Theyâre not as bad as some of the final scores indicate. They had a QB change in the North Texas game. The Washington final score is ugly, but that was a 1 score game heading into the 4th quarter until UW scored 28 straight (pick six and a fumble in their own redzone were their first two offensive possessions in the 4th). Then they dominated a bad CSU team and took Ole Miss to the wire.
Their defense is legitimately good. The UNT and UW scores are misleading because the offense had many brutal turnovers. If they protect the ball, then this could legitimately be a close game.
Theyâre 56th in the country in total defense, 10 spots better than us. They held Ole Miss to their worst offensive performance of the year, both in terms of yards and points. Pretty even against the pass and run. Looked physical against Ole Miss.
Maybe âlegitimately goodâ was too nice but theyâre a solid unit. The point totals against UNT and Washington were largely the fault of the offense.
For context on why stop rate could be misleading, Wazzuâs defense had FIVE possessions in the FIRST HALF against North Texas where North Texasâs offense started their drive inside of the WSU redzone due to turnovers and special teams. UNT scored TDs on all 5 of those possessions.
All of those 5 count as failed stops according to stop rate.
lol Iâm not trying to say theyâre elite or anything but I feel like some of our fans saw that they gave up a bunch of points in some of their games and got the wrong impression. Iâve only seen them against Ole Miss but they looked way more competent and honestly talented than I would have thought. Sure Ole Miss probably took them lightly coming off of a big win over LSU, but WSU stayed in the game throughout. Their offense isnât as scary, though they seem to have figured something out with the new QB. Itâs entirely possible we come out and treat them like Stanford but it wouldnât surprise me to see us look a little lethargic on offense given some of our injuries and time off.
LOL fair enough. They are a competent unit for sure. Itâs a 3-3 team. Thatâs decently tested so far this season with games against Wash and Ole Miss. Part of me wants to throw the Ole Miss game out but I know you canât do that. I need to dive more into their offense because the QB nullifies some of what they did early in the year but itâs not clear how big of an impact.
Iâve seen a few tweets now about a surge in ticket sales for Saturday. I know ticket maps on the VA Sports site arenât always reliable, but I hope itâs true. The guys deserve a big turnout
Helps that itâs Homecomings, good-looking weather forecast (60âs and clear), late game lets people have their Saturday activities and still make the drive. Hope the team is locked in and gives the fans a good show!
