Game 15: NW vs LR

I don’t know about you guys, but our tailgate was awesome! The “TJ & Dude Sweatlodge” was standing room only again this week. It was quite literally hot inside the enclosed canopies.  I spent about an hour or so outside of the canopies before the game acclimating to the weather. I was much more prepared for the weather this week, than I was last week. After last week’s game I went out and got some new boots to keep my feet warm – and they worked! I was not cold at all this game, I have a feeling I was in the minority. But it’s only fitting that a semi-final game be good and cold!

Last Week’s Recap:

This game was a classic example of Piss Poor Preparation = Piss Poor Performance. Unfortunately, I think that the piss poor performance was probably subconscious in nature. I also think that the cause was probably the fact that the starting quarterback was not there the entire week to practice and game plan with. Trevor was in New York receiving the prestigious scholar athlete award from the National Football Foundation along with Coach T and President Jazz. Now don’t get me wrong, as far as I know Trevor Adams had no choice in deciding whether or not he was going, so we can’t blame him. I don’t know if there really is anyone to blame, other than maybe the NFF for planning an event while active seasons for every division except for the BC$ was still in play. But to think that having the primary signal caller not available doesn’t affect the rest of the team, is just silly. I think that it sent a message to the rest of the team that total focus wasn’t needed to prepare for Grand Valley.  I don’t think that anyone – players or coaches – would have said that it was happening at the time, but that’s the thing with subconscious behavior: you can’t quantify it, observe it, or really even stop it. The entire first half the offense was not crisp, and was killing themselves. It wasn’t like the UCM game where they were getting stopped,  NW was just killing themselves with turnovers.

On offense, it was the tail of two halves.  Northwest could not get their offense to ‘click’ in the first half. The unforced turnovers were killers. TA’s first pass that was a lateral pass was way behind Reuben Thomas. TA did a great job of getting over to the ball and tackling the ball carrier. I think that he probably saved a TD there. I had visions of the MoWest playoff game dancing in my head. But TA shook that one off but then fumbled a few series later on a QB sneak on like the 1 yard line. Korey Jackson did a great job of chasing down and tackling the GV player who had picked up the ball and was on his way to the endzone.  I think that the coaches did a great job of switching up QB’s when needed. I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a 2 QB system work as well as it did this game: well, with the exception of the ACU playoff game in 2008 with Joel and Blake.  The second half was a different story. They scored on every possession except for one. NW punted on that possession despite being 4th and less than one on the GV 43. The offensive line looked very discouraged that they weren’t even allowed to line up and try or even have the QB do a pooch punt. I don’t know if I agree with AD’s choice on that one – but I understand it: GV had just scored and you don’t want to give them the chance of gaining even more momentum. The offensive line did a spectacular job of protecting the QB again this week. They also did great opening holes for the runners. Speaking of runners: Billy Creason had one of his best games ever – not in total yardage, but great plays at the right time. Phil Jackson had another good game. Bobby Burton seems to have disappeared the past couple of weeks. I don’t know if he is dinged up a little, or just REALLY doesn’t like the cold. Receivers: wow. Reuben Thomas just continues to impress, not to mention that Korey Jackson had one of his best games as a Bearcat. Bryce Young and JaJo both did a great job with their chances as well they both did a great job of down field blocking. If the offense had been clicking in the first half like they did the second half, the game would not have even been close.

On defense, the Bearcats did a pretty darn good job.  Grand Valley was the first team to score on their first possession since Saginaw Valley.  And that is because they started at the NW 17 – GV actually ended up with a net -3 yards on that drive, but still managed a FG.  Overall the D did a good job. You know you have a good defense when you are frustrated that they didn’t do better, but managed to stifle a very good offense and only allowed 13 points.  The Dline did a pretty good job of disrupting Parling. Longacre looked like a man among boys out there. The GV offense was able to get a pretty good push at times. Collin Bevins was able to play a couple of downs, but he didn’t look too comfortable out there. I think that he had hurt his ankle on one of the first plays. So when he was hobbling off the field, I am hoping that was because of his ankle, and not because he had hurt his knee any more. He will definitely be needed next week if he is able to play. The linebackers did a good job again. I’ve been watching Cody Matthewson a lot lately, and he continues to just get better all the time. For the most part, the secondary did a good job. The officials weren’t helping them out at all. They were allowing the receiver to do all kinds of pushoffs but if the defender even slightly touched the receiver, they were flagged.  The Dixons both had a really bad day. Brandon has not been at his best the past few weeks. It’s almost like ever since he got his invite to the NFLPA Senior Bowl he has lost a lot of focus. My guess the problem this game was from a combination of things: not wanting to get flagged, mental snowball, and the cold. I think that the cold really affected these Florida boys, I already mentioned the officials being flag happy, and when the troubles started, I think it became more of a mental thing than anything.  The GV quarterback was definitely going right after Brandon Dixon. The thing is, it wasn’t like he was getting burned or anything. He was all over the receiver, step for step, he was turning around in time and seeing the ball, but for some reason he wasn’t going up after the ball. It wasn’t like Parling was throwing bullets out there, he was literally throwing jump balls for his receivers. Like I said, Brandon was right there with the receiver, turned around and saw the ball, but just didn’t jump up and go after the ball. It was very frustrating because I know that Brandon is a better CB than what we saw on Saturday. But he is human and everyone has a bad game from time to time. In fact, he did a pretty good job for most of the game, but just had a couple of series that he didn't do well at all. I think it got in his head and just kind of snowballed on him. Bryce Enyard had one of the most amazing break ups that I've ever seen, saving a TD. Enyard came bareling across the field and literally knocked the ball out WR's hands. I don't know where he came from, but I think I heard a sonic boom when the play was over. The entire Bearcat defense was not good in their tackling. They weren’t arm tackling, which is a good thing, but they were tackling very high which was allowing GV to get extra yards after initial contact. That is going to need to change before next week!

Special Teams: What is going on with the NW kick off recovery coverage? It has been pretty bad lately. Teams are obviously seeing a weakness and exploiting it. At one point and time on Saturday I would have been in favor of just kicking the ball out of bounds and giving GV the ball at the 35 as that would have been better field position than what they had been getting.  Ever since the fake punts from UMD, NW has not been going after the punter much.

Next Week’s Game:

So I’ve watched several of Lenoir-Rhynes games so far. They are not as bad of a team as some people may be expecting. LR runs a triple option offense – the last three games that NW has faced a triple option offense: NW has outscored them 116-21. But LR is not MoSo or Harding. From what I’ve seen, they have much better skill players but their OL is not as good as Harding’s was. They also appear to have a better defense than either of those teams. The offense needs to come out hitting on all cylinders – rather than the sputtering that they did the first half last week. If the O can score on their first couple of drives and the D can prevent them from scoring – then the Bears will be in a world of hurt as a triple option offense is not designed to come from behind very well. I watched all three of the LR playoff games: against Carson Newman, UNA, and West Chester. Carson Newman runs an option offense as well, so their offense doesn’t compare well, and the West Chester game was a muddy mess, so that doesn’t compare well either. The UNA game the field was very wet to and was just starting to get muddy – so that definitely affected their playing, but their offense was the closest thing to the NW offense of the three games  I watched.  UNA was able to score 39 points on their D, despite the fact that their offense was hindered by the field conditions. UNA did a good job of bringing in a backup QB to use as a running QB – they had a lot of success doing that. Hopefully that carries over for NW as well.

The Bears defense is not very big, but they are fast and tough. They do a really good job of tackling. From what I saw, nobody was able to consistently stuff the ball down their throats.  But when they D was spread out protecting the pass, then the QB was able to get yards running. They also seemed susceptible to the play action pass. If the coaches play it right, it could be a quite fun game to watch – but if they don’t, the LR defense is good enough to frustrate the NW offense.  A lot will depend on how TA plays; if TA has a good game, and we can mix things up with Bolles – it will be a good day to be a Bearcat. The Bears defense can get very aggressive at times, and can get burned doing it. If NW is able to pick up the blitzes, NW can get some good yards off of short passes and runs. I am anxious to see how Bobby Burton plays. I know that he has been battling turf toe for a large part of the season. The past few weeks since it has gotten really cold, RB3 has not been playing a whole lot.  I don’t know if it is his foot that is bothering him, or just the cold; or maybe the cold is really affecting the turf toe. I don’t know, but it looks like it is going to be a lot warmer in Florence than it has been the past few weeks.  Billy Creason had a great performance last week, and Phil Jackson is looking to continue to build a name for himself. Clint Utter is expected to return this week. He probably could have played if needed last week, but the GV secondary wasn’t scary enough to require him to play. I expect to see him have some big plays from Utter as well as Reuben Thomas will be as dangerous as ever. I’ve said it multiple times, but the NW receivers corps is super talented and deep. You never know who is going to be the hot target: Thomas, Utter, Young, Jackson, JaJo, etc? I would really really like to see the TE get more involved in the pass game – Marcus Wright seems to do a dang good job whenever he is thrown to. Hopefully he will get involved early and often!  Ultimately its going to come down to the play of the Offensive Line.  They have done a great job all year of protecting the QB and opening up holes. They have one more game, let’s hope that they can continue their performance.

Well, they say that defense wins Championships: this is a perfect opportunity to prove that right. This game is all about playing sound gap assignment football. Northwest is very good at that. They may be one of the best in the nation at doing that.  The LB’s and the DL is going to have their hands full. As long as everyone does their job,  they should be able to limit LR’s offense. I have a feeling this game is going to be a lot like the Harding game. NW gave up a ton of yards, but no points. I would not be surprised to see LR be able to get some drives going, but they will eventually stall before they get to the endzone. I will gladly trade TD’s with FG’s. My guess is that since LR doesn’t throw the ball (they literally have only thrown the ball 94 times this season, current QB has only thrown it 6 times) the CB’s and Safeties will be used a lot to stop the run. The entire DL is going to have to play very good. Like I said earlier, the LR skill players are VERY good, but their OL is not the best. That will help the NW line be able to disrupt their option game.  I don’t know if the Bears have seen a defense any where close to as good as NW’s.  I don’t’ know what the status of Bevins is, but I really hope that he can play. He does an excellent job blowing up these types of offenses. I am sure that he will give it his all, as he knows that he has all offseason to heal up.

