Presented by BACON BOISE.
Wednesday Weekly…April 10, 2024.
By association, Boise State offensive line coach Tim Keane was looped into the offense’s struggles a few seasons ago. The running game was stuck in the mud back then. In 2021, the Broncos rushed for just 120 yards per game and 3.1 yards per carry. They also allowed 27 sacks in 12 games. It was an ouch-fest. Everyone knows now it wasn’t Keane’s doing, and the proof is in his development of O-linemen over time.
Something happened at the beginning of last season that surprised me, at least. Instead of moving veteran Cade Beresford over to the left tackle spot to replace the graduated John Ojukwu, Keane left Beresford on the right side and inserted redshirt freshman Kage Casey as the all-important protector of the quarterback’s blind side. The staff already felt strongly about Casey. But was that a sustainable move? All that happened was this: Boise State was sixth in the nation in rushing at 214 yards per game, it was 13th in fewest sacks allowed (16 in 14 games), and Casey was named second-team All-Mountain West.
TILLER IS CONCEDING NOTHING
There were five scoring plays listed from last Saturday’s Boise State first spring scrimmage. They were: Malachi Nelson five-yard touchdown pass to Latrell Caples, CJ Tiller 40-yard TD pass to Prince Strachan, Troy Wilkey two-yard TD run, Colt Fulton 27-yard TD throw to Austin Bolt, and Jonah Dalmas 43-yard field goal. What’s interesting in there? Well, it was nice for Nelson to get one on the board. But Tiller is sure out there competing this spring. Other than the touchdown, he was 4-for-8 for 23 yards, but the deep ball to Strachan was important. In Tiller’s one game as a Bronco, when he started against UCLA in the LA Bowl last December, his longest completion was 45 yards, but George Holani got most of that after the catch. Strachan had a 26-yard catch, and other than that it was short stuff.
A THROWBACK BOISE STATE WIDEOUT?
Boise State has leaned toward tall wide receivers on the recruiting trail the past two or three years—witness 6-5 Prince Strachan and 6-3 Austin Bolt, plus 6-3 Cam Camper and 6-3 Chris Marshall out of the transfer portal. But the Broncos’ first commitment of the 2025 recruiting class, Quinton Brown of Argyle, TX, has a compact body with a ton of speed. Brown, who gave his verbal on Sunday, is 5-8, 155 pounds and is a state 100-meter champion at the private school level in Texas, according to 247 Sports. He has run a 10.5 100 multiple times this track season. Brown caught 51 passes for 745 yards and 16 touchdowns this past fall. He chose Boise State over Pittsburgh and Oregon State, among others. The Broncos have doling out a flurry of scholarship offers lately.
EAST SIDE WILL HAVE TO WAIT
It was never going to go exactly as planned, but Boise State’s North End Zone project is going to happen. It just won’t be done in time for the 2025 season as first hoped. Don Day of BoiseDev updated the project at length late last week, and Day reports that construction should begin after the Famous Idaho Potato Bowl this December, with the opening in 2026. Premium seating infrastructure, including field-level suites, loge boxes and “ledge seats,” takes up a lot more space than regular bleacher seating, so Albertsons Stadium’s capacity will decrease by about 1,570 seats. The concourse linking the west side and east side of the stadium around the north end zone is still in the works. That’ll take pressure off the congested east concourse, but the major changes needed on that side are still down the line.
SHAKIR COULD CLIMB THE BILLS’ LADDER
We are cautiously optimistic that a big door has opened for Khalil Shakir in Buffalo. The former Boise State star’s role with the Bills could elevate with last week’s trade of fellow wide receiver Stefon Diggs to the Houston Texans. After all, Diggs didn’t have a 100-yard game after Week 6 last year, and Shakir had two. But there are those who doubt this helps Buffalo. Writes Nick Davis of USA Today: “It’s possible tight ends Dalton Kincaid and Dawson Knox, wide receivers Curtis Samuel and Khalil Shakir and running back James Cook can compensate by committee for Diggs’ statistical void—or at least until a replacement can be brought up to speed—but none are likely to scare defensive coordinators in the same way or draw double teams.” Me? I’m a big believer in chemistry, and the Bills have improved theirs.
