The Good, Bad and Ugly of an Apple Cup Victory

It’s ours again!

“Give me that f***ing trophy! That’s our f***ing trophy!”
– Jake Dickert, as the clock wound down in the Washington State Cougars 24-19 Apple Cup victory.

Don’t believe me? Go back and watch the video. I rewound it several times to make sure, and it was SOOOOOO AWESOME!

One thing about Apple Cup wins, they never go out of style. Even when we Coug fans go crashing down, we come back every time.

It sure was a journey for Jake to get his trophy back, filled with some great plays, some definitely not good plays, and some help from the team in purple. That help even extended to the end of the game, when a Washington player punched Rod Tialavea in the face. Those Huskies are so damn classy, y’all.

But none of the Washington buffoonery matters. Only this matters:

So about that journey. Let’s try and do our best to pick out some of the details, shall we?

The Good

• Gotta start where it ended, with the WSU defense staring down four Washington tries from inside the 10, and turning away every damn one of them.

1. First and Goal from the 9 – The Cougs stuff Jonah Coleman for a loss of 1
2. Second and Goal from the 10 – Stephen Hall breaks up a Will Rogers pass that was perfectly thrown. Outstanding play.
3. Third and Goal from the 10 – Pass complete to Denzel Boston, out of bounds at the 2. I’ve seen a lot of chatter that Boston should have made a better effort to score, and I agree. I wonder if he thought he had a first down? No idea. Anyway, what isn’t mentioned is Hall’s incredible effort here.

WSU is in man, and Hall apparently doesn’t get the defensive call. Washington runs two guys at him for a natural rub route, and Hall avoids them while chasing the receiver all the way across the field, staying close enough to get Boston out of bounds. I cannot tell you how difficult that is for a defensive back, and Hall did just enough to set up fourth down.

4. Fourth and Goal from the two – You already know what happened. Let’s watch it again anyway!

Another angle:

Kyle Thornton got a ton of credit for making this stop, and rightfully so! However, this was an incredible job of WSU’s guys setting the edge. First is Andrew Edson, who quickly gets outside leverage and drives the tackle two yards back, immediately disrupting the play. Then, Taariq al-Uqdah takes on the tight end and forces a cutback. In many a game past, that cutback lane was often an open path the paydirt. But on Saturday, Edson beat his guy so bad that he created a pile in the lane, and then Thornton filled the gap like it was his only goal in life. You could not defend that play any better, and Cougar players, coaches and fans will remember that play for the rest of their living years.

• There’s some good news in all of this, Washington. Due to cable disputes and streaming agreements, hardly anybody knows how bad you are!.
• Respect to Nick Saban and Kirk Herbstreit, both of whom took the Cougs to win outright.
• The WSU defense didn’t do much in terms of game-turning plays until the final minute, but they epitomized “bend but don’t break” on Saturday, as several promising Washington drives ended in field goals. The Huskies only scored one (1) touchdown. One.
• There were also some huge pressures and sacks, such as Edson forcing Rogers into an intentional grounding flag, and Raam Stevenson sacking Rogers to kill another possession.
• Johnny Mateer. Man, what a gamer. He doesn’t have great accuracy, and he can make some bad reads, but the guy just somehow gets things done. I guarantee you that the Washington defense was anticipating the draw on 3rd-and-20 at the end of the first half. Did. Not. Matter. Mateer cut left off a great block and outran everybody else. In a moment where WSU need a breath of life, Mateer provided the defibrillator, and a halftime lead.
• Credit to the offensive lone is long overdue in this space. For one thing, the unit is missing the guy who is possibly its best player in Fa’alili Fa’amoe. That has caused Christian Hilborn to play out of position at tackle, even though he’s best suited for guard. Despite that, WSU ran for 136 yards, and oftentimes gave Mateer the protection he needed to find open receivers. This new offensive line coach is a clear and obvious upgrade from the last guy we had, but we already knew that.
• One instance was when Mateer had a ton of time to spot a wide open Tony Freeman for 38 yards on WSU’s final drive of the first half, setting up the go-ahead score.
• Parker didn’t get a ton of space to work, but that jump cut that turned into a long run was a thing of beauty.
• That last WSU possession may not have happened had al-Uqdah not done a masterful job of breaking up a screen pass to Coleman on 3rd-and-3. All-world type of play there.
• If you didn’t know who Josh Meredith was before Saturday, you sure as hell do now. Seven catches on seven targets for 111 yards and a gorgeous, diving touchdown.
• WSU is 3-0 in this young season despite missing one of its best receivers, the aforementioned lineman, and the punter/holder. That is not something we would have foreseen! Credit to the coaches for getting the backups ready to play.
• Not quite as big as the WSU stop on 4th-and-goal, but still quite large was WSU goading Washington into two straight offsides penalties on the final possession. The first one got the Cougs some critical breathing space in case of a punt. On the second, Mateer wisely slid down in bounds to ensure the clock would wind at the “ready for play” signal, which ensured that WSU wouldn’t have to punt the ball back. As a fan of the game who has watched probably thousands of hours of football, I am still mad at myself for not realizing what the slide meant until they wound the clock.
• Oh, and Devin Kylany really, really, really sold that first offside by rolling damn near to the back of the endzone like he was hit by a mortar round. My man has a future in soccer!
• WSU is one of only five FBS teams (h/t Jeff Collier) to have defeated two A4 opponents this season. One of five!
• Coug Twitter was an absolute nuclear event on Saturday night, and it was the damn best. As sampling, led off by Dallas Hobbs’ outstanding troll of Washington and the Big Ten.

