From the 30,000 foot view Montana is 5-0, 2-0 in conference, and headed into their bye week right where they were expected to be at this point. At no real point in this game did it feel like ISU was going to win it either. Montana's ground game finally got moving like we hoped it would. And save what is hopefully just an ankle sprain to Brown, they got out of the dome with minimal injuries.
Obviously there's plenty of hand wringing to do, the game wasn't pretty. The Griz were sloppy with the ball and made more errors (especially on ST) that didn't allow them to slam the door shut on ISU who kept fighting the whole day. Passes were just a little too off target, the run blocking broke down just a few times too many, and the defense was once again attacked with the formula that appears to be the answer to moving the ball on us - albeit infrequently.
The bye week is coming at a good time, this game suggested to me that a slight break might be just the thing for this team. So yes, once again a bunch of weird stuff went down at Holt, but this can't be attributed to a crappy old dome, it was an oddly high compounding amount of execution errors. I have confidence it'll be ironed out - because if it isn't.... the 2nd half of the regular season could be brutal.
Some other observations:
- Alex Gubner might be having one of the best seasons we've seen from a Griz DT since Alan Saenz's senior season. He's tallying up tackles and sacks (1.5 sacks today). He's blowing up the LOS and playing as disruptive as I've ever seen from him. Let's see if he can keep it going when the level of competition really steps up.
- Once again we saw the stud WR get in the slot and attack our safeties. After the Cotton ejection Guillory made some easy work of his coverage... for a while. I saw a Rainey tweet that suggested he had about 65 yards on the safeties. Then, Montana countered that move and had Justin Ford shadow him a lot. He finished with only 25(ish) more yards after that. I will say, I was impressed with Guillory, I have no clue how a kid with his talents lands at a dump like ISU.
- Marcus Knight finally had the game we were waiting for this season. 109 rushing yards and 1 TD. He had a big burst on a near 50 yard run and looked much more decisive hitting the hole. It was great to see him back. Just 14 touches too, lets see if that continues to increase. I thought Ostmo had a great day too with 84 total rushing yards.
- Not the best day in the office for Lucas Johnson. A nice rushing TD and then a good read on a TD pass where ISU's coverage busted. But then a pick on the ISU side of the field on the first drive and then a fumble at the 2 yard line that turned into a touchback... a play that ended his day as Bobby benched him. Johnson wasn't the most accurate either today. It was all odd to see from a guy that so far we'd seen be fairly consistent, accurate, and somewhat error free. I noticed that ISU started blitzing the hell out of him and that would lead to some bad passes. Teams will test him going forward. It could be on tape now that heavy pressure an create issues for the passing game.
- I'm not sure what TraJon Cotton was supposed to do as the WR was getting pulled down. He did hit him in the head with his arm, was previously lining up for a body hit or a hit on the ball. Tough call there.
- Incredible TD catch by Cole Grossman, he was well covered and hauled it in. Crazy to think that TD wound up being the difference in the game.
- Kale Edwards I'm just going to bet is going to be fair catching anything that comes his way on kickoffs. Defensively he had a great sack and another TFL, he played well there from what I saw on TV.
- Adding to the funky-ness of the day, ISU puts the ball on the turf twice - once it goes right out of bounds on a kickoff, another it comes right back into the hands of an ISU player. That's the way it goes sometimes though.
- I'm seeing O'Connell has 0.5 sacks and 1 forced fumble on his stat list. I feel like he had multiple sacks, didn't he? There was one where he pushed the ISU QB out of bounds for a 3 or 4 yard loss on a pass play.
- ISU's game plan of quick passes worked for a while. Once Montana took away those quicker routes it led to less success on offense for them. They did get a TD on a heavy blitz in the 4th and then whatever the heck ISU's last TD drive was...
- I have no clue what ISU was thinking with their two onside kicks... or squibs... or whatever.
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I think this team will build off of this "ugly" win. Having the bye week there can be some work on breakdowns that occurred and I'm sure they'll be firing much better in 2 weeks when Idaho comes to town. The Griz are still undefeated and right where they want to be! Hopefully they get a bit of rest - because from here on out, it's almost entirely all going to be far tougher games than they've had so far.
Go Griz!
Obviously there's plenty of hand wringing to do, the game wasn't pretty. The Griz were sloppy with the ball and made more errors (especially on ST) that didn't allow them to slam the door shut on ISU who kept fighting the whole day. Passes were just a little too off target, the run blocking broke down just a few times too many, and the defense was once again attacked with the formula that appears to be the answer to moving the ball on us - albeit infrequently.
The bye week is coming at a good time, this game suggested to me that a slight break might be just the thing for this team. So yes, once again a bunch of weird stuff went down at Holt, but this can't be attributed to a crappy old dome, it was an oddly high compounding amount of execution errors. I have confidence it'll be ironed out - because if it isn't.... the 2nd half of the regular season could be brutal.
Some other observations:
- Alex Gubner might be having one of the best seasons we've seen from a Griz DT since Alan Saenz's senior season. He's tallying up tackles and sacks (1.5 sacks today). He's blowing up the LOS and playing as disruptive as I've ever seen from him. Let's see if he can keep it going when the level of competition really steps up.
- Once again we saw the stud WR get in the slot and attack our safeties. After the Cotton ejection Guillory made some easy work of his coverage... for a while. I saw a Rainey tweet that suggested he had about 65 yards on the safeties. Then, Montana countered that move and had Justin Ford shadow him a lot. He finished with only 25(ish) more yards after that. I will say, I was impressed with Guillory, I have no clue how a kid with his talents lands at a dump like ISU.
- Marcus Knight finally had the game we were waiting for this season. 109 rushing yards and 1 TD. He had a big burst on a near 50 yard run and looked much more decisive hitting the hole. It was great to see him back. Just 14 touches too, lets see if that continues to increase. I thought Ostmo had a great day too with 84 total rushing yards.
- Not the best day in the office for Lucas Johnson. A nice rushing TD and then a good read on a TD pass where ISU's coverage busted. But then a pick on the ISU side of the field on the first drive and then a fumble at the 2 yard line that turned into a touchback... a play that ended his day as Bobby benched him. Johnson wasn't the most accurate either today. It was all odd to see from a guy that so far we'd seen be fairly consistent, accurate, and somewhat error free. I noticed that ISU started blitzing the hell out of him and that would lead to some bad passes. Teams will test him going forward. It could be on tape now that heavy pressure an create issues for the passing game.
- I'm not sure what TraJon Cotton was supposed to do as the WR was getting pulled down. He did hit him in the head with his arm, was previously lining up for a body hit or a hit on the ball. Tough call there.
- Incredible TD catch by Cole Grossman, he was well covered and hauled it in. Crazy to think that TD wound up being the difference in the game.
- Kale Edwards I'm just going to bet is going to be fair catching anything that comes his way on kickoffs. Defensively he had a great sack and another TFL, he played well there from what I saw on TV.
- Adding to the funky-ness of the day, ISU puts the ball on the turf twice - once it goes right out of bounds on a kickoff, another it comes right back into the hands of an ISU player. That's the way it goes sometimes though.
- I'm seeing O'Connell has 0.5 sacks and 1 forced fumble on his stat list. I feel like he had multiple sacks, didn't he? There was one where he pushed the ISU QB out of bounds for a 3 or 4 yard loss on a pass play.
- ISU's game plan of quick passes worked for a while. Once Montana took away those quicker routes it led to less success on offense for them. They did get a TD on a heavy blitz in the 4th and then whatever the heck ISU's last TD drive was...
- I have no clue what ISU was thinking with their two onside kicks... or squibs