VALUE IN AGBO’S EVALUATION
Catching up on that report from KTVB’s Jay Tust that Boise State’s Chibuzo Agbo is entering the 2024 NBA Draft while maintaining his collegiate eligibility. This should be a good thing for both Agbo and the Broncos. He’ll be able to audition in front of NBA scouts and get good feedback on his game. Agbo’s numbers are good. He averaged a career-best 13.7 points per game and shot a shade under 41 percent from three-point range this past season. As Tust points out, Agbo often guarded the opponent’s best player, too. There is a precedent for this at Boise State, as Derrick Alston Jr. and Chandler Hutchison each tested the NBA waters after their junior seasons. Both returned for their senior years and were better off for it. Agbo is unlikely to be drafted, so that’s the logical route here. And maybe NIL helps?
MORE PROOF IN THE AZTECS’ PUDDING
Boise State has been riding a fine line the past few years, but it’s still the Mountain West’s flagship football program. I mean, championships matter. By the same token, San Diego State is the flagship basketball program in the Mountain West. And something that happened last week just magnified it for me. Former Aztecs star Malachi Flynn became just the third player in NBA history to score 50 points off the bench in Detroit’s loss to Atlanta. While a lot of SDSU players have made the NBA, only a handful of Broncos have. Chris Childs had the longest career, and his career-high was 30 points. Chandler Hutchison’s best was 21. Boise State has beaten San Diego State in six of their last seven meetings. But it’s easy to have mad respect for Aztecs hoops, as coach Brian Dutcher has always had that for the Broncos.
STABILITY COUNTS FOR SOMETHING
It’s “Leon Rice Longevity Appreciation Day” here today. You need only to look to Fresno State to see why. Justin Hutson was just fired as Bulldogs basketball coach, and the school has controversially hired 67-year old Vance Walberg of Clovis West High School. Nothing against the age or high school, where he has coached for eight years. But the Fresno Bee points out that “when Walberg was last a head coach in Division I—at Pepperdine in 2007-08—he resigned in the middle of the season amid allegations that he abused players and violated NCAA rules. He had a 14-35 record in a season and a half. John Watson, Pepperdine’s athletic director at that time, said Walberg had made “mistakes in judgment” that included derogatory remarks and making one player suck his thumb during a practice for ‘acting like a baby.’”
CAITLYN CLARK’S LOCAL EFFECT – IF ANY
What we want to know moving forward is how far the trick-down effect will go in women’s basketball now that the final numbers are in. It just got bigger and bigger as Caitlyn Clark and Iowa worked their way through the NCAA Tournament. The championship game against South Carolina was the biggest of all, as you’ve heard—18.7 million viewers. It was larger than any basketball game (men’s or women’s, college or professional) in five years. On a Sunday afternoon. Will Boise State be able to benefit from this windfall of sorts? Attendance for Broncos women’s games was up from 846 to 1,294 per game this past season—eighth in the Mountain West. But that’s a 53 percent increase. Can they do it again next season? It would take a concentrated marketing effort—and a superstar to anchor it.
THE SUN SHINES ON DLP
It’s going to be in the mid-60s today. That’s softball weather, and Boise State has its biggest home game of the season this evening at Dona Larsen Park. The Broncos host No. 10 Washington, and to add to the mojo, they’re having football coach Spencer Danielson throw out the first pitch. This is some kind of matchup, coming as it does in the middle of the Mountain West season for Boise State (and the Pac-12 season for the Huskies). UW is the first Pac-12 team ever to visit the Broncos—and the first Power 5 program to do so in 10 years. Then when it hits the 70s, Boise State goes back into conference play with a three-game series against Fresno State this weekend.
This Day In Sports…brought to you by FRANZ WITTE GARDEN CENTER…beautiful landscapes start here!
April 10, 2016: Danny Willett becomes the first European in the 21st century to win the Masters, and the first Englishman in 20 years, on a shocking day at Augusta. Defending champion Jordan Spieth, who had led the entire tournament, had a five shot lead with nine holes to go. The advantage was down to one stroke on the par-three 12th hole, where Spieth put two shots into the water and took a quadruple-bogey seven. Just like that, Spieth dropped three shots back, and he never recovered. Instead of becoming the first player in history to lead wire-to-wire in successive years in a major, he suffered one of golf’s greatest collapses.
(Tom Scott hosts the Scott Slant segment during the football season on KTVB’s Sunday Sports Extra and anchors four sports segments each weekday on 95.3 FM KTIK. He also served as color commentator on KTVB’s telecasts of Boise State football for 14 seasons.)
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