Don’t forget, Pat, before you stabbed WSU in the back (not that we were upset about it), you started all of this by agreeing to extend the series.

I hope Jake and the boys violated every no-smoking law in that county.

Coug Alumni apparently also tuned in!

STEPHANIE THERE ARE CHILDREN WATCHING OK WHATEVER I’LL ALLOW IT

And finally, Morgan with the evergreen troll.

• Other Stuff

This photo, man. Awesome.

This one captures the emotion of this win pretty well, I think.

College Football Final Team of the Week! Hell yeah!

• “I think we won boys!” – Jake Dickert into his headset after Mateer slid and the refs started the clock. Yes, yes you did, Jake. You won. We all won. Go Effin’ Cougs.

The Bad

• Jedd, that hoodie was certainly a choice. Bleck.
• Probably not a great omen when your cheerleader bus doesn’t even start. Fortunately the Cougs overcame it!
• As bad as Washington was in terms of penalties, the refs still missed some! Such as a clear grab of Williams’ jersey on a deep route and a clear hit out of bounds that would have given WSU an extra 15 early on. But the most egregious error came on WSU’s first possession, when WSU didn’t sub, yet the refs held the ball when WSU could have caught Washington with too many men on the field. As you know, the drive ended without points. Thanks, refs.
• As many good throws as Mateer had, he had a couple really bad ones. First among them was an underthrow to Williams which resulted in a killer interception after WSU had a good drive going. He also missed Williams on a slant in the second quarter that probably would have been a score, and threw a five-yard hitch on 3rd-and-10 when he had a ton of time to throw, resulting in a punt.
• Chris Hutson, buddy, gotta keep your feet when you have a sure touchdown.
• Why is Peacock so insistent that I watch old “Martin” episodes? Sheesh.
• More useless – a one-legged man at an ass-kicking contest or in-game coach interviews?

The Ugly

• Colt McCoy. Just everything about him. For real though, who saw this guy’s audition and said, “yep, that’s our man!” There isn’t enough space on the internet to talk about how bad he is, so I’ll just stick with the first thing I saw. Just before the game began, the camera was on the two announcers, and Colt said, “the rivalry energy in this crows is incredible.” Here was the crowd:

THE ENERGY IS PALPABLE!

• Tyson Durant, as good as you were last week, Saturday was the polar opposite. Washington’s most explosive plays came when a 6th-year senior just blasted past Durant time after time for long gains, including Washington’s only touchdown and a 45-yard pass to get Washington in position to score the go-ahead points late. Durant was caught flatfooted every time, and it damn near cost WSU the game.
• Would you have felt better if WSU had been ahead 27-19 on that final Washington possession, instead of 24-19? I would have! But the kicker missed another chip shot kick, so WSU was at risk or falling behind. Again I will ask, how much longer will the coach tolerate this garbage? There was a kicker for Abilene Christian who came in and drilled a 54-yarder to win a game Saturday. Abilene Christian! And WSU can’t find someone who reliably hits from 40 and in? Really? Inexcusable.

Now we’re on to San Jose State, with the Spartans coming to Pullman next Friday night. If there were a textbook spot for a letdown, this is it! So help the Cougs out, and do whatever it takes to get to Pullman and show this team how much they mean to us all. GFC

Highlights!

EDIT: Here’s the celebration video mentioned in the comments. It’s rather rudimentary and redundant, but there are certainly some fun parts, such as the wide angle when “Back Home” is blaring over the PA system. The funniest part, to me, is just after the 12:25 mark. I’ll leave it at that.

Interviews!

Rankings!

The Cougs did not reach the AP Top 25 just yet, garnering 30 votes, but they did garner one Top 10 ranking!

This Week in Parenting

GFC!