SB Nation - Matt Eichelberger

Monday hodgepodge: Recruiting, injuries and more

Nuss — Mon, 12 Oct 2009 21:53:21 -0000

Bye weeks are always a little weird and awkward for blogs, since -- like the team -- we get into a certain week-in, week-out routine with games every Saturday. For the first time in a month and a half, there is no game to look forward to this weekend (assuming you do, in fact, look forward to them).

Of course, this isn't a bad thing, as this team needs a week off to heal in the worst way. Every team says they look forward to a bye because of the injury factor, but this team is a special kind of hurt. We all thought it couldn't get any worse than last year, but it has. Boy, it sure seems like a long time ago that we were talking about this team being healthy out of camp.

So, the bye will not just allow for an extra week for some of the guys who have been out to get healthy, but it will allow those who have been playing banged up to get right. That's a big deal moving forward.

Why? Because if this were last year, I honestly wouldn't care about this team getting healthy. They were in so far over their heads on a weekly basis, that it honestly didn't matter who was on the field. But this team has shown signs of life -- the kind of life that leads you to wonder what they might be able to do with a few more bullets in the chamber, specifically on the offensive line.

Looks like we'll probably get a chance to find out against Cal. Guards Zack Williams and B.J. Guerra and guard/tackle Steven Ayers all have a shot at being back in the lineup. Assuming both Kenny Alfred and Micah Hannam are healthy for Cal -- both were banged up by the end of the ASU game -- we actually could have our entire starting five back on the offensive line (assuming Paul Wulff wants to put Ayers back in the starting lineup for Tyson Pencer).

One player who almost certainly won't be ready for Cal is Brian Danaher, the backup guard who returned from a concussion on Saturday. Wulff seemed concerned about Danaher all week, even refusing to re-insert him into the starting lineup. Well, it turns out his concern was well founded, as it's believed Danaher suffered yet another concussion.

Danaher now has a disturbing history of brain trauma, and while I'm sure the coaches, trainers and Danaher don't need my advice, I'm going to give it to them anyway: Shut him down. Maybe forever ... but at least for this year. Knowing what we now know about these brain injuries -- and given that there is so much more to learn -- there is no reason to put his future at risk. None whatsoever.

Another player who won't be back for Cal is corner back Daniel Simmons, who suffered a broken leg and is done for the year. Major bummer for him, as he had fought his way into the starting lineup this year. However, he's still just a redshirt freshman, so still lots of promise to look forward too.

Tough to say exactly what Wulff and defensive coordinator Chris Ball will do in this spot. If Eric Block is healthy -- he's been struggling with his digestive issue again, and didn't play on Saturday -- you could see a move of Chima Nwachukwu back to corner. That could also happen if they're comfortable with Jay Matthews, who played but didn't record a tackle.

I don't think they'll do that, though. my guess would be that they would elect to put either Terrance Heyward or Aire Justin (remember him?) over there. Why? Because Cal is a team that's obviously going to focus on running the ball, and it's going to be more important to have sound tackling from the safety position, and the dropoff in that respect is significant after Nwachukwu. If LeAndre Daniels or Tyree Toomer were still back there, it would be a different story. But they're not.

The good news is that the Cougs should get some help up front in trying to stop Jahvid Best and Shane Vereen in the form of defensive tackle Bernard Wolfgramm, who appears as if he should return from his hip injury. That's beyond huge, because we all remember what Best did to Matt Eichelberger and Ai Ahmu last year ...

There's absolutely no doubt that with Wolfgramm, this starting four up front is light years ahead of those guys. Even against USC's vaunted line, there weren't any holes like that. (At least, not after the first drive.) Additionally, middle linebacker Alex Hoffman-Ellis should return from his staph infection. While Greg Trent was as hard-nosed a player as you'd find, he wasn't the most fleet of foot. Hoffman-Ellis gives the Cougs a chance with his athleticism.

