Well that wasn’t very fun. In front of a full stadium, the 2001 national championship team, and with hopes for a win to help keep Montana on pace for a top spot in the conference, it all fell apart as injuries, the offense, and a gassed defense could not put together enough to put Montana up over Sacramento State.
This was Sac’s first win ever in Wa Griz and I’ve got to say head coach Taylor and DC Andy Thompson had a damn good plan to come into Montana and get away with a monumental upset win. The Montana offense was terrible inefficient and unable to get in rhythm the whole day. Meanwhile the defense was caught early with a well scripted Sac drive and then were on their heels the whole game continually having to answer again and again and again. Add in some uncharacteristic special teams errors that wiped off a punt return touchdown and it just seemed like if it could go wrong, it did go wrong today.
There’s no pretty statistic from this game. 23:05 TOP for UM, 4 of 14 on 3rd down, and 272 total yards of offense (84 rushing / 188 passing). The Montana passing offense was averaging 6.5 yards per completion while Sac was averaging almost double at 12.1 yards. Then you flip it defensively, Sac ran for 154 and passed for 302, they were 9 for 15 on 3rd down and obviously held the ball for far longer than Montana, 36:55.
It seemed like even when regularly good plays happened, like Ford’s INT, it actually hurt Montana as a batted pass there would’ve swung the field almost 30 yards for the Griz on that one play. Injuries also once again reared their head as it seemed Xavier Harris missed the whole 2nd half, and many defensive players were getting knocked out with cramps or other injuries too.
By no means is this season over, but this team needs to get things figured out fast as now this stretch of what we once thought were “easy” games suddenly don’t look so easy anymore. The offense has continually receded in efficiency and now the defense is unraveling as they’re being asked to continually do so much every single game.
Some additional thoughts:
- O-line play today wasn’t good. I don’t know if there’s any way to sugar coat that. Sac was constantly pressuring Brown and got to him with a 3 man rush once and few 4 man rushes as well. They would scrape an end across the line and it seemed to be a tough task to pick him up. There were seemingly no running lanes cleared up either (2.9 YPC).
- Kris Brown was efficient in his completions but they were almost entirely short/check-down passes. There were open options up the field at times that were missed, and then maybe the most costly was a bad throw to a well covered Akem that lead to a goal-line pick just one play after a Sac fumble. Brown had 2 more turnovers today and took some really costly sacks. I don’t think the design today did a lot of favors to help him, but especially once the 4th quarter got going, he looked like a freshman in a moment he might not have been fully ready to take on.
- I know there’s going to be more clamoring for how soon Cam can come back, but if he’s going to get lit up all the time like Kris did, he’ll be back on the injured list real quick himself.
- A great day for Justin Ford, save the pick that really helped Sac – but that’s hard to criticize as he was doing his job. Multiple breakups and many big plays to kill Sac drives and keep Montana in the game.
- Also a good day for Cole Grossman, he seems to be getting more comfortable in this offense and was the top target today.
- I feel that the 2nd half of the EWU game, now the Dixie game, and this game has shown teams how to handle the high pressure Montana defense. Keep extra blockers in (TE/RB) and then find the open hole in the zones. Sac exploited that very well today, and all day long.
- Horrific officiating today. It didn’t cost the Griz the game as I think Sac has a pretty good argument on the 4th and 1 stop late, but holy cow that was bad out there today.
- Montana’s 4th quarter possessions, 1 play ending in an interception, 3 and out, turnover on downs that went 8 plays but actually finished with a net of -1 yards. Montana had 5 three and outs and two drives that ended in 2 plays or less on turnovers.
- Save 1 wobbly kick another good punting day for Buschini.
- I know the running game will be a subject for discussion but I’m unsure what this team is supposed to do. We’re now on our 5th string running back who is a true freshman that is slated to play WR. And Bergen actually had a decent day overall. The youth an inexperience in many positions that have been wrecked by injury are showing.
Man, that was a rough one. I’m hopeful that this team can regroup and hopefully with some games that are seemingly more winnable they can put the pieces back together and get things going again. We’ve seen other Montana teams on the ropes and many have bounced back and made a post-season push. The Griz are going to have to get things rolling as their ranking is going to take a big drop and they’ll need to rattle off a handful of wins moving forward. I hope the fans don’t give up on these guys, this has been a long time in the making and these guys are facing some heavy adversity. Yes many things need to be addressed and cleaned up, but I remain hopeful that they will be.