Special Teams: NW has got to do something about their kickoff coverage. The last couple of weeks it has just been bad. Also, I would like to see the Bearcats be aggressive again on punt blocks. They have hardly gone after them like they did earlier.

Overall, I think that the NW D is going to be too much for the LR Bears. I think that the Bears will be able to slow down the NW offense – but not a whole lot. NW wins this one big 38-10.

Game 14: NW vs GVSU

Brrrr….. that was nipply! It wasn’t nearly as miserable as Duluth, but definitely cold. Thank God there was no wind, because that would have been terrible. As it was it was just cold. Our tailgate set up was awesome. We had enough heaters and powerful enough heaters that it was actually quite warm in the tent. As for the game itself, it wasn’t all that bad – but we were really packed in. I didn’t wear my coat in the first half, but did have tons of layers on. There was a slight breeze on my back which made me put my coat back on at half. My feet on the other hand, did get pretty darn cold just standing there. I didn’t realize how much the little heaters in my shoes were keeping my toes warm until they stopped working. Great Googily Moogily I didn’t realize how much cold my boots let in. Needless to say, I hit up Cabelas on Sunday and invested in a new pair. Should be much better this week! I’ll let you know next week how my toes come out! Hopefully I still have 10!

Last Week’s Recap:

Well, I was wrong again. Not the first time, won’t be the last time. I was scared of the Huskies offense, but they apparently were more scared of the Bearcat defense. From the get go, the Huskies body language said that they did not want to be in Maryville Mo playing football. But regardless of whether or not they wanted to play, the Bearcats definitely showed up and put a whoopin’ on the Huskies.

Offensively, the Bearcats couldn’t do much wrong. There were only three possessions that they didn’t score on. The first drive they stripped the ball from Robert Burton. Two drives later the Husky defense forced a pooch punt from Adams, and All American Kyle Goodburn didn’t see the field until the very last drive for NW. Huge shout out to Trevor Adams for completing over 85% of his passes this game. There weren’t any deep balls this game, but they weren’t needed. Plus I don’t think it would have been a very good idea to try and throw that frozen rock vertically. Huge props to Clint Utter. He got rocked on some of those catches, and continued to play. I am pretty sure that he got a concussion in there somewhere as he didn’t play in the second half. JaJo (Jason Jozaites) continues to impress. If indeed Utter does have a concussion and can’t play next week, JaJo will have to step up and fill the role of the big WR to go up and get balls. I’m thinking AD or Flohr read my report last week talking about Phil Jackson :D Talk about a coming out party! He tied XO and LC’s record for 4 rushing TD’s in a PO game, and was only the second rusher all season to have broken the 100 yard mark. The future looks bright with a backfield consisting of RB3 and Phil “Action” Jackson! The offensive line did an amazing job this week giving TA plenty of time and opening giant holes for the Billy, Bobby, and Phil to run thru. Overall, it was a great day to be a Bearcat!

Defensively – this group continues to impress me. At halftime, SCSU’s numbers were pathetic. If I remember right, it was something like 76 yards of total offense. It wasn’t until the majority of the starters had been pulled that the Huskies had much success at all. Despite being dinged up, the DL did a great job of disrupting Klaphake’s game. Cas Weitl did a good job filling in for Collin Bevins. This was also one of the best performances by the secondary I’ve seen in a while. They were all over their receivers like stink on poop. Klaphake didn’t have any options and the DL finally ate him up. The LB’s did a great job once again - I could go on and on singing this groups praises, but I would just be reiterating what I’ve said for the past 13 weeks! It is a lot of fun seeing what Wright, Bostwick, and Gordon have done on defense!

Next Week's Game:

I am worried. I am worried because I am not worried. I have thought all season that GV was not a very good team. We are talking about a team who eeked out a win over Truman 31-15 in the second week of the season, and GV fans at that time were trying to convince me that Truman was actually a really good team. That was when I knew that GV was not. Then a few weeks later they got curbstomped by 43 points by ODU, then two weeks later they got beat by Ferris. Then two weeks ago they came from behind to beat Pueblo – PUEBLO. And last week they came from behind again to beat West Texas A&M. This all being said, my head knows that they are in the semifinals and can’t be taken lightly – after all they curbstomped SVSU in the first round of the PO’s 40-7. But if you listen to the Grand Valley fans, the team is nothing more than smoke, mirrors, and duct tape from losing so many players to injury.

Offensively, I think that the key is going to be running the ball. If NW can run the ball on GV, its going to be a great day to be a Bearcat. In both of GV’s losses, they have been pretty susceptible to the run. If Billy, Bobby, and now Action can run – watch out. Because once NW is able to establish the run game, then the pass game will be that much more effective. In the last four games GV has given up 306, 156, 297, 397 in the passing game. So you can say that that is probably the weakest part of their defense. If NW can establish the run game, they can then exploit the secondary. TA has been throwing dimes lately – if the OL continues to give TA time, I think that he will be able to pick apart the Laker secondary.

Defensively, just continue to eat. I’ve heard a rumor that there is the possibility that Bevins may be able to play in this game. I don’t know if that is true or not – or if he will even be needed. IMO, if he isn’t absolutely needed, I would say let him rest for another week. The Lakers primary RB went down a couple of weeks ago, so from what I’ve seen they don’t really attack the middle very much. During the WT game, they went wide a lot. I think that that really plays into the speed of NW’s linebackers strength. So if the DL can bottle up the middle, and the LB’s can take out the sides, that leaves the secondary. I put NW’s secondary against Parling’s arm any day. From the WT game, it didn’t seem that Parling threaded the needle a whole lot – more like he threw a jump ball and made his receivers go up and get it. I have a feeling that the Dixons are going to have a field day with that type of strategy. As long as they stay focused and don’t get overly physical, the Bearcat secondary will stifle Parling. But if they get physical and the refs throw a lot of flags, that could make the game closer than it should be.

Special Teams: I feel a blocked punt or two coming on. GV punter is not a rugby style punter, so they could very well get to him. GV did fake a punt against WT, so NW is going to have to be prepared for that option as well.

Overall, NW has a field day with the Lakers. NW wins this one 55-21

Game 13: NW vs SCSU

What a great day for a football game. It was a bit chilly early in the morning during tailgating, but by game time, the weather was perfect. And despite there not being a full crowd in the stands, the area where I sit (stand) was packed in like sardines. It was great. A lot of the people around me were old school Rickenbrode Rowdies and it felt like the good ole days. The UMD fans were very respectful and we weren’t able to get into any good shouting matches. They did however do some team cheers during injury timeouts for NW. Well, that didn’t stand in my book, so we had to return the favor on one of their injury timeouts. Overall, it was a great game day experience.

Last Week’s Recap:

I believe that the technical term for what the UMD Bulldogs received is called a ‘whoopin’. I had told some people before the game that the game was either going to be extremely close, or it could end up being a lot like the Washburn game. It ended up being closer to the Washburn game than being extremely close. I think that there were essentially two game changing plays: the first was the goal line stand in the second quarter. I think that this really deflated a lot of the Bulldog sails, NW went on to score in their next two possessions before the end of the first half. The other was the pass interference call when UMD was on 3-24. The play prior that the Bulldogs were really dragging – and looked like they definitely did not want to be out on the field any more. The QB had just gotten sacked for the second time in a row and was very slow getting up. He looked very disgusted. The OLine was dragging their butt back to the line to get into position for the next play. Then the penalty happened – first and foremost there was some light contact between the two, it would have been pretty ticky-tacky to call – but the ball was not catchable at all. The injured guy sitting on the UMD bench had a better chance of catching that ball than the WR. Well, needless to say that was all it took to invigorate the UMD offense.

Offensively, I thought that NW came out rather flat. Part of that I think came from having a bye week, but the majority of it came from the play calling. The first couple of series are usually pretty scripted by the coaches ahead of time, and I’m sorry – they wrote the wrong script. It seemed to me that they were trying to go at UMD horizontally and try to get the edge. We saw the return of that stupid jet sweep – which worked about as well as it has all year: not at all. It wasn’t until Brady Bolles got in there and started passing the ball down field mixed with some QB runs, that the offense started to get going.  I think coaches out think themselves some times; luckily they came to their senses and started running the offense like they have all year. TA looked good and bad all in the same game. He made some great throws – he also made some really terrible throws. The WR’s did a great job this week. Reuben Thomas has a career day – 8 catches, 154 yards, and 1 TD. He looked like he did in his highlight reel from JuCo. You can see why he was on the D1 route at one point and time. Utter continues to just make plays. He did have one time in the end zone where the turf monster got him, but he more than made up for it a couple of plays later when he made a great TD catch. The way NW is able to spread the ball around is a great asset. I keep getting more and more impressed with Marcus Wright at TE. NW did not have a lot of success early running the ball – which is not surprising going against the UMD rush D. I expect to see them increase their production this week. The OL did a great job of protecting the QB and giving them time to throw.

Defensively what can I say? Stifling. That would be a good word for it. The Bearcat D held the Bulldogs to their lowest rushing production all year – by quite a bit. Going into the game, the Bulldogs were averaging over 300 yards rushing per game: the Bearcats only allowed 98 yards. That is amazing. The LB’s performed amazingly. DJ Gnader and Eric Reimer continue to impress. The Dline did a great job overall. But it was an expensive win. Both Collin Bevins and Brandon Yost got hurt on the same play. Yost came back later in the game but Bevins never did. He was seen running  along the sidelines but was later on crutches on the sideline. Rumor has it that he has a torn MCL and is probably done for the season. It looked like Yost sprained his ankle – he came back but wasn’t nearly as effective as he had been earlier in the game. The second half of the game, after NW had shut down their run game – UMD had to go to the pass. And like I said in the report last week, UMD passing versus the Bearcat secondary – NW is going to win that battle. NW secondary did a pretty good job, but did get burned a couple of times. Several teams have gone after Manning. It appears that he provides the softest coverage all the secondary. He got burned multiple times on the same little curl route.  Don’t get me wrong, I think Manning is darn good defensive back. That is more of kudos to the entire secondary than a rub against Travis. Hats off to Bauer he did make a couple of good throws – one in particular was a great throw and an even better catch. Brandon Dixon did his best at knocking the ball down, as that was his only chance at defending the pass, but the WR made an amazing one handed catch – I think the ball was probably out of bounds when it came down and he was able to snag it. As a football fan - it was truly a thing of beauty.
Special Teams: The punt game was perfect. Two of UMD’s drives started within their own 5 yard line. They didn’t get a blocked punt, but those are hard to come by with a rugby punter. Hats off to UMD for executing two fake punts. NW is usually very aggressive, and it cost them on those plays.

