - That is a rough game to start the year with a brand new coach taking over one of the worst programs in Power 5.
2nd year - Auburn - The team that won that National Title the year before. And we only lost by 7 in their house?
3rd year - Rutgers - Okay this game was infuriating from the beginning (we should have won it, I still remember Rutgers opening play touchdown on Tracy Clark...yeesh). Still we lost by 3 points. Should have won it, but eh.
4th year - Portland State - Okay this was incredibly embarassing, Don't know if it was timid falk, or the horrible weather, but we shouldn't have lost this game. Honestly this is the first game I saw falk's overly cautiousness. Lost the game by 7 to a team we definitely should have beat.
5th year - Eastern - In a boat race that was ridiculous we get nipped by Eastern. They beat Eastern in 2013, had Oregon bend over backwards to try and get their QB, gave UW fits, and nipped us. We should have won, but Eastern is one of those teams that plays FBS just as good as anyone and usually down the wire. We lost by 3.
6th year - We win. we beat Montana State. In fact we started the season 6-0.
So looking back on it we never were really clobbered by someone except for BYU. In the opener.
In fact looking back on the 5 losses.
2 were by 3 points
2 were by 7 points
4 out of the 5 were by 1 score.
And only the first game was a loss by more than 2 scores.
Should we have won some of those, absolutely, but looking back we still went to bowls 4 out of 6 years going 1-5.
While I agree with your sentiment (to a certain extent. I'm done with "moral victories. We're past that, IMHO), it doesn't instill confidence with the idea that we are a bit on the thin side, this year.
These aren’t moral victories.
It’s just illustrating that the margin was very thin in most of the losses and had everything from steep competition like Auburn to FCS teams.
It sort of highlights that at the first game the kinks aren’t worked out but also the situations are strange.
If anything it shows us walking into “trap games” right out the gate.
The only 1 that wasn’t was BYU. But in 2013 we won 6 games and made a bowl.
2015. Won 9 and a bowl.
2016. Won 8 went to a bowl.
This indicates very clearly that not only did these games not represent the capability of the team, but sort of confirms a program trying to get its bearings every season.
We could (by a slim margin) have been 5-1 in openers.
Not a moral victory just an observation of how the misfires illustrate a program trying to get the engine starting and coming up short on the first fire.
Good point; but we get a full game worth of tape to help. two steps forward (not prepping for us all summer and game tape) and one step back (improvement between first and second game). I may be wrong, but I still like that they play a game first.
Poo on all of you. CML goes back to his home state and lays 50 on the Cowboys.
50-35. I stand by it.
Then you're seeing something I'm not. Their D can play and we have a lot of new faces on offense. They DO have a redshirt frosh QB of their own and 2 or 3 more on their offensive line. Points will be at a premium in this one, and I suspect that turnovers will determine the winner
It'll be like the 2003 Oregon game. Ye of little faith.
https://www.sports-reference.com/cfb/boxscores/2003-09-27-oregon.html
I hope you are right. I think you probably are. But... I think it was 1982 when we lost to Pacific. Haven't forgotten that astonishing loss either. Just like the Apple Cups in '82 and '83, for better or worse, just can't forget the unforgettable.
We could certainly lose to Wyoming this year. I'm not 100% sold that they were all that good on defense last year. Here's the list of teams that they held to 20 points or less last year:
1-10 Gardner Webb
2-10 Texas State
3-9 New Mexico State
7-6 Colorado State
5-7 Air Force
10-4 Fresno State
2-11 San Jose State
8-5 Central Michigan
There's a couple decent teams in that list but when you look at Fresno State, they failed to score more than 20 points in six games, so it wasn't surprising that they struggled against Wyoming. Central Michigan feasted on a terrible schedule, going 8-2 against teams ranked #75 and below in power rankings and 0-2 against teams better than that (and even they weren't particularly good). They gave up 49 points at home to Oregon.
