The Griz offense is on fire, but can they beat Southern Utah?
Homecoming week is here for the Montana Grizzlies (3-1). They face off against defending Big Sky Champion Southern Utah. The Griz are coming off a bit of an odd game, which saw the team break a number of offensive records, but ultimately fall to Cal Poly. How worried should fans be about the Cal Poly loss and can the Griz bounce back this weekend in Missoula?
Z-Train (Griz fan): How should we take Brady Gustafson’s and Jerry Louie McGee’s (aka Jerry Touchdown, aka JLM) record-breaking performances this week? Should there be an asterisk? The game was, to me, finally, a fuller realization of Stitt’s intended offense with the type of reciever–a supremely shifty JLM–that he said he was missing last year.
Color me intrigued and hopeful that the offense is getting on track, especially since Stitt has shown improvement in that area week to week. Given the time and the weapons, I think it’s becoming clear that his offense can move the rock. They’d done it for half of two games, but they’ve now done it for an entire game against a strong opponent.
The fact these numbers came in a loss doesn’t bother me. The Dave Dickenson completions record Gus broke was also in service to a losing effort, so I don’t think it should be discounted too heavily.
Jasper Moonshot (Griz fan): How should we view those record-breaking performances? That it was really fun. There’s no such thing as an acceptable way to lose, but I’d rather lose like that than watching a bunch of Mick Delaney 3rd and Long draw plays. Watching Gus sling and JLM shake defenders felt like a game of Madden. JLM is the cheat player and the fly sweep is the equivalent of the Madden 95 circle pass.
Z-Train (Griz fan): Also, Cal Poly is a legit top ten team based on their performance this year. So far they have an OT loss to FBS Nevada, a win at San Diego, a win at a top-25 SDSU, and a down to the wire win over an improving and top-25 UM.
The Griz put up more points against Cal Poly than all those team (they gave up the most as well). The Griz held the Mustangs to their lowest offensive output of the year and held them over 100 yards below their usual rushing output. Those plusses were more than negated by the two short fields Cal Poly was given and the ludicrous effectiveness of their passing attack (3 TDs on 6 completions, averaging a depressing 37 yds per TD grab). I am ALMOST willing to give up one or two long TDs because we were packing the box and forcing guys to play on an island, but 3 on 6 completions is unforgivable no matter the circumstances. The (shoulda been encouraging) bottling up of league leading rusher Joe Protheroe was ultimately meaningless.
Beyond the UM secondary’s newfound predilection for giving up back-breaking big plays, the turnover bug that’s continued to infect Gus is troubling. UM could’ve actually survived Book ‘Em Dano’s otherworldly efficiency throwing the ball if we didn’t give Cal Poly the rock twice inside our own 20.
Jasper Moonshot (Griz fan): Moving on to this week, I’m not at all nervous about Southern Utah. The Griz defense has proven to be a force. I realize making that statement after giving up 40+ points sets up some rebuttals, but if you watched the CP game and understand how potent that triple-option was, I think you’d agree.
I’m not worried about Malik Brown, SUU’s top rusher. We won’t be playing an unorthodox offense that forces our secondary to play perfect.
Hot Take Nate (Cats fan): SUU has some swagger. Big Sky defending champions. Just beat PSU. Not scared of WAGriz at all. I don’t think they roll over.
Z-Train (Griz fan): Agree. Southern Utah came out of nowhere last year, and their success was driven by a defense that lost several players to the draft. Their season so far is a mixed bag: they were blanked by FBS University of Utah, squeaked out a home win over Southeastern Louisiana 28-23, and then beat Portland State, who was a playoff team last year, but currently sits at an unimpressive 1-3.
Against Utah they passed for just 42 yards. Against Southeastern Louisiana, Brown went off for 156 yards. Against PSU, Brown went for 176 and Pringle went for 122. Clearly they want to run.
They didn’t play the Griz last year and last played at WaGriz back in 2012 when the Griz had Trent McKiney playing QB in that lost year. We’ll see if they are ready to handle a crowd like Missoula.
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