This Week’s Game:

So I will be completely honest with you – St Cloud scares the crap out of me. They have an amazing QB in Phillip Klaphake (pronounced ClapHockey) is the real deal. Easily the best QB that NW has faced all year. I would say that he is a mixture of SVSU’s Jonathan Jennings and MSU’s Jon Wolf. He’s got a great arm, fast runner, can scramble, and hard to bring down. On top of that, he’s got receivers that can catch the ball. This game will be the biggest test for the NW secondary to date. I’m kinda worried that the NW secondary has lost some focus lately. They seem to be playing much more physical rather than smart football the past couple of weeks. The Huskies don’t seem to have much of a primary receiver, they do a very good job of spreading the ball around evenly. The secondary is going to be as focused and prepared as ever for this game. The DL is going to need to be able to stop the run as well as provide some pressure on Klaphake. Klaphake is the Huskies leading rusher, he does  a lot of designed runs but can scramble too. When Klaphake isn’t the ball carrier, he usually hands it off to Michael Walker, who is averaging 4.7 yards per carry on 169 carries this season and has 19 touchdowns. This offense scares me.

St Cloud defense on the other hand does not scare me. They have given up a ton of points and yards the past couple of weeks. They like to blitz a lot – a LOT actually. And it burns them a lot. But their defense does seem to be very fast. I watched parts of the Mankato game, and St Cloud defense seemed to be very quick. They chased down Jon Wolf, and we all know how elusive he can be. Mankato did not seem to have a lot of success when trying to run on the edges (ie don’t try the jet sweep) but had more success going up the middle. They gave up almost 500 yards on the ground to UMD in their one loss – granted that game was played in crappy weather and neither teams passed hardly at all. I seriously doubt we see him, but I would love to see Phil Jackson given the opportunity to carry the ball more. If NW can have success pounding the rock, I think that they can exploit the St Cloud secondary. The Huskies #1 DB broke his collarbone in the last game of the regular season, so he is out, and their #2 DB has been suspended for this game after getting arrested Saturday night. With the number of blitzes that they like to run, that will make them more susceptible to the intermediate routes. I think Marcus Wright could have a really good day if given the opportunity.

I have a feeling that Special Teams are going to play a big role in this game. I expect to see at LEAST one blocked punt. I hope we can keep Goodburn on the sideline, but if called upon – I’m sure that he will deliver another great showing. The Great Dane seems to be getting better and better every week.

Overall, I think that the NW defense is better than the Husky defense and NW wins this one 55 – 35.

Game 12: NW vs UMD

Well, I think its official. I enjoy watching NW playing in Bearcat Stadium South, I mean Splatt, I mean Spratt Stadium. Having 4000 fans on one side yelling and screaming with all their hearts and souls and every fiber of their being – it truly is a great experience.  I am pretty sure that it is always windy as heck in St Joseph, MO – at least it seems that way. If it hadn’t of been so windy – it might have actually been a rather warm day. The wind kept me from breaking out the t-shirt for much of the day.

Last Week’s Review:

Talk about an old fashioned curb stomping. The only thing that kept MoWest from getting it even more was NW’s emotions. They wanted to extract revenge from last year – and they did that. They wanted to make MoWest pay – and they did. The officials obviously knew that there was bad blood and they tried to rule with an iron fist to keep as much of the extracurricular stuff from happening. Well, it still happened and they ended up interfering with both teams. 29 penalties in one game is a bit ridiculous – especially when there were hardly if any OL holding calls. I’m not sure that the White hat knew that he was supposed to be the one looking for that.  Officiating has been particularly bad this year.

Wow, I haven’t seen a MoWest defense that bad in quite some time – if ever. Kudos to the Oline – TA had all day to throw, and the RB’s had nice holes to run thru. Heck, all of the RB’s averaged over 5 yards per carry. The Bearcats even had a RB go over 100 yards – which is the first time all season. Which normally would be a troubling statistic, but since it’s been a RB by committee approach, and the reps have been split pretty evenly – they’ve gained a lot of yards but just haven’t broken the century mark.  I liked seeing Phil Jackson get some reps at RB – but I don’t like how he put the ball on the ground; they called him down – but I don’t think that he was really down. Definitely going to need to work on that – as he has the potential to be really good. I am hoping that that potential does materialize eventually.  I think that this was the best game by the Northwest Receivers in a long time. There weren’t any drops, and they did a pretty good job of blocking downfield.  I loved seeing the return of Korey Jackson – it had been several games since he had received some meaningful throws. Talk about a corps of wide-receivers. There weren’t any receivers that caught more than 5 balls, only one that caught more than 2. Yet NW averaged over 17 yards per catch on 15 passes to 8 different receivers. I love getting the TE involved – and I think that Marcus Wright has some really good hands and can make an impact if he gets thrown too. As it is, he is used a lot as a blocker and decoy. I think that he has the potential to add to the history of really good TE’s NW has had, too bad he’s a junior and NW only gets him for one more year!

The Northwest D will have to clean up the penalties going into the playoffs. Granted it was against a rival and emotions run high, but the defense can’t have 13 penalties against UMD and expect to win. The officiating crew that did the MoWest game is the same crew that did the NSU game – if you remember there were a ton of penalties in that game as well. That tells me it has more to do with the officials than anything.  Needless to say, I don’t think that giving your opponent a free first down 8 times in a game is a good thing! I can’t say that I was upset to see Jerry’s Kid getting pummeled out there. The Dline did a great job and provided really good pressure. Spencer didn’t get a lot of yardage – what he did was primarily on the edge.

Holy Moly the Bearcats found a FG kicker in the Great Dane. For his second time in the role, he managed to win the MIAA Special Teams player of the week. I really don’t mind having three kickers at this time. At least their not missing extra points and puts the option of field goals back on the table.

This Weeks Game:

So this game cannot get here quick enough.  At this point, I just want to get Thanksgiving over so I’m that much closer to this game. Bye weeks are nice for the players to rest up, but as a fan I only get like 16 weeks of this a year – and sitting at home for one of them is not the best use of my time.  So I watched a bit of the Emporia St vs UMD game and looked at some stats – and I’m not too scared of the Bulldogs.

On offense – this game is going to come down to the offensive line. UMD doesn’t have the speed in their secondary to keep up with the fast WR’s, so they rely on getting after the QB to take out the pass game. UMD blitzes a lot – but they don’t really try to hide it all that well. If the Oline can give TA time and he can handle the pressure, I think TA can pick apart the UMD secondary – which isn’t the best in the world. UMD will be without their starting noseguard Buma Foncham who was ejected for throwing punches in the second half of the ESU game, by rule he will be out the first half of this game. From what I’ve seen from the UMD defense on tape, they look physical but not nearly as disciplined as they have been in the past. UMD’s offense is not built to play catch up – if NW can get up by two scores, I think you can turn the lights out on the Bulldogs. But like I said – this is going to come down to the OLine, if they can hold off the D pressure, I think NW can get some great gains in the passing game – which will open up the run game.

On defense – it comes down to the Dline being physical and the LB’s playing smart football. If everyone does their 1/11th, and just focuses on their assignment, I really don’t think that UMD will be able to hang with NW. It really is all about gap assignment – the Hornet defense was not that great, but when they followed thru with their assignment, the Bulldogs didn’t get much. But when somebody didn’t do their job, the Bulldogs exploited that. This will truly be a test for Rich Wright to get his players to do their job. If NW can funnel the run inside to Yost and Bevins with the LB corps doing their job, they aren’t going to get much. If they try to run to the outside, NW’s speed on defense is going to stop them. That forces them to go to the air – and Bulldog WR’s and freshman QB against the Bearcat secondary: my money is on the NW secondary every time (and twice on Saturday.)

Special Teams – it looks like the UMD punter does a rugby style punt, so that makes blocking them a bit tougher. UMD has also faked several punts and FG’s this year – I wouldn’t be surprised to see that happen again. I hope that NW can keep their All American punter on the sideline again this game. Looking forward to seeing if the Great Dane can follow up to his nice performance against MoWest.

Prediction: NW 45 UMD 27

Game 11: NW vs MW

Well it’s been a while since I’ve experience some good heckling. The Emporia State student section did a good job of remedying that. I particularly enjoyed the students jingling their keys in the first quarter when they were down 6-0. I don’t think that they necessarily understand what that gesture means. Or the drunk ESU fan who was trying to argue that Bearcats aren’t real – even his fellow students couldn’t convince him otherwise.  My favorite quote of the week has got to be “Sell more tickets” which was in response to one of the students heckling NW fans for being in ‘their’ section.  Which last time I checked the ESU stadium map, the only reserved section was Section B which was reserved for the Emporia Students – which was only partially full. That didn’t stop the Hornet security from trying to move NW fans out of the “Emporia fans section.” I even heard of one gentleman who tried to purchase a reserved seat but the manager of the box office refused to sell him one because he was a NW fan. Oh well, that is their prerogative.

Last Week’s Recap:

Well the Hornets are definitely improved over last year, but so is NW; and their improvement isn’t enough to go against a team with a good defense.

Offensively, NW pretty much did what ever they wanted to do. Their first drive they Emporia State defense was pushed from the NW 19 all the way to the ESU 2. NW obviously has no faith in their FG kicker, because I don’t think that there was ever a doubt in mind that NW was going go for the TD instead of the FG. And rightly so – as Trewyn hit the upright with his first extra point attempt – he ended up getting a pretty good ass chewing about that one. NW’s next series they ended up going 3-out – the only other time that happened was their final possession of the game. Trevor Adams had another great game – going 24-35 for 291 yards and 5 TD’s.  Bolles was tied with Billy Creason as the second leading rusher – 40 yards on 9 carries. I really hope that the NW coaches are doing these single play switches for some type of set up. I really think that Robert Burton in the backfield with Bolles as QB in those situations is much more dangerous for defenses to prepare for. Bobby Burton was again the teams leading rusher with the highest yards per carry – 4.9. The Offensive Line did a great job of opening up holes and giving the QB all the team that they needed. The WR’s, and Reuben Thomas in particular, need to remember to catch the ball, and THEN run.

