Browning looked pretty good. He threw some nice balls, moved around in the pocket, barked orders, wasn't nervous, etc. He looked like he belonged, but objectively speaking, he played like shit. 20-34 for 150 and a pick is a terrible game.
We've harped on the offensive coaching enough, but our talent isn't that bad. It's really not. And even if it is bad, I still expect to have a good enough coach to coax something out of them. It's fucking pathetic. The defense and special teams set them up multiple times with outstanding field position and they twiddled their dicks and kicked FG's. I think they got one first down on either of those drives.
It's really depressing that Petersen and his staff had a long time to reflect on last year's dreckfest of an offense and improve it. All off season to make necessary tweaks and changes. And we come out and play arguably the worst offensive game of the Petersen era. We all know how bad some of those games were last year too. This was as bad or worse than ASU and Stanford last year. There were some good things going on, but it's hard to feel good about anything with this embarrassing of a showing.
I would say UWs offensive talent surpasses Colorado, Oregon State, and Wazzu. Maybe Utah, but they have Booker. So it's below average, but not befitting of the worst offense in the league.
I thought it was odd they never opened up vertically to make BSU pay for stacking the box. Boise actually didn't pressure a ton, they just took away the run completely. My guess is Peterson thought his defense could win him a FG and field position battle...and he was almost correct. He just ran out of time.
If they have that much talent, they should have won.
I thought Browning played well in his debut. Given his age he plays very calm. His demeanor didn't fluctuate much throughout the game. It's clear that Browning is the guy for this team right now and although the overall stat line was ugly, it was easy to see that he possesses the arm talent necessary for the pac12. Obviously coming from Cyler last year any noodle arm dipshit trying to play quarterback would be an upgrade but I was encouraged by Browning's ability to extend plays with his feet and he showed some nice accuracy. He's a keeper.
However, until we establish the run we won't get to see the full potential of his arm. This needs to get fixed immediately because our run game was a fucking joke vs Boise. Total disaster. I think that Pettis/Lenius can make plays downfield and I'd like to see Daniels or Perkins step up and get more involved but we need a god damn run game to bring in the safeties and soften up the defensive fronts.
Do we have a bellcow running back on this roster? I don't know. It sure didn't look like it as we had only 29 total yards on the ground combined by our running backs. Pathetic. The coaches shouldn't want to deal with a committee approach when its so much easier to build an offensive identity with a consistent producer at running back. That guy hasn't emerged yet and was clearly no where to be found in Boise. To make matters worse, Oregon has the antithesis of UW's running game in Royce Freeman. The lack of a steady running attack is the reason we are 0-1.
It also just comes down to someone stepping the fuck up and making plays. Anyone, I don't care who. We shouldn't risk giving Budda touches to try to switch things up but I wouldn't mind seeing Austin Joyner move over to running back, the position he showed the most explosion in high school. We need a spark from someone at the position.
What we do know is that Dwayne Washington isn't the answer. He is a slow wide receiver masquerading as a running back. He's soft and doesn't like contact. In terms of elusiveness he grades out at an F. I was surprised we didn't see more of Lavon Coleman. I envision Coleman as more of a two down back but he only had 1 carry and it went for -2 yards. Gaskin showed some burst but gained only five yards on the same number of carries. He also looked confused periodically. Probably because at this time last year he was playing vs gig harbor. It certainly showed. Ultimately UW never committed to running the ball because Johnny Underachiever doesn't know how to build an offensive gameplan let alone call a game. Fucking clueless.
Special teams was a bright spot. We didn't get to see much in the way of kickoffs but Pettis plays fast on punts and the blocking was clean. This unit made the most plays all night. Loved the blocked kicks. It appears the work Petersen has put in personally is starting to pay dividends. As pathetic as it sounds I thought we had a better chance to win the game on a special teams play than on offense. Confidence level at all time low. For the college game in 2015 that is completely unacceptable.
The defense in the first half was concerning. We played small and looked like we hadn't tackled in a year. The second half was a different story and that was good to see. They didn't quit and kept us in the game despite our embarrassingly deficient offensive. It didn't seem like conditioning was a big issue towards the end of the game but we still need to be more consistent. Azeem stepped up and made the tackles he was supposed to make. Good to see King with the pick. Boise wasn't much of a threat through the air. Overall the energy was present in spurts but it needs to be there for four quarters and not two. Promising unit if we can get more out of the D line and pass rush.
Petersen needs acknowledge that Jonathan Smith is not providing any value to the team in his current capacity. Every other aspect of this team has improved except the offense for which he is responsible for as the coordinator. He needs to be held accountable or this season could get ugly. Sac State is no pushover.
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However, until we establish the run we won't get to see the full potential of his arm. This needs to get fixed immediately because our run game was a fucking joke vs Boise. Total disaster. I think that Pettis/Lenius can make plays downfield and I'd like to see Daniels or Perkins step up and get more involved but we need a god damn run game to bring in the safeties and soften up the defensive fronts.
Do we have a bellcow running back on this roster? I don't know. It sure didn't look like it as we had only 29 total yards on the ground combined by our running backs. Pathetic. The coaches shouldn't want to deal with a committee approach when its so much easier to build an offensive identity with a consistent producer at running back. That guy hasn't emerged yet and was clearly no where to be found in Boise. To make matters worse, Oregon has the antithesis of UW's running game in Royce Freeman. The lack of a steady running attack is the reason we are 0-1.
It also just comes down to someone stepping the fuck up and making plays. Anyone, I don't care who. We shouldn't risk giving Budda touches to try to switch things up but I wouldn't mind seeing Austin Joyner move over to running back, the position he showed the most explosion in high school. We need a spark from someone at the position.
What we do know is that Dwayne Washington isn't the answer. He is a slow wide receiver masquerading as a running back. He's soft and doesn't like contact. In terms of elusiveness he grades out at an F. I was surprised we didn't see more of Lavon Coleman. I envision Coleman as more of a two down back but he only had 1 carry and it went for -2 yards. Gaskin showed some burst but gained only five yards on the same number of carries. He also looked confused periodically. Probably because at this time last year he was playing vs gig harbor. It certainly showed. Ultimately UW never committed to running the ball because Johnny Underachiever doesn't know how to build an offensive gameplan let alone call a game. Fucking clueless.
Special teams was a bright spot. We didn't get to see much in the way of kickoffs but Pettis plays fast on punts and the blocking was clean. This unit made the most plays all night. Loved the blocked kicks. It appears the work Petersen has put in personally is starting to pay dividends. As pathetic as it sounds I thought we had a better chance to win the game on a special teams play than on offense. Confidence level at all time low. For the college game in 2015 that is completely unacceptable.
The defense in the first half was concerning. We played small and looked like we hadn't tackled in a year. The second half was a different story and that was good to see. They didn't quit and kept us in the game despite our embarrassingly deficient offensive. It didn't seem like conditioning was a big issue towards the end of the game but we still need to be more consistent. Azeem stepped up and made the tackles he was supposed to make. Good to see King with the pick. Boise wasn't much of a threat through the air. Overall the energy was present in spurts but it needs to be there for four quarters and not two. Promising unit if we can get more out of the D line and pass rush.
Petersen needs acknowledge that Jonathan Smith is not providing any value to the team in his current capacity. Every other aspect of this team has improved except the offense for which he is responsible for as the coordinator. He needs to be held accountable or this season could get ugly. Sac State is no pushover.