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Monday, January 4, 2016.
Sometimes Boise State makes it interesting in the first half, sometimes in the second half. But the Broncos always make it interesting. And so it was in BSU’s 84-80 win over Colorado State to open Mountain West play Saturday night. The Broncos were reminiscent of the team that beat Oregon three weeks earlier, this time watching a 14-point lead at halftime evaporate down to two points five different times down the stretch. This team is pretty darn good when it plays 40 minutes. “When” is the operative word here. Still, Boise State got it done—you can’t underestimate the importance to the Broncos of holding serve on their home court in the conference opener, especially after they started the league schedule 0-3 last year. One of those losses was in Taco Bell Arena to Utah State, Boise State’s opponent Wednesday night in Logan.
Colorado State coach Larry Eustachy credited Boise State’s experience with surviving the storm Saturday night. “They’ve all been there before,” said Eustachy of the Broncos. “And we’re sending out guys trying to do things they haven’t done before, so we’re going to have a big learning curve.” No one personified that more than senior guard Mikey Thompson, who played his best game as a Bronco. Thompson scored 18 points, including a putback of his own missed layup (kept alive by Zach Haney) with nine seconds left, essentially putting the game away. He also dished out nine assists, matching the most by a Bronco in the past seven years. Thompson added five rebounds and three steals. But which stat was he the most proud of in the victory? “No turnovers,” said Thompson on the Learfield Sports postgame show.
James Webb III led Boise State against Colorado State with 28 points, topping 20 in three straight games for the first time in his career. The thing about Webb: he always leaves fans with stories to tell. Like when, early in the second half, he was the victim of a flagrant foul around his neck while going in for a layup. After some rubbing and wincing, he clanged a pair of free throws. And when, on a breakaway midway through the second half, Webb took flight from just inside the free throw line looking for a tomahawk dunk, only to have it boomerang off the iron about 15 feet into the air when he was fouled. Webb cut his thumb on the play—and after it was taped up, he swished his two free throws. Not to forget that he did throw down a tomahawk in the first half.
If only NFL honchos saw Kellen Moore the way Boise does. Kellen’s Forever Fan Club saw him go 33-of-48 for 435 yards and three touchdowns in his second start for Dallas in the Cowboys’ season finale against Washington yesterday. The yardage was the sixth-highest number in Cowboys history and the best of the day in the NFL. Moore looked ever-so-much like his Boise State days during one second-quarter drive, a two-minute drill that started on the Dallas 14-yard line and saw him complete all seven of his attempts for 86 yards and a touchdown to Cole Beasley. He was really good when he was in his rhythm. But, unfortunately, we know that’s not the way the NFL works.
Moore will be judged as much for those first four Dallas drives that, on third downs, produced a Beasley drop, a poorly-executed screen, an interception on an overthrow of Jason Witten, and a fumble on a muffed center-QB exchange. They’ll point at the Cowboys going 2-for-10 on third-down conversions versus a Washington team that substituted liberally before halftime arrived. He’ll be skewered for his goal-line interception in the fourth quarter (whether Beasley interrupted his route or not), and they’ll be skeptical of his athleticism in being sacked four times. But we’ve seen countless NFL quarterbacks go through similar things. If it’s not Dallas next season, some team is going to say, “Hey, Kellen Moore threw for 435 yards in his last game. How many backups have done that?” Cowboys owner Jerry Jones, however, does say it could be Dallas.
In the postgame media mob around his locker, it was Kellen just being Kellen. He was asked if he had shown enough to the the Cowboys moving forward. “I don’t know—I mean, bottom line is I’m really appreciative of the opportunity,” said Moore. “A lot of guys can wait in my situation and never get a chance to play in an NFL game, and I got a chance to play in a few down the stretch. I feel like there were some good things that came out of it, but at the end of the day, we didn’t win games, and we need to figure out a way to do that.” And he’s earned another chance to do it.
Among the relative boredom of this season’s New Year’s Six Bowls, there were some spectacular individual performances. Along those lines, you can see why Kelsey Young opted for Boise State as a graduate transfer. The Cardinal’s Christian McCaffery defined the term “feature back” in the 2015 campaign, culminating with his Rose Bowl-record 377 all-purpose yards in the 45-16 pummeling of lowa. Young didn’t get that many more carries as a Bronco than he may have as a senior backup at Stanford, thanks to Jeremy McNichols’ banner season. But Young was productive when called upon, rushing for 511 yards and eight touchdowns and averaging 5.1 yards per carry.
Like Boise State last year, Houston represented well as the Group of 5’s second entry in a New Year’s Six Bowl. The Cougars dispatched Florida State 38-24 in the Peach Bowl on New Year’s Eve, taking advantage of the absence of FSU quarterback Everett Golson. But the bottom line was that the Seminoles had no answer for the Houston offense. The point was made more than once toward the end of the game that UH coach Tom Herman joins Chris Petersen (with Boise State in 2006) as the only coaches to win 13 games in their first seasons. Former Bronco cornerback/safety Lee Hightower ended his college career with six tackles for the Cougars.
Fresno State coach Tim DeRuyter, in an effort to pull his program out of its nosedive, has hired Eric Kiesau as his new offensive coordinator. The Bulldogs fired OC Dave Schramm after winning just three games this season, their fewest in 37 years, and finishing last in the Mountain West in total offense. Kiesau is currently an “offensive analyst” for Alabama and will stay on Nick Saban’s staff through the national championship game against Clemson next Monday. He was offensive coordinator at Washington in 2013, when the Huskies opened the season by rolling up 592 yards in their 38-6 win over Boise State.
After recent victories of 8-5, 6-3, 5-2 and 6-3 again, the Idaho Steelheads threw fans a curve in CenturyLink Arena Saturday night. They won in a 1-0 shutout. Emil Molin scored eight minutes into the game for the Steelheads, and it turned out to be all they would need. Goalie Jack Campbell baffled Colorado by rejecting all 28 shots he faced in recording his second shutout as a Steelie (the first came during his seven-game stint with the team last February). The Idaho penalty kill unit was key, wiping out all five Eagles power plays. The Steelheads have now won eight of their last 10 games and travel to first-place Utah this Friday and Saturday.
New Idaho Stampede guard Corey Hawkins just missed crossing paths with his former UC Davis teammates last week. Hawkins, the 2015 Big West Player of the Year with the Aggies, was acquired from the Sioux Falls Skyforce on New Year’s Eve, the day after UC Davis lost 64-56 to Boise State in Taco Bell Arena. He’s slated to debut with the Stampede tonight when they visit the Bakersfield Jam. Hawkins appeared in nine games for the Skyforce this season, averaging 2.1 points and 1.3 rebounds.
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January 4, 2006, 10 years ago today: The night the BCS gets it right, as USC and Texas—ranked first and second all season long—meet in the Rose Bowl for the national championship. The Trojans led 38-26 with less than five minutes left before Longhorns quarterback Vince Young scored two touchdowns, the last one with 19 seconds left, to win the game, 41-38. Young turned in probably the best pressure performance in college football history, rushing for 200 yards and throwing for 267 more. That kept USC from a national title three-peat and broke its 34-game winning streak.
(Tom Scott hosts the Scott Slant segment Sunday nights at 10:30PM on KTVB’s Sunday Sports Extra and anchors five sports segments each weekday on 93.1 The Ticket. He also served as color commentator on KTVB’s telecasts of Boise State football for 14 seasons.)
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