Defense again was stifling. Honestly the majority of ESU’s yardage came on a handful of plays. Their first TD happened on something that I said NW had to watch out for – Brent Wilson’s escapeability. He somehow was able to sneak out of the pocket after it had surrounded him, and found a wide open WR. But NW adjusted and destroyed them the rest of the year. I really do like Brent Wilson though – I think that he has the potential to set a lot of records in the MIAA.

Special Teams: Punt blocks are awesome. But something needs to be done in the NW kicking game. But Ben Trewyn is not the answer we’ve been looking for. 5 missed extra points is not acceptable. Either let the Great Dane kick all of the extra points, and not worry about FG’s, or pull Alex “Easy Money” Easley’s redshirt. If NW loses a game because of a missed xtra point, that will not sit well with Bearcat Nation

Next Week's Preview:

Prediction: NW 45 MW 17

Game 10: NW vs ESU

I want start off by letting everyone know about a fundraiser for the NW baseball team. The fundraiser is to raise money to purchase some camo jerseys to honor the Armed Forces as well as honor the late Matt Mason – NW alumni, baseball player, and Navy Seal. For more information, please go to: http://bearcatsbaseballreport.blogspot.com/2013/11/camouflage-jersey-fundraiser-this.html

Great Googily Moogily the regional rankings are a mess. It is very possible that a 1 loss MIAA team will be missing the playoffs. There are a lot of Pitt St fans watching the scoreboards of other games to see if the right scenarios play out for them to make it into the PO’s.  PSU is right on the verge and they need a little help from other teams to make sure that they are in. They had a much better chance of making it before last week ends games – MoWest losing to Emporia St really hurt their Strength of Schedule.  As it stands right now, NW is almost guaranteed a place in the post season.  If NW wins out, they should be seeded #1 in Super Region 3 and that would mean a first round bye as well as home field advantage throughout the playoffs.

Last Week’s Recap:

 Wow – what an absolute great game by Trevor Adams. I think that this was probably his best game ever.  His QB efficiency rating was 217 – which is crazy good. Not only did he have a good efficiency rating, he looked good doing it. There have been other times this year where he had really good stats – but his throws weren’t necessarily great. That wasn’t the case this game. There was one throw that wasn’t quite on target, but it was still catchable and the receiver still caught it. Adams was definitely not affected by getting pulled on designed QB runs. I’m not sure why the coaches are doing that type of play calling – it seems to me that it is pretty obvious when the QB gets pulled for one play there is a 95% chance that it’s going to be a QB run.  But like I said, that obviously didn’t affect Trevor’s throwing.  There were only four balls that weren’t caught – and I don’t think that any of those were the fault of the passer.  This is the third week in a row that the WR’s had a case of the Reubens – what I mean by that is that the ball hits their hands and they still drop it. It’s getting better, but continues to need to improve. Both Billy Creason and Bobby Burton averaged over 5 yards per carry. Congrats to Billy Creason who proposed on the field to his girlfriend after the game. I really liked how the TE is getting involved more in the passing game. I really believe that Marcus Wright has the potential to be really good for NW. He’s done a good job blocking as well as catching the ball when it gets thrown his way. The Oline did a good job of giving TA all day to throw and opening up holes for the RB. There were a couple of times that they struggled against blitz’s which led to the QB getting sacked 4 times.

The defense did a great job again.  They only allowed 69 yards on the ground and 244 in the air. Honestly, they probably could have limited those passing yards even more. It seemed to me like the secondary was more worried about getting an interception than just breaking up the pass. Granted they did manage to get 5 interceptions. But when they didn’t get the interception then the receivers were able to get some yards after the catch. I didn’t realize that Mitch Buhler was soo elusive. He managed to slip out of the pocket and elude getting sacked multiple times – NW ended up with 15 QB hurries and only 2 sacks.

Special Teams was interesting this game. The Great Dane, Simon Mathieson, did a remarkable job kicking. I don’t know how much experience he’s had kicking an American football, but being from Denmark I would imagine that he’s played his fair share of soccer. He appears to have a very strong leg, he doesn’t take much of an approach on the ball but he gets it up quick and high. Kicking with the wind he got some very good distance on kickoffs – but kicking into the wind the ball got hung up there. This allowed some very good returns. Kickoff coverage needs to get better.

Next Week’s Preview:

When talking about the Hornets it sounds a lot like what we discussed last week in regards to their previous schedule. Up until last week, there schedule is the variable who’s who of who’s not a good team: Fort Hays, UNK, UCO, NSU, Lincoln, SW Baptist, Lindenwood, and then MoWest last week.  If it wasn’t for MoWest’s 6 turnovers – they probably would have won. MW snagged defeat out of the jaws of victory.

I really don’t think that NW is going  to struggle to put up points and yards. The Hornets D has given up over 400 yards of total offense 5 times this year, two of those were over 500 yards: MoWest and UCO.  I think that ESU’s secondary plays a lot like NW’s did last week. They get a lot of turnovers, but also give up a lot of yards. In fact, they are averaging giving up 248 yards per game.  They usually do a pretty good job of stopping the run, but against both UCO and MW they gave up over 200 yards rushing to go with the 300 yards passing. I really don’t think that Emporia has seen an offense that can put up as many yards and points that NW can. The greatest thing about this team, is that – it truly is a TEAM. There isn’t any one player that really stands out – therefore you can’t shutdown the offense by trying to key into one particular player. If you shut down one player, one of the others will just step up and take their place. This game, like most will come down to the line play – if the NW Oline can open up holes for Billy and Bobby to run thru like they did against WU, its going to be a good day to be a Bearcat.  If TA can repeat the performance that he put on against Washburn, I will be a happy camper.

Brent Wilson may be the best QB that NW has played against.  I really do think that ESU is very similar to SVSU. They have a very good QB and some very good WR’s. Wilson is currently averaging 69.8% and has an efficiency rating of 184.5 on the season. Unlike Jennings, Wilson has two very good WR’s to throw to: Ray Ray Davis and Austin Willis. Both are averaging over 100 yards per game and have a combined 22 TD catches between them.  The NW secondary is going to have their hands full with those two. But if the NW Dline plays like they did against Pitt St, that is definitely going to limit Wilson’s efficiency. Wilson is a scrambling QB – in fact he is the second leading rusher for the Hornets; so that is something that NW is going to have to factor into their coverage. I honestly don’t think that ESU has seen a defense nearly as good as NW’s.

I look forward to the Special Teams each week – but in big games  the Special Teams has always come up big. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a blocked punt or two – as well as I think its time for Enyard to return a KO for a TD.

In the end, I have no doubt that ESU has improved since last year, but I don’t think that they are that much better – and I think that NW is a much better team than they were last year. My prediction: NW 45 ESU 24

Game 9: NW vs WU

It is definitely beginning to be ‘football weather’ on Saturdays. The morning air was rather crisp – okay, it was downright freezy butt cold when the sun first came up and the wind started blowing. The parking lot Nazi’s were out in full force. They didn’t allow anyone into the bottom lot (the big one) until the very last parade participant had finished the parade – despite the fact that the lot was empty by 9:20 they didn’t let anyone in for at least an hour after that. It is like they are trying to ruin the game day atmosphere. I really don’t get it. There have been rumors about charging to park next year – not sure how they are going to manage that logistically. What would be nice is if they would sell parking locations – for example, I pay $100 and I am guaranteed my specific location to tailgate in. That way I don’t have to show up at 6am to get my spot, just to sit there until 4 hours before kickoff to start tailgating.

Last Week’s Recap:

Well, it wasn’t the most fun game to watch, but I will take a 36 point win any day of the week. As I was walking out of the stadium, I was walking by the visitors’ locker room entrance. There were some MoSo coaches standing there and one of their significant others came up to them and was consoling them for their loss. The coach’s response: “Well that’s Northwest for you, they kick people’s asses.” I couldn’t have said it better myself.

I’ve heard people complain about Bolles – going as far as saying he was terrible. That’s simply not true. He wasn’t great, but he wasn’t bad either. It seemed like the offense never really got into a rhythm. I think that there were several contributing factors to that. Brady was nervous – it was his first collegiate start and I think the boogy man kind of got to him a little bit. The WR’s dropped some balls that hit them on their hands. The coaches pulling Brady every time that there was a QB run. None of those things help a rhythm to get established. That being said, Brady still completed 65% of his throws, had over 9.6 yards per attempt, and had an efficiency rating of 152. Not too shabby for a sophomore in his first start. If you take out the three balls that the WR’s dropped after hitting their hands, it is even better. I don’t think anyone expected him to be perfect. In fact, most of us that have been wanting to see Bolles start have said that he needs the game experience to get better, to get these types of things out of the way. That’s why I wanted him to start in the FH, UNK, NSU, UCO stretch of games. I believe I was even quoted as saying that he’s young and is going to have some bad games and some WTF plays – but I would like to see those bad games and WTF plays happen against poor competition rather than against good teams. As one of my friends said – I would rather win by 40 against bad teams and beat good teams, than beat the bad teams by 70 and lose to good teams. Pretty much sums it up all right there. But enough about the QB for today – there are other fish to fry. The wide receivers have to stop dropping the ball! Thomas dropped two in a row – one that would have gone for a lot of yards after catch. And then later Utter dropped a nice jump ball – reminded me of a Blake to Jake fade away. NW went on to score that series so it wasn’t detrimental, but it sure would have been nice to see and may get the juices flowing on O. I wonder if Bobby Burton will ever unseat Billy Creason as the starting RB. I doubt it since Creason is the senior and NW is oh so very loyal to seniors, despite the fact that Burton consistently out gains Creason. Don’t get me wrong, Billy is the embodiment of NW football – dedication, good work ethic, etc. but he’s not the best back. But the two seem to be splitting carries pretty well and Burton’s number of carries has increased as the season has gone on. I imagine that would probably continue as he continues to shine. The coaches seem to always go to Phil Jackson on 3-1 or 4-1. He is definitely the power back, and I think as soon as he learns the offense better, he will be a force to be reckoned with in the MIAA.

