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Wednesday, May 6, 2020.
The subject of Boise State’s career rushing record has been broached this week. And there’s this: George Holani has as good a chance at as anyone in recent memory at breaking it. The record is 4,475 yards, and this fall will make it 40 years since Cedric Minter set it in 1980. Minter rushed for 877 yards as a true freshman in 1977, while Holani netted 1,014 last season, becoming the first Boise State freshman (redshirt or true) to hit a thousand. Holani will have to average 1,154 yards per season to get to the top. Then again, if he’s that good, will he stay through his senior year? To Minter’s credit, he accumulated all his rushing yards in just 44 games. The former Borah High star is another guy who didn’t get credit for a couple of games during the Broncos’ run to the 1980 Division I-AA national championship.
TOP 25? CBS SAYS YES…
Poll predictions for Boise State in 2020 are all over the place. Well, Ben Kercheval of CBSSports.com is counting down that site’s preseason Top 25, and on Tuesday No. 24 was revealed to be the Broncos. Kercheval prefaces his evaluation with a tribute to the program: “Consistency is hard in college football. Moreover, the financial gap can put a greater strain on resources to win at the Group of Five level. And yet, through all of those obstacles, Boise State continues to win. The Broncos may not be the top-10ish program flirting major bowl bids like they were a decade ago. Still, Boise State is on the short list of Group of Five programs ready to make run to a New Year’s Six bowl and knock off a perennial power now and then. That was the case last year and, for the most part, that rings true this year as well.”
WALKER RAMPING UP FOR HIS FINALE
If you doubt Jalen Walker’s NFL aspirations as he approaches his senior year at Boise State, check out this from CFB Film Room, which professes to be dedicated to advanced college football stats. Walker is the No. 5 returning defensive back in the country in preventing deep pass plays. He allowed 4.21 “yards per target vs. explosive routes.” Tweeted Walker on Tuesday: “Not Good Enough. We Workin’.” The 2020 season could be a transformative one for Walker. He became the Broncos’ top cornerback last fall, but he occasionally had trouble containing his emotions. A year older, a year wiser?
KELLEN’S COWBOYS QB CAST APPEARS SET
Kellen Moore’s quarterback room shuffle continues with Dallas having released backup Cooper Rush. That was cause-and-effect after the Cowboys’ signing of Andy Dalton last weekend. It was Rush who essentially put the writing on the wall for Moore’s playing career in 2017, putting up a strong preseason and getting ahead of Kellen in the Cowboys’ pecking order. Rush, who backed up Dak Prescott last season, was in turn signed by the New York Giants on Tuesday. So now he’s reunited with former Dallas coach and current Giants offensive coordinator Jason Garrett.
CODY PICKETT FLASHBACK
Now that Cody Pickett has switched from coaching girls basketball to boys basketball at Eagle High, the Seattle Times could do a “where are they now” for Washington Huskies fans. Here, it might be good to do a “where he has been” for Treasure Valley sports fans. For those who didn’t know, Pickett went from stardom at Caldwell High to UW, where he was the starting quarterback from 2001-03 and threw for 9,916 yards and 53 touchdowns. He was chosen in the seventh round of the 2004 NFL Draft by San Francisco and played two seasons for the 49ers, finishing his pro career in the CFL. He’s also the son of Pro Rodeo Hall of Famer Dee Pickett and spent some quality time growing up on the world famous Chicken Dinner Road south of Caldwell.
SAY HEY, WILLIE
There are lots of transplants in the Treasure Valley, and I’m not just talking about recent ones. There are those like me who moved to Boise decades and decades and decades ago. And transplants like me from the San Francisco Bay Area understand why May 6 is always a big day. Willie Mays had all the tools in the shed. He could hit for average, hit for power, steal bases, field like nobody’s business, and throw from the centerfield fence to home plate on a single bound. Mays fans unite—the “Say Hey Kid” is 89 years old today.
This Day In Sports…brought to you by MAZ-TECH AUTOMOTIVE…your car says, “Take me to Maz-Tech!”
May 6, 1982: Seattle pitcher Gaylord Perry, known as the “Ancient Mariner,” picks up his 300th career victory in a 7-3 win over the New York Yankees. Perry would finish his career the following year with 314 wins. He also tossed 303 complete games, an unthinkable feat in today’s game, and this was one of them. Perry was only the 15th pitcher ever to notch 300 victories. There have been nine since, but nobody since Randy Johnson reached 300 back in 2009.
(Tom Scott hosts the Scott Slant segment during the football season on KTVB’s Sunday Sports Extra and anchors five sports segments each weekday on 93.1 FM KTIK. He also served as color commentator on KTVB’s telecasts of Boise State football for 14 seasons.)
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