There also appears to be more help on the way for next year. Somebody asked recently about defensive end Brandon Rankin. I couldn't find any info out there, but the intrepid Vince Grippi did some looking and dropped this little nugget in his pregame report from Saturday:

Two players who signed with WSU last February but couldn’t make it into school, Brandon Rankin and Quayshawne Buckley, seem to be on track to get into school in the spring semester. Buckley is waiting to hear his test results – that was kept him from qualifying – and is confident he did well. Rankin is on track to finish his classes. In case you don’t know, Rankin is 6-foot-5, 260-pound junior college defensive end who has earned a four-star rating from Scout.com and will have two years left. Buckley, a 6-4, 270-pound defensive lineman, earned three stars as a high school senior last year.

Rankin is the kind of kid who could have an immediate impact. Imagine a defensive end rotation with Travis Long, Kevin Kooyman -- who looks more and more like he's headed for a medical redshirt -- and Rankin. How cool would that be?

That about covers it for today. We'll be back along either tonight or tomorrow with a lengthy post looking at the defense. You'll also start seeing the second quarter grades (can you believe the season is half over?), and we'll have Paul Wulff's press conference for you to listen to tomorrow. And since basketball kicks off its season this weekend with Midnight Mayhem, we'll probably be sprinkling in a little hoops content this week, too. I can guarantee it will be part of what we talk about on the podcast, so you've got that to look forward to as well.

In other words, while the football team will be on a bye ... we won't.

Finally, some more good football news

Nuss — Thu, 04 Dec 2008 22:45:05 -0000

We're a couple of days late on this, but for all the bad football news in the past 12 months -- both on and off the field -- this is a piece of news that deserves some recognition.

The Cougs tied for the Pac-10 lead with 15 players on the conference all-academic teams. That's up from 12 in 2007.

Congratulations, guys. Believe it or not, the reason we all go to college is to get an education. (Although, we really won't be sad if we have all these all-academic selections and win a bunch of games next year, OK?)

List of selections after the jump. I cannot believe how many offensive linemen are on that list. Smarts are supposed to be a big part of playing on the line, so that's got to count for something next year, doesn't it?

First Team
- Chima Nwachukwu, S/CB
- Matt Mullennix, DE
Second Team
- Matt Eichelberger, DT
- Joe Eppele, OL
- Adam Hineline, DT
- Micah Hannam, OL
Honorable Mention
- Kenny Alfred, OL
- Steven Ayers, OL
- Daniel Blackledge, WR
- Brian Danaher, OL
- Devin Frischknecht, TE
- Hallston Higgins, LB
- Kevin Kooyman, DE
- Vaughn Lesuma, OL
- Ben Woodard, TE

Wazzu Week: No Time For Bruins To Get Comfortable

Nestor — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 01:00:05 -0000

If anyone is feeling comfortable about this weekend’s game just remember this note from last season. Last season Washington State was coming off a humiliating 7-53 loss against Oregon and 1-4 record in the Pac-10 (3-5) to take on UCLA. We know what took place in Pullman after that. It was us who left that place humiliating as the Cougars beat us up by a score of 27-7. Cougars’ RB Dwight Tardy ran all over UCLA defense (which was decent last season) by rushing for 214 yards in 37 carries. Here is the box score if any one has the stomach to go through it again.

Dwight Tardy is back as he is looking to make a comeback from a major knee surgery from this past season. He leads the team in rushing (250 yards in 66 carries, averaging 3.8 yards per carry). You can bet Tardy and the Cougar OL will be closely looking at the game film from this year’s UCLA defense which has posted some disconcerting numbers to date. More on that below.

Tardy is not the only RB Cougars have at their disposal. They also have Christopher Ivory who according to the bloggers at CougCenter “has shown the same difficult-to-tackle rushing ability that Jacquizz Rodgers showed” against Southern Cal. Ivory to date has rushed for 136 yards in 28 carries. So given that combination it would not be prudent for Walker’s front-7 to overlook these guys, especially considering how leaky our rushing defense has been so far this young season.