I’m not sure I could sing any more praises of this NW defense than I have in the past weeks. The defense did pretty much what I thought that they would do, and the MoSo offense did what I thought they would do also. The Lions did manage to get 221 yards on the ground – but had zero, yes I said ZERO passing yards. They only to throw three times, one completion for 0 yards, 1 was batted down by the Dline, and the other should have been intercepted but wasn’t. Those 221 yards came on a total of 55 plays – which is like 4.0 yards per carry, but one long run of 41 yards really skew that stat. If you take out that one play, the D held them to 3.3 yards per carry on 54 plays. Not too shabby at all. And I will take the blame for that long run. That run happened right as I was walking onto the sidelines. I think that it was the leftover jinx from last year coming out. Needless to say, I don’t think that I will be going back onto the sideline this year – just to be safe. The Dline continues to impress – the tag team of Bevins and Yost is soo much fun to watch. It’s amazing how much having good Defensive Tackles affects the overall defense. They each command a double team otherwise it will result in a sack or a QBH, which leaves the DE’s the ability to harass the QB – which then messes up everything. NW has really been lacking at DT since Shayne Shade graduated. The LB’s are what we’ve come to expect – great. Gnader and Reimer continue to impress, and I’ve noticed that Matthewson has really come on the past couple of weeks – seems like he is involved in more and more key plays. I know that he was the closest thing to a starter that was on the field during the MoSo scoring drive. I think he was involved in almost every tackle that drive – including a horse-collar tackle – but if he hadn’t of gotten the runner, the guy probably would have taken it to the house; I will gladly take a 15 yard penalty vs. a score.

Special teams – they are a mixed bag. In every aspect except kicking field goals (and extra points too now) Special teams are kicking butt. But something needs to be done about the place kicker. Not sure what exactly that is, but missing back to back extra points cannot continue to happen.

Next Week's Preview

I have spent the past couple of days pouring over the stat sheets of Washburn since I haven’t actually seen them play this year. And what have I come up with… nothing. They are almost identical stat wise with Northwest. The difference is who they have played. Who have they played, you are probably asking yourself; the answer is nobody. So far this year there schedule looks like this: UNK, Hays, NSU, OCU, SWB, Lincoln, Fort Valley St, Lindenwood. Their closest games have come against UCO and Lindenwood where they beat both of those teams by only 9 points. So the stats are pretty meaningless – and without actually seeing them play, this is going to be like shooting into the darkness, but I’m going to do my best.

On offense I expect Adams to start – simply because it’s Senior Day. From what I understand, he is still pretty banged up and could risk more injury if he takes a big hit. So I wouldn’t be too surprised to see him take the first couple of snaps and then call it a day. I am hoping to see a much crisper Bolles in action than what we saw last week. I truly believe that the more meaningful experience that he gets the more potent this offense is going to be. There are a lot tendencies that QB’s have to learn about their WR’s, and vise versa. They only learn those things in game situations, practice definitely helps, but under the lights is a different animal. I would hope that the coaches don’t pull Bolles every time there is a designed QB run. That kills any kind of rhythm and makes it blatantly obvious what the play is going to be. I don’t mind seeing Bolles running some – but not 18 times a game like Arrowhead. The WR’s are going to have to step up their game and stop dropping so many balls that bounce off of their hands. There again, having a different QB who puts a lot more zip on the ball has probably affected them as well. This is going to be a true test for the NW OLine. The Washburn D has 19 sacks, second only to NW in the MIAA. And they are only allowing an average of 2.3 yards per carry – which sounds impressive, but remember who they have played. So if the OL can give the QB some time to throw the ball, and open up some holes for the RB’s to run threw, could be a lot of fun to watch this team come together.

On defense, I really don’t know what to expect. I do know that Vershon Moore will be making the trip to Maryville. You remember Verson – he was an All American RB who a few years ago a few weeks before fall camp started decided it would be a good idea to rob a bank. Well after spending two years in the clink he has served his time and Washburn was quick to let him back on to the team. Moore previously couldn’t leave the state of Kansas, but apparently has now gotten the okay to travel with the team. So far this year, Vershon has been a shell of himself – this is the guy who put up 99 yards in a little over one half before he got hurt the last time he played NW. Moore went out of the game last week do to a helmet to the ankle. So he probably won’t be at 100% on Saturday. The Ichabods leading receiver is their TE Tore Hurst. We all know how NW’s D has a history of being beaten by a good TE. If Hurst has a good day, it will be a long day for the Bearcats. DaJuan Beard joined the Icky’s last week after being out several weeks due to injury. If NW can shut down the WU run game and make them one dimensional – I don’t think QB Mitch Buhler is going to have much fun against NW’s secondary. Buhler has already been picked off 8 times this year.

I am looking for Special Teams to come up big again this week. Wouldn’t be surprised to see a blocked punt or two. Something I don’t want to see is another mixed extra point. I can understand missing FG’s, but no excuse for extra points!

With the exception of the past two years, Washburn has always been a very difficult game for NW. They always seem to match up very well against Bearcats. My head says that this game is going to be a 7-10 point spread game, but my gut says that WU isn’t that much better than they were last year. I’m going with my gut: NW 42 WU 17

Game 8: NW vs MoSo

What an absolutely beautiful day for a football game. It was a complete 180 degree different from the Fall Classic last year. And the parking lot Nazi’s seemed to not be as oppressive this year as they have in the past. Overall, I would say that this was probably the best experience that I’ve had at Arrowhead in the past couple of years. After last year I was glad to see the game coming to an end – the parking Nazi’s were absolutely terrible, but after this year – I would be happy to see the game extended. I would actually really like to see the game moved to Sporting Park; I think that that would be a great atmosphere to watch the game in 17,000 in a stadium that holds 18,000 looks much better than 17K in a stadium that holds 77K. But I understand that the allure for playing in an MLS stadium is not nearly what it is to play in an NFL stadium. This game brings a lot of exposure to both schools and is a great recruiting tool to both as well. I say as long as both schools want to continue the game and as long as it is profitable, I don’t see any reason to stop having the game there.

Last Week’s Recap:

If defense wins championships, I think NW has a good chance. That has got to be one of the best all-around performances by a defense that I’ve ever witnessed myself. I am not afraid to admit when I am wrong – and I was flat out wrong about this game. I thought both teams defense would struggle against very good offenses, when in fact it was the exact opposite – both teams offenses struggled against very good defenses. Pitts secondary was much better than I thought it was going to be, but NW did drop a lot of balls that could have been caught. So did Pitt for that matter.

TA was actually having a good game until he got hurt. I don’t know the severity of the injury – but hopefully it isn’t too bad. It looked like it was his shoulder that was in pain, and he was in a sling at the end of the game. Both TA and Bolles had some bad throws – throws that were thrown later that they should have been. My guess is that that is because of the defense. There was a much smaller window of opportunity in this game than there has been the past 4 weeks. As the season continues and into the PO’s, this is only going to continue. This is where Bolles has the advantage. He can throw the ball much quicker and puts a heck of a lot more zip on the ball than TA does. The late throws will go away as Bolles sees more significant playing time and gets more game reps against those good Defenses. It seemed to me that it took a couple of series for Bolles to settle down - I remember his brother usually took a series or two in the big games to do the same. I think that the play calling was very questionable at times. It was only during the third quarter that the play calling seemed similar to what we’ve seen the rest of the year. And the offense was getting good yards and points. And then once NW got the lead, the play calling went VERY conservative again. I seriously don’t understand all of the designed QB runs when you are already playing your ‘back up’ QB and you have a RB who is averaging 5.9 yards per carry. Just doesn’t make sense to me – especially the series where Bolles ran three times out of an empty backset. I really don’t understand why the coaches aren’t using the RB’s more than they are. But for that matter, I don’t understand why Creason is still the starting RB. I understand that he is a senior and has been super faithful to the program – but that doesn’t change the fact that he isn’t the best RB out there. Creason is really good if you have a big hole and need to get some yards. But he isn’t elusive at all and has no hips – can’t make the cuts necessary to make people miss. Now he can plow over some guys as he is a very powerful runner. But Burton is much more elusive and able to make the first guy miss and may be able to break the second tackle as well. Jackson seems to be a nice combination of the two; I was hoping to see him play more than just special teams. The Bearcat WR’s seemed to struggle in this game. Obviously part of that was due to the Gorilla defense, but they still had a lot of balls that they dropped that hit their hands. They also had a hard time getting away from the defender – like I said, that could be due to the Pitt St secondary. The OLine did a great job. They gave the QB a really good amount of time, as the QB was only sacked once and only ‘hurried’ 3 times. They did have some difficulties opening up holes for the runners, but they still managed to get NW 172 yards rushing.

Defense: one word – amazing, awesome, tremendous, prodigious. You take your pick. Here is a fact for you: in the past 23 quarters of football, the Bearcat defense has only given up 8 touchdowns. And boy was I wrong last week! Last week my comment about John Brown: “I don’t think that they are going to shut him down by any means, but I think that they will be able to limit him.” If 3 catches for a total of 17 yards and no TD’s isn’t shutting him down, I don’t know what is. Much of the success of the defense comes from the trenches. Yost and Bevins have become quite the fierce duo that the NW D has been missing for a while. Bevins requires a double team, which leaves Yost man on man – which he is going to win most of the time. Those two in the center allows the DE’s to be able to bring tremendous amounts of pressure on the QB. The linebackers were outstanding as normal – Eric Reimer continues to impress and I would say that he was easily the best LB on the field on Saturday, which is really saying something considering the LB’s on both teams! Secondary – great. Other than two brain farts on coverage – which a team like Pitt St is going to make you pay for – the cornerbacks and safeties did an amazing job. One thing I did notice was that John Brown does a great job of blocking downfield – there were times that he stopped Brandon Dixon from going and making the stop, which is quite the feat!

Special Teams – Great Job! I said that Special Teams usually play a big role in these games, and I wasn’t wrong. The Bearcats managed to block one punt and almost blocked several more. Kyle Goodburn did a great job punting – he pinned the Gorillas inside the 20 on four of his five punts. Ben Trewyn does a good job on kickoffs but has got to improve his field goals. His kicks take a long time to get in the air, which has allowed a lot of them to get blocked or at least tipped.

This Weeks Game:

This game has the potential to be a trap game for Northwest. After an emotional win against Pitt St last week, and looking forward to the upcoming weeks – Missouri Southern could be seen as an inferior team. I don’t think that the coaches or seniors on the team will allow that to happen though. Add in the fact that it is Homecoming, I think that will probably help to increase the teams focus.