Regroup, let’s get back to the win column next weekend.
Go Griz!
This was Sac’s first win ever in Wa Griz and I’ve got to say head coach Taylor and DC Andy Thompson had a damn good plan to come into Montana and get away with a monumental upset win. The Montana offense was terrible inefficient and unable to get in rhythm the whole day. Meanwhile the defense was caught early with a well scripted Sac drive and then were on their heels the whole game continually having to answer again and again and again. Add in some uncharacteristic special teams errors that wiped off a punt return touchdown and it just seemed like if it could go wrong, it did go wrong today.
There’s no pretty statistic from this game. 23:05 TOP for UM, 4 of 14 on 3rd down, and 272 total yards of offense (84 rushing / 188 passing). The Montana passing offense was averaging 6.5 yards per completion while Sac was averaging almost double at 12.1 yards. Then you flip it defensively, Sac ran for 154 and passed for 302, they were 9 for 15 on 3rd down and obviously held the ball for far longer than Montana, 36:55.
It seemed like even when regularly good plays happened, like Ford’s INT, it actually hurt Montana as a batted pass there would’ve swung the field almost 30 yards for the Griz on that one play. Injuries also once again reared their head as it seemed Xavier Harris missed the whole 2nd half, and many defensive players were getting knocked out with cramps or other injuries too.
By no means is this season over, but this team needs to get things figured out fast as now this stretch of what we once thought were “easy” games suddenly don’t look so easy anymore. The offense has continually receded in efficiency and now the defense is unraveling as they’re being asked to continually do so much every single game.
Some additional thoughts:
- O-line play today wasn’t good. I don’t know if there’s any way to sugar coat that. Sac was constantly pressuring Brown and got to him with a 3 man rush once and few 4 man rushes as well. They would scrape an end across the line and it seemed to be a tough task to pick him up. There were seemingly no running lanes cleared up either (2.9 YPC).
- Kris Brown was efficient in his completions but they were almost entirely short/check-down passes. There were open options up the field at times that were missed, and then maybe the most costly was a bad throw to a well covered Akem that lead to a goal-line pick just one play after a Sac fumble. Brown had 2 more turnovers today and took some really costly sacks. I don’t think the design today did a lot of favors to help him, but especially once the 4th quarter got going, he looked like a freshman in a moment he might not have been fully ready to take on.
- I know there’s going to be more clamoring for how soon Cam can come back, but if he’s going to get lit up all the time like Kris did, he’ll be back on the injured list real quick himself.
- A great day for Justin Ford, save the pick that really helped Sac – but that’s hard to criticize as he was doing his job. Multiple breakups and many big plays to kill Sac drives and keep Montana in the game.
- Also a good day for Cole Grossman, he seems to be getting more comfortable in this offense and was the top target today.
- I feel that the 2nd half of the EWU game, now the Dixie game, and this game has shown teams how to handle the high pressure Montana defense. Keep extra blockers in (TE/RB) and then find the open hole in the zones. Sac exploited that very well today, and all day long.
- Horrific officiating today. It didn’t cost the Griz the game as I think Sac has a pretty good argument on the 4th and 1 stop late, but holy cow that was bad out there today.
- Montana’s 4th quarter possessions, 1 play ending in an interception, 3 and out, turnover on downs that went 8 plays but actually finished with a net of -1 yards. Montana had 5 three and outs and two drives that ended in 2 plays or less on turnovers.
- Save 1 wobbly kick another good punting day for Buschini.
- I know the running game will be a subject for discussion but I’m unsure what this team is supposed to do. We’re now on our 5th string running back who is a true freshman that is slated to play WR. And Bergen actually had a decent day overall. The youth an inexperience in many positions that have been wrecked by injury are showing.
Man, that was a rough one. I’m hopeful that this team can regroup and hopefully with some games that are seemingly more winnable they can put the pieces back together and get things going again. We’ve seen other Montana teams on the ropes and many have bounced back and made a post-season push. The Griz are going to have to get things rolling as their ranking is going to take a big drop and they’ll need to rattle off a handful of wins moving forward. I hope the fans don’t give up on these guys, this has been a long time in the making and these guys are facing some heavy adversity. Yes many things need to be addressed and cleaned up, but I remain hopeful that they will be.
Regroup, let’s get back to the win column next weekend.
Go Griz!