Meanwhile, the Cougar offense has other skill players that Wazzu fans are lot more excited about. Once again here is Grady from CougCenter (one of our latest colleagues in the SBN network, who have shown great composure and poise blogging about the Cougars in an incredibly difficult season they are experiencing in their ead coach’s first season). Anyway, Grady is excited about Brandon Gibson, the team’s leading WR and Marshall Lobbestael, the freshmen QB who has gotten a lot of a action in last two games:

1. Brandon Gibson - Of all of the players on the roster, only one seems to show NFL potential on a weekly basis. Gibson appears to have shaken off his case of the dropsies from the Oklahoma State game and is rounding back into form as one of the conference's elite receivers. He is on pace for another 1,000 yard season, although he probably won't repeat his outrageous 17.6 yards/catch average from 2007. And he's doing it while being the focus of the defense, and without current Seahawk Michael Bumpus at his side.

2. Marshall Lobbestael - First there's the nickname factor. You can call him "The Lobster", "Rock Lobster", "Ocho Rojo", or "The best FBS quarterback in the state of Washington now that Jake Locker is hurt". Either way, he has more good nicknames than Brink, Rogers and Lopina ever had, combined. Also, it turns out he's a decent QB. We may have a slightly unhealthy pseudo-obsession with Ocho Rojo here, but he's backing up the hype: he's the only Cougar QB with a positive TD/INT ratio (4:3), and is averaging 6.2 yards per pass attempt (remember, per attempt, not completion). Which begs the question: why the heck aren't we throwing it more?

Obviously this team is struggling and lot of those numbers were piled up courtesy of Portland State. However, once I will repeat again that it will be very foolish for our defense to get complacent and over look this team.

Tardy based on his last year’s success against a more talented Bruin defense is going to look to spike his numbers up against a defense which to date has given up 37.5 points per game. The defense so far has given up 679 yards in rushing with an average of 4.41 yards per carry [See cfbstats.com]. Those are not pretty numbers because the soft defense against opponent’s rushing attack has repeatedly put the opposing offenses in comfortable 3rd down situations and a lot of pressure on our young secondary.

Meanwhile, on the other side of the ball, the Cougar defense is hurting up front. Nuss at Cougars center offered up the following simple explanation for their defensive struggles:

Without a doubt, this team has its fair share of problems at the moment. But none is more glaring -- or more damaging to the Cougs' chances of winning -- than the horrendous play of the defensive line, which is shaping up to be one of the worst in school history.

It starts with the tackles, A'i Ahmu and Matt Eichelberger, who are proving that they don't belong anywhere near a Pac-10 football field. Not only are both fat and slow, neither is very strong. Same goes for defensive ends Kevin Kooyman, Matt Mullennix and Andy Mattingly, who I suppose at least are trim and fit while not being very strong.

The result is all four being washed out on virtually every running play, unable to ever hold a gap at the point of attack. Consider the chain reaction this causes, which is practically fatal to this team's chances of ever stopping anyone against the run.

In some ways the problem the Cougar defense is having sounds kind of similar to what we are experiencing in Westwood. The struggles of our starting DEs and LBs (sans Carter) is also making our defense susceptible to the opponent’s rushing attack, while forcing secondary to make way more than their share of tackles. Currently the list of our top-5 tacklers include ATV, Lockett (even after missing a game) and Rahim Moore. That’s a not a good sign.

Going back to the Cougar’s defense, it will be imperative for our OL to come in with total focus and determination in this game. Let’s hope they are not patting themselves too much in the back following the encouraging performances from last two weeks. They will have to come into this game with a mean, nasty streak, and look to impose their will on a Cougars front-7, which by all accounts have been struggling this season.

Again, the Cougars are coming into Rose Bowl arguably in lot worse shape (and with out the luxury of a bye week to prepare for UCLA). Yet as we have reminded in our early morning notes today, it would be foolish to look past these guys given what they have done to us recently at the Rose Bowl embarrassing the Bruins in 2006 (35-15) and 2004 (when a 5-6 Wazzu team beat UCLA by a score of 31-29). Our guys will have to come in and get off to a good start. Otherwise, if they let these guys hang in the game early on, based recent history you can bet the Cougars will do everything they can to take advantage of their rare opportunity to grab a victory this season.

Bottom line, it is no time to get comfortable for our team or our fans.

GO BRUINS.