The Missouri Southern Lions have improved from last year. But I don’t think that they have improved so much as to threaten NW too much. That being said – you can’t take anyone for granted in the MIAA. In almost every statistical category, the Lions are in the high middle / low top area within the MIAA. That usually means a pretty good all-around team. MSSU runs a triple option offense, so their rushing yards are off the charts: averaging 362.7 yards per game (6.3 yards per attempt.) Keep in mind that out of the 6 MIAA teams they have played five of them are in the absolute bottom of the conference in defending the rush: UCM, SWB, UCO, NSU, and LU. The only other team in the MIAA they’ve played is MoWest and for some reason the Lions always put a beating on MoWest. I’m really not to concerned with the Bearcats ability to defend the triple option. They did well last year, and this year’s defense is even better. They do have a better throwing QB – but that really isn’t saying much. They’ve only thrown the ball 73 times this year and have been picked off 3 times, including twice last week against MoWest. I have a feeling that NW will be able to play man on man against their receivers which will leave the LB’s and probably a safety to come in with run support. Last year Wrights defensive game plan against the triple option was to eliminate the pass threat and force the run – without giving up a big run. Basically make the teams consistently get 3-4 yards per play. Which ended up getting the teams a lot of yards, but they weren’t consistent enough to have those drives end in scores. My guess is that not much is going to change. I wouldn’t be surprise to see MoSo get more yards than we would like, but not have the points to go along with those yards.

I am really looking forward to seeing what Northwest does on offense. This will be Brady’s first game starting – which means it will be the first game that will have been game planned specifically for Brady’s talents. I think that will probably open up the playbook a little bit more, as I believe Bolles is a more versatile QB. That being said, with the starting QB injured, I am hoping that the amount of designed QB runs greatly diminishes. While I believe that Zimmerman is probably a good QB, I don’t want to have to rely on him at this point and time. NW has a full stable of RB’s that I would like to see play a lot. I am also sure that the WR’s are anxious to redeem themselves after last week. There were way to many drops, and I can guarantee you that Coach Osborn has been working with them a lot this week. With MSSU’s style of offense, they like to eat clock and keep their opponents offense off of the field as much as possible. But if NW’s offense is capable of scoring quickly when they have the ball, I don’t really see an issue in this. Also being a home game, there are more bodies to substitute in, so fatigue shouldn’t be a factor either.

Special teams will probably be fun to watch again this week – as they have been all along. I am really waiting to see Enyard or Fulks break off a KO return, that would be nice to see this game.

Overall, I think this will be a fun one to watch. Hopefully there are some butts in the seats. The Student Section has been absolutely terrible all year, and I don’t see it getting much better. I see Brady leading the team to a massive victory 52 – 24.

#freeBolles

Game 7: NW vs PSU

So Saturday was a beautiful day for a football game. A little chilly in the morning, but by gametime it ended up being absolutely gorgeous.  I thought that the patriotic theme was very cool. In fact, I thought that the patriot decal on the helmet looked even better this year with the faux paw logo than it did last year with the classic paw. I also liked the giant flag during the National Anthem – however, the fact that the flag was lying on the ground prior to it being unfolded was an absolute disgrace and violation of the US Flag Code. I know myself and many of the veterans around me were visibly upset with that.

Last Week’s Recap:

Northwest won. By a lot. And UCO lost – by a lot. It has been a very long time since I have seen a defense as bad as UCO’s was. It was so bad, that TA was actually checking down a couple of times – it’s been a while since we’ve seen that. Adams actually had a really really good game. It was the type of game I truly hope that TA would have every game. The Bearcats put up video game type stats – 323 yards rushing , and 364 yards passing.  NW averaged 7 yards per rush, and had two RBs (Burton & Jackson) each averaged over 10 yards per carry. Four different receivers had 48 yards or more of receiving. I think that is what makes this offense so special – it truly is a team. There isn’t any individual star: no Omon, Council, Soy, Simmons or Shaw. But the whole is definitely greater than the sum of its parts.

As far as the defense goes: Bravo. Coming into this game, UCO was averaging 494 yards of offense per game, and NW held them to 297: almost 200 less than normal. NW held the Broncos to only 2.1 yards per carry. 229 of those yards came in the passing game, over half of those yards came on 3 plays. The first of those big plays happened when Brandon Dixon was tripped up by that terrible turf monster – yet still managed to make the tackle.  I was very impressed with their Redshirt Freshman QB – considering his offensive line gave him absolutely no time what so ever. They also had a couple of good wide receivers. They are definitely getting better on that side of the ball.

This Week’s Game

I am actually worried about this match up. Not because I think Pitt is a superior team – in fact just the opposite. I’m worried about this game, because I’m not worried about this game. And whenever that happens, it is always a much closer game than I had expected. Overall, I’m not that impressed with this Pitt St team. They do have some really really good players (John Brown) on the team, but overall – they don’t scare me. Statistically they compare almost identical to Northwest. But to me the biggest difference is that while NW didn’t play their starters after the first half of the last four games, Pitt St left their starters in well into the 3rd and even 4th quarters. That doesn’t quite make it comparable. They also struggled early on with Lincoln and Southwest Baptist. So my gut says not to worry about Pitt St. But my head says that Pitt St is a rival, and they always play NW tough, despite how they’ve played others; and vice versa.

As with most battles, the war is won or lost in the trenches. This will probably be the biggest test for NW’s offensive line to date. If the Oline is able to get a good push and open some holes for the runners and give the QB some time, I really like NW’s chances to win the game. But ultimately I think this game will come down to QB play. Which TA will show up? The one from the past couple of weeks, or the one from the past two UCM games and MSU game? If the TA that likes to play catch with the defense shows up, I don’t know if Bolles would be able to pull NW out of the hole again. As a Bearcat fan, I truly hope that the really good TA shows up, I just have very little faith that that will happen. This game usually comes down to a single score, and NW cannot afford to turn the ball over. That goes out to TA, but it also goes to the rest of the team. Pitts secondary has been suspect at times – so there is the possibility of some big plays deep. Pitt does have some very good LB’s. In addition to Nate Dreiling, Tyler Disney has become a yin to his yang. As far as Pitts rush D – I really can’t say since I haven’t watched them play myself. Statistically they have definitely held some teams in check – but others not so much. And those teams that they’ve held, are not known for their running game. Against UCO they gave up 237 yards, NW gave up 68. The other two like opponents (NSU and UCM) the stats were pretty much identical.

On defense, those boys are going to have their hands full. The Dline is a little dinged up – Meinert hurt his shoulder I think (imagine that, Meinert hurt – shocking I know) and Bevins sprained his ankle. But I don’t think that either will sit out this game. This is going to be a big game for the DE’s. NW has struggled at time containing the run on the edge. If NW is able to seal the edge, that will definitely help out the rest of the defense. Pitts main runner is Jeff Seybold – he is averaging 6.7 ypc and has 11 rushing TD’s this year. Their QB, Anthony Abenoja is not the dual threat runner like past Pitt QB’s. That said, he is still their second leading rusher. Pitts biggest and scariest weapon is John Brown. We all know what Brown can do. He is one of the most talented WR’s I’ve ever personally seen in D2. But, NW has Brandon Dixon – who is probably the best CB I’ve ever personally seen in D2 – other than maybe Brandon Carr. But Dixon vs Brown, Brown may still have an edge – but when you add in NW’s safeties of Manning and particularly Enyard: I like NW’s chances of limiting Brown. I don’t think that they are going to shut him down by any means, but I think that they will be able to limit him. But Brown isn’t Pitts only WR – they also have a couple of other talented WR’s, namely Gavin Lutman.

These games usually come down to Special Teams. NW has had some very good special teams play so far this year – blocked punts, blocked field goals, blocked extra points etc. NW has also had some blocked kicks of their own. NW’s kicker seems to have a very strong leg, but he doesn’t get the ball up in the air very quick – which allows it to get blocked from time to time. NW has also given up some big returns, and kicking off to John Brown is always a dangerous feat. If NW Special Teams continue to be as much of a weapon as they have been this season – I think the advantage has to go to NW.

Overall – I think that this is going to be a really fun game to watch. The weather appears to be perfect and neither team is too banged up that I know of. My guess is that this will be a close game, with NW coming out on top: NW 45 Pitt 35


#freeBolles

Game 6: NW vs UCO

For some reason, I thought that Tahlequah was farther than it is. We didn’t rush or even take the fastest route, but still managed to get to the Quah from my house on the north side of KC in like 4.5 hours. I also didn’t realize that Bentonville Arkansas was as far west as it is, it is directly south of Joplin. Obviously the cities of Bentonville and Rogers revolve around Wally World. They had so many hotels and eateries you would think that they were a major tourist destination – nope just a destination for every business pitchman at some point and time. For two weeks in a row now – the weather has been nasty before the game – but greatly improved during the game. After a 50 minute weather delay, the game finally started and the sun came out. I ended up taking off all the rain gear and sweatshirt – and watched the game in a Tshirt and wishing I had my sunglasses. Not too bad of a day! The NSU student section was the best student section I’ve seen in a long time. There wasn’t a whole lot of them, but those that were there were loud and rowdy!

Last Week’s Recap

We won. Handily. Not sure what else I can say about that. I’m just going to look at the first quarter. That is the only time that NW had their first units in. After the first quarter NW had a time of possession of 5:34, 14 points, 130 total yards (60 yards rushing 70 yards passing) on 13 plays – average of 10 yards per play. NSU had TOP of 9:26, 0 points, 31 total yards (12 yards rushing, 19 yards passing) on 18 plays – average of 1.7 yards per play. That pretty much says it all right there.

Here are some other random observations from the game: Haden Bryant is going to be fun to watch in the coming years. When Phil Jackson has some form of blocking from the OLine, he is a dangerous RB. NW’s 3rd or 4th string CB (Jack Young) needs to learn to turn around – he would have had an easy pick on one, and should have had multiple Pass Interference calls in the fourth quarter! Brian Dixon does a great Cha Cha – even if the refs don’t like it. The sightlines at Doc Wadley Stadium are very nice – but I think that there is even less sideline space at NSU than there is in Mankato. Cell service at the stadium sucked – three blocks away it was great but in the stadium not so much. There are a crazy amount of resorts along the Illinois river.