Wyoming is going to have a week to blow the cobwebs off and that sucks, but as mentioned above, it means that we'll have a chance to see tape on them this year which may give us a little leg up. This game is definitely a bowl barometer game for us, with or without our previous early season struggles. Win this game and a bowl game appears likely. Lose this game and we might be 2-3 heading into the Oregon State game. We should beat OSU but can we feel confident about getting three wins against Oregon, Stanford, Cal, Colorado, Arizona and UW this year? We went 3-3 against that group last year without the question marks we have right now. No doubt that we need to take care of business against the Cowboys. If we can beat them by double digits, I'll start feeling better about us getting to 8+ wins for the fourth straight year.
I'll take your word for it. I get what you're saying. We had good teams that blanked out. That's why I said above, there are no excuses because WE had all summer to prepare for the likes of Eastern or Portland, the same way they had all summer to prep for us!
I don't like the "coulda, shoulda" game. You make good points but then slide into "We could have been..." which sounds a lot like others here during CML's first year talking about another coach that "almost won" this or that game... Not buying that part of your statement and that's the part that is sticking in my craw.
I take zero comfort in the idea we "almost" won anything. The past is the past and I was among those that gave CML a pretty long leash that first year. And as years progressed, I've expected more. But I'm not going to look back on those losses with any other lense than, "We lost and we should have won". Slightly ashamed.
"That's all I've got to say about that."
What would have could have tells one how close they were or are. In 1998 there was no would have could have. 2000 there were four games like that . I take comfort in it because it means we are at the party playing. When you are 3-8 getting blown out of every game you aren’t even at the front door of the party
Yeah I have no issue with you being annoyed with games we should have won. We should have won them. It’s that simple. I think we should have beaten Cal this year. I just added the context to them because it was an interesting phenomenon. I’m always looking for how we can get better and what really is the issue.
Is it a lack of preparation? Is it starting out just playing to the level of the competition? I think it is a combination of both out the gate and well if that’s the case that’s bad.
I also wonder if it’s a leadership issue with the players at the time. I will say that I really like the excitement that Minshew brings to the team. That energy and swagger from Falk was never quite there. He was as calm as anyone which is great, but that killer instinct was there. He seemed overly cautious at times, and I wonder how much of our slow start was actually Falk being overly cautious.
Remember Portland was his first start. Then you Eastern. Then Montana. Falk went 1-2 in openers against 3 FCS teams.
Now looking at Haliday. He went 0-2 against Auburn and Rutgers
And then Tuel went 0-1 against BYU.
Now of the 3 QBs while Halliday had the gunslinger mentality, Tuel was good but cautious. Falk was calm, consistent and cautious. Falk had the better college career but played lesser opponents.
The defense also didn’t exactly dazzle in these games except maybe Auburn. Rutgers it was trash, Eastern trash, Portland it was lack luster.
So it’s not just the QB.
I think it really comes down to being ready to play and ready to assert yourself from the very beginning. On offense and defense.
It’s walking in and making a statement, and I think that really was the attitude missing. Falk isn’t a make a statement kind of guy. Halliday sort of was but the defense didn’t help him.
When the defense shutout Idaho that’s a statement. Never really saw a statement in the opener.
We like to make statements against USC or Stanford or Oregon, but for some reason no statement in the opener.
Offensively, we were a little flat against Montana State, but I thought 31-0 was a pretty decent statement overall.
Yeah last year was the first year it happened how it should. There was no reason why that couldn’t have happened the two years prior with Falk. I think it got to a point where enough is enough but it shouldn’t take losing twice before to do that.
Not to quibble but I thought Falk started 3 games the year before? Including a Pac-12 player of the week win against OSU? Maybe that was fake news. Or I am living in the past...…..
Our D line will be smaller but appears to be faster than most of the PAC. That will bite against the few power teams that we play on our reg season schedule (UW; Stanford; SC; maybe Utah), but it may be a plus against the various spread/mobile QB offenses. Should certainly be a plus against the non-con schedule. Overall, it works for a 7 win expectation while providing some upside potential. Definitely should work OK for Wyoming.