This Week’s Game:

If Brady Bolles doesn’t start (and I’m not holding my breath) it will be a huge mistake by the coaching staff. These past three games and the game this week would have been a great opportunity to give Brady the reps with the starters. I’m sorry but one series in the first half with the starters does not equate to quality time. When TA falters again – and don’t fool yourself, he will – Brady will be there to pick up the pieces. Hopefully he will be able to pull the team out of the hole that Adams has put them in. When NW starts playing some good competition, we will see TA fold like always. And it will have made sense for the coaches to use this time to prime Brady instead of letting TA look like a stud against crap teams. It really is quite sickening. It is my prediction that NW will not win a CC or NC with TA as the play caller. It’s obvious that he’s not the best QB on the team – and it sends a dangerous message to the rest of the team. The team deserves the best chance to win – and you can’t tell me that the best chance to win is with TA. And TA will look good again this week – because UCO is a typical LSC style team: really good offense with no defense. The Broncos are dead last in the MIAA in almost every defensive category. In fact they rank 159/162 teams in total defense – giving up 537 yards per game. On the flip side, they are averaging almost 494 yards of total offense. They are the Tony Romo’s of D2. Offensively NW should roll right over UCO.

Defensively – this should be a fun game to watch. The Broncos definitely have the potential to get yards and score some points. The Broncos are led by signal caller Adrian Nelson who is completing about 59% of his throws – averaging 276 yards per game. The vast majority of those balls are caught by Marquez Clark – so we all know that Brandon Dixon will be put on him, and I’m guessing that he will severely limit his production. Clark is also their kick returner. The Broncos most dangerous threat is their star RB Joshua Birmingham. Birmingham is averaging over 110 yards per game rushing not to mention he is their second leading receiver. NW’s defense has been very salty at times stopping the run (UNK) and given up some more than they should at times. I think that this game would be a good opportunity for NW to keep their starting defense in much longer than they have the past three games. This will help provide game day conditioning for the rest of the season when the 1’s stay on the field much longer than they have been.

Overall, I don’t think that UCO has the talent to keep up with NW. NW wins this game before half and UCO scores some points in the second half to make the score look better than it actually was. NW 56 UCO 28

#freeBolles

Game 5: NW vs NSU

What a crazy week in the MIAA. Missouri Southern lost to Southwest Baptist, and other teams didn’t do as well as they should have: going into the lockerroom at half MoWest only held a 7 point lead over Ft Hays, Pitt St only scored 7 points against Lincoln in the first quarter – and until :24 before half the Gorillas were only up 21-10, and Washburn struggled with UCO ending up beating them only 28-19. The biggest news to come out the MIAA this week was the announcement that beginning in 2014 Southwest Baptist and Lincoln will no longer be competing in the MIAA in football. This will leave 12 football schools in the MIAA – meaning that there will be a complete round robin: thus being able to crown a true conference champion. This is kind of bitter sweet in my opinion. A true conference champion can be named, but at the same time – this doesn’t allow for any nonconference games. You may ask, “So what? What does that matter?” Why that matters is the playoffs and the Regional Rankings. When your conference plays everyone and no one else, your Strength of Schedule (which is figured by your opponents winning percentage, and your opponents opponents winning percentage) is .500 – which is not good. How that  comes into play is regional rankings. Regional Rankings are based on your winning percentage and your Strength of Schedule. So what, you say – win the conference and you will make the PO’s. Well I don’t know about you – but I like having a bye week, or having home games, or hosting SemiFinal games. These are all much less likely by having such a low SOS. How bad is an SOS of .500? Well, last year that would have tied for 94th place. But hey – we don’t have to play the Blue Tigers or purple Bearcats anymore.

Last Week’s Recap:

I am not afraid to admit when I am wrong. And I was completely wrong about UNK. I really thought that the Lopers were going to be able to get a lot of yards, but not necessarily a lot of points. Boy was I wrong. NW was able to hold the Antelopes to a total of 124 yards of total offense. The last time that NW held a team to that few yards was Truman in 2009 (NW won that game 70-0, Truman had 92 yards.) The defense did an amazing job of containing Marsh. In fact, I would say that that was the best performance by the Dline all year. The combination of Bevins and Yost at DT – that is something fun to watch. I would say that NW is 1 defensive end away from having an elite Dline. That DE may very well already be on the team and just needs to step it up a notch. I’ve seen flashes by several of the DE’s on the team – if they can make that step up – WOW is all that I can say. The secondary of course is great again this game – special props to Manning and Enyard – they just continue to impress. And the LB’s are looking better every week. This D is starting to look really really good – like what some of us envisioned it to look like.  They have only allowed 3 touchdowns in the last 11 quarters of football.

The offense rocked again. No surprise there – UNK’s D is not very good. If this game proved anything – it was that TA and Bolles do NOT have different skill sets. One is just better than the other, and one is a Senior and the other is a Sophmore. There was absolutely no difference in call playing depending on who was playing. The only difference was that the receivers didn’t have to wait for the ball to get to them. That would be the only knock on Brady – he throws too hard at times. But that is a good problem to have.  A WR worth their salt should be able to catch the ball – and those that aren’t WR’s won’t: like the Loper LB that jumped the route and almost had an interception. I’m pretty sure that the only reason why he didn’t catch the ball was that it was thrown too hard and he wasn’t able to hold on to it.  I thought that the WR’s did a great job, and Coach Osborne has done a great job of stressing the role of blocking downfield. What I wasn’t really fond of, was the fact that two of the top three rushers were QB’s. NW has a ton of RB’s and the QB’s are being asked to run and run – even when the game is well in hand. It is almost like AD is tempting fate to injure one of the QB’s – so he doesn’t have to make a final decision about who should be the QB. But getting back to the RB’s – we’ve got a lot of them. Let’s use them! Bobby Burton and Phil Jackson are each averaging 5.8 yards per carry. That’s pretty darn good.

Overall, the problem with a game like this is that you don’t really know what you’ve accomplished. It’s easy to think that you are really good, but in fact, you really haven’t played anyone. You lull yourself into a false sense of security. And with Fort Hays last week, UNK this week and NSU and UCO in the coming weeks, it will be important for the coaching staff to keep that mentality from setting in!

This Week’s Game:

I don’t really know what to say about this game. I honestly am not that excited for the game. Kind of hard to get excited about a team that lost their starting QB in the first game and scoring an average of less than 12 points per game and giving up over 38 ppg. But one thing I’ve learned is that if you overlook anyone, they can come up and bite you in the buttocks. Just ask MoSo about the purple Bearcats! The Riverhawks are lead on the  ground by their RB Joel Rockmore. Rockmore is currently averaging 6 yards per carry and 122 yards per game.  Thor Long (QB) go to target is Terrance Dixon. But he isn’t his only target, they definitely spread the ball around and there really isn’t one main guy. In fact, Dixon is their leading receiver, but he’s only caught 10 balls this year.

I know that this is short and sweet, but I think NW is going to have fun. I forsee one thing for the Riverhawks: PAIN. The Bearcats are definitely going to rain on their Homecoming parade.  Last year NW beat them 66-6. I don’t see a whole lot different happening this year. How much NW wins by depends on what the coaches want to do in the second half. If the last two weeks is much of an indication, the starters won’t play much if at all in the second half. Overall, NW wins this one easily. NW 70 NSU 0

#freeBolles

Game 4: NW vs UNK

 I think that the drive to and from western Kansas drained me of any gumption to write this report.  I want to start out this report by talking about sportsmanship. My nephew plays football at a small school in Minnesota, and they are having a pretty good season, this was posted by one of the parents of the opposing team on Facebook after my nephew’s team beat them 49-21: "Was anyone else besides me impressed by Royalton's sportsmanship last night? They put us through the ringer, and there was hardly any celebration when they got touchdowns, interceptions or hard hits. And when one of our guys went down, they immediately got together quietly, took a knee, and faced the man down. Hats off to them and their coaching staff." This is something that we see a lot at NW and frankly we’ve become rather used to seeing it. There isn’t a lot of ‘hot doggin’ or excessive celebration going on. They act like they’ve been there before and done that. There are other teams in the conference that aren’t so sportsmanlike – to see them celebrate when they get a TD you would think they just won the Super Bowl. My hat goes off to all the players and the coaches and staff that instill those values in the players.
If you’ve never been to Hays stadium, I would recommend it. It is actually a nice small stadium. They were having their tailgate extravaganza in the lot next to the stadium, which provided a very nice game day experience. The worst part about the experience, is getting to Hays Kansas. From Kansas City, it was only like 3:30-4 hours, but it felt like approximately 16 hours each direction. The drive back was a little better, just because it was dark and you couldn’t see the fact that there wasn’t anything to look at. The most impressive thing about the entire trip was the giant wind farm that stretched on and on. Kinda sad. It was a long and boring trip, but I was glad to get to scratch Lewis Field Stadium off my list of unseen MIAA stadiums.

Last Week’s Recap:
      
That was perhaps the worst officiated football game I have ever seen. I am pretty sure it was the white hat’s first game, as he did not seem comfortable out there in his role. He never once came over and talked to AD about any of the calls made or not made. The refs apparently forgot that they have whistles, and are supposed to blow them. On multiple plays a whistle was never blown, in fact I am still waiting for the whistle on the last play of the game. Their complete lack of knowledge on some calls and missed calls was staggering – the ones that stand out to me were when Jared Fox was blocked into a punted ball on the ground, and when the Hays QB intentionally grounded the ball to avoid a sack by throwing the ball out of bounds but it didn’t cross the line of scrimmage. These aren’t obscure rules – yet somehow these officials didn’t know them or worse they knew them and chose to not enforce them.
       
As far as the actual playing of the game goes – what a snoozefest. It was exactly what I expected – Fort Hays was really bad, and NW really did pretty much anything that they wanted to do (in the first half.) The second half was a different story, but that was because the vast majority of the starters never saw the field.  The players that were playing it was completely different personnel packages than normal, and players were playing out of position. Not to mention that the play calling was kind of weird – it was like they were just throwing stuff against the wall and seeing if anything would stick. Which I guess is okay in those circumstances. But we did get to see some fresh faces that we haven’t seen before. Phil Jackson saw his first action – gaining 40 yards on 5 carries – not too shaby. We also got to see the premier of Haden Bryant – the walkon freshman WR. He only had 1 reception for -2 yards – but that was on one of the many Jet Sweeps that have yet to work this year. One player I did want to mention was Clint Utter – he had some nice catches, but the thing that really caught my eye was his down field blocking. He had some great blocks this game and its not something WR’s get recognized for, but it’s a vital part of the game. My biggest concern for the NW offense, is who was the starting QB. I am kind of amazed the AD stuck with TA despite his poor performance in 2 out of the last 3 games coming into this game – and Bolles great performance getting NW out of the hole TA dug. Bolles is obviously the future of NW, but apparently not the present. Sad but I think that this sets a very dangerous precedent. What motivation do players have to get better and be the best at their position, when the coach is just going to start the more senior player anyways?  #freeBolles

As far as the defense goes – what can you say about a team that only gave up 14 points? About the only thing that I can complain about it the DL play. So far this season the D only has 4 sacks and 8 QB hurries. That needs to improve. Zach Williams going down at DT isn’t going to help – although I suspect that will cause Bevins to get moved to DT. Which I think that he should be playing there anyway – not fast enough to be a DE but a big strong guy. Don’t think he will start now, but I could see him in the future.  The Tigers were able to move the chains on the ground, as they were averaging 5.6 yards per carry. In fact on the season, NW is averaging giving up 4.1 yards per carry – and NW hasn’t faced any really good running teams, but mobile QB’s have given NW fits: which isn’t a good thing when facing Bronson Marsh this week. But overall, the NW D did a decent job – hard to get too excited when you beat the opponent by 35! I do want to give a shout out to Eric Reimer – he is quickly becoming an LB to be reckoned with! The D will definitely need to work on tackling this week. There were a lot of missed tackled because they failed to wrap up. You can bet they will work on that!

This Week’s Game:

 UNK is not a terrible team. They are a much better team than Fort Hays and they are getting better every week and much better than they were last year. I think that UNK is going to be a really good program one day, they aren’t there yet, but on their way. They have shown a dedication to their athletic department the past few years, and earlier this year they announced an $11.6 million donation to their athletic department which will go a long ways in endowing scholarships and improving facilities.

Right now, UNK is a dangerous team. They have nothing to lose, and a lot gain. If the Bearcats aren’t ready this game could be close. The thing with UNK is that you don’t really know what you are going to get. In their first three games, they’ve been everything from conservative to very aggressive on both sides of the ball. In their first two games, they hardly blitzed at all, but last week they blitzed almost every down against MoWest. Their secondary doesn’t scare me at all as they only have 2 interceptions this year, and are averaging giving up 308 yards per game. TA and/or Bolles could have a field day. Rushing they are giving up an average of 193 yards per game (4.3 yards per carry.) They are giving up 41 points per game. This will be a good test for the Oline, as I’m sure that they are going to be getting a lot of pressure. But if they can open some holes and give the QB some time to find the receiver – the offense should be able to pick apart the Loper defense.

Offensively, UNK scares me a little bit. Like I said previously – they are a dangerous team, in that you don’t know what they are going to do. They are an option team. Last year, NW was susceptible to giving up a lot of yards to option teams – not a lot of points, but definitely a lot of yards. And the UNK offensive line is very good. They have only given up 3 sacks this year. NW Dline is going to have their hands full – this may be the best Oline that they’ve faced this year, that is something considering SVSU’s Oline. The key to the Loper offense is their QB: Bronson Marsh. Marsh is a good QB – he spent two years at Nebraska before transferring. In highschool he set the Nebraska passing career record – breaking Scott Frost’s record. So he can obviously pass the ball, but he can run too. Against MoWest last week, Marsh threw for 241 yards and ran for 194 as well. He could give the defense a work out. I would not be surprised to see NW give up a lot of yards this week. It will be interesting to see what kind of game plan Rich Wright puts together to minimize Marsh.

UNK has been outscored 79-19 in the first half this year. I can see that happening again this week, with NW jumping out to a lead and the Lopers playing catch up. In the end, they don’t get close: NW 48 UNK 28.

Game 3: NW vs FH

So what a beautiful day for a tailgate this game day was. And our group definitely had quite the feast – we did our “Back to Bama” tailgate – with a southern inspired menu: Alabama chicken, smoked brisket, bread pudding, fried pickles and onion rings, beans, mac-n-cheese, lemon and key lime bars, etc etc. You get the drift. My mouth is watering just thinking about it. I brought a friend with to experience game day in Maryville. He was a D2 virgin – he had never been exposed to really any kind of tailgating. I think that we showed him a pretty good time. We got to Maryville pretty early in the day, the stadium was still open, and we were able to get in and walk around the track and check out the stadium. Needless to say, he was amazed that we would be able to walk on the field on gameday. At the end of the day – I think that there is a new D2 fan today.

Last Week’s Recap:

I think that my friend summed it up best after the first 12:30 minutes of the game – this is not good, do they always look this bad? I had to be honest and say, well not usually against other teams – but UCM always plays NW tough. And historically NW has not played extremely well against the Mules. I think a lot of that comes from the coaches. UCM seems to be in Coach Dorrel’s head – like he always overthinks his game plan. This year was no different. That first quarter was some pretty bad playcalling. The only thing worse than the playcalling, was Adams execution of the called plays. This was not a surprise to me or anyone else who has a basic understanding of the game of football. Adams always struggles with teams with good defenses. Against teams with poor average or poor defenses, and in practice – he looks awesome. This has been his MO over his career. From all accounts, he is a great kid – and smart too. And he has the respect of his teammates. But last week’s game proves he is not the best QB on the team. Without a doubt, TA is easily the best backup QB in the MIAA, if not all of D2. But as far as being ‘the man’ – that should not be his role. The only reason that Bolles would not start is if AD is too stubborn to admit that he is wrong.  But I don’t think that AD has to make that decision anymore – I think it has already been made for him. Bolles is young, so he will have some bone-head plays – like he did this week. Holding on to the ball too long and taking the sack rather than throwing it away. Like the old adage goes – good decisions come from experience, experience comes from bad decisions. UCM had a good game plan against NW – put 6 in the box, drop 2 safeties to cover the deep ball. Problem is, that is what UCM always does against NW, and it still works. The RB’s weren’t as impressive this week – but that’s because they were going against a much better D – yet the RB’s still managed to average over 5 ypc combined (Creason 6.6 on 10 carries RB3 3.8 on 11 carries.) NW was pretty darn balanced – 182 yards on the ground, and 196 in the air. The WR’s continue to impress. UCM’s secondary was covering pretty good, and the receivers made some great catches. Utter just picked up where he left off last week. He some really nice grabs, and did some excellent blocking down field on a couple of plays. I would still really like to see the TE’s get more involved – although on Korey Jackson’s TD pass, it was in the formation that the TE usually gets the ball, which is what sucked in the CB and safety to cover the TE, but left Korey open. I think as the offense gets more opened up with Bolles as QB, we will start seeing more of those plays. I thought that the OL played pretty good too – especially in the 4th quarter. They were really able to open up some nice holes as the game went on.

On defense, NW did a pretty darn good job IMO. Central isn’t going to beat you on the ground, as NW kept them to only 56 yards rushing. Their bread and butter is thru the air. This weeks game was no exception. I said that they were going to dink and dunk – and they did. Hawk managed to get 304 yards in the air. Nothing real deep, they were all primarily in the short area. The D was able to not allow UCM to really have many good drives. Of their 4 scoring drives, the first was a short field and they managed to keep them out of the endzone on 6 attempts within the 10 yard. They were only able to put together one really good drive – for their last score. Their first TD wasn’t bad – but they only had to go 57 yards, and their only other score was on that 55 yard scamper after the catch. It’s amazing how just a couple of injuries in key spots can really effect the overall product. I thought the secondary did a good job, but I think that they could have done a lot better if Brian Dixon had been out on the field. Hopefully he will get better soon. The D line wasn’t able to get the pressure that they were the week before – which kind of surprised me. Not sure what UCM was able to do, but I hope that the other teams don’t figure it out, or NW figures out how to overcome that.

This Weeks Game:

Here is what I would like to see at Lewis Field stadium on Saturday: Blake Bolles in his first collegiate start. There is absolutely no reason why Bolles should not start. The only reason to have a 2 QB system is if the two have two different skill sets. That isn’t the case here. There isn’t anything that TA does that Bolles doesn’t do, and do it better. Bolles is definitely the future of the team, he should also be the present – as the future starts now.  Yeah, I get the fact that TA is a captain and a leader – well good leaders know when to step back and put the team first. The best example of this is Jordan Simmons: he actively recruited JF3 to come to NW after UNO folded, despite knowing that it would cut down on his number of carries – he knew that it would be best for the team. Not that this is TA’s decision at all – in fact I wouldn’t be surprised if TA would put Bolles in ahead of himself if it was decision, according to all the great reports of what a leader he is. What I am saying is that this is really a simple decision for AD to make – because its already been made on the field. And because TA is such a great leader, AD shouldn’t worry about stepping on seniority or hurting anybody’s feelings by putting in Bolles. In fact, you could argue that it sets a dangerous precedent if he doesn’t. What incentive do any player have to be the best, if the coaches are just going to play the guy with the most seniority?! It seems like the majority of positions are very competitive for the starting spot, but some spots – not so much. But anyway, I digress. Let’s get back to the game at hand. Fort Hays is bad. Like really bad. So NW should put up video game type of stats.  That being said – strange things happen on the drive to Western Kansas. And weird things happen in Fort Hays. The Tigers have a history of playing NW better than they should. And Hays is always tougher at home. Those things combine for interesting games. By all accounts, the WR’s should have a Hay Day – as the Tigers are averaging giving up over 315 passing yards per game. The RB’s should do good as well, as Ft Hays D is giving up almost 240 yards per game on the ground. I would really like to see Phil Jackson on the field at some point. From everything that I’ve heard, he is a beast – but I don’t know if he even will make the travel team, probably not. I think that this game is definitely an opportunity game. Depending on some of the decisions that the coaches make, it could set things in motion for 2013 to be a really good year for the Bearcats.

When the Tigers have the ball, the NW D should have a field day. So far this year, Ft Hays has rushed for a total of 134 yards. I don’t see them rapidly increasing those numbers this week. They have done a pretty good job of protecting their QB, as he’s only been sacked once in two games. Hopefully NW’s Dline can change that number. So if NW can shut down their run game (which doesn’t sound too difficult) and force them to the air, I think that NW’s secondary is going to have fun. Hays QB, Treveon Albert, is currently 30/60 for 380 yards, and he’s been picked off 6 times. They are definitely going to be having fun out there!

Basically, I believe that the Bearcats are going to have a Hay Day in Ft Hays. NW 56 Fort Hays 6

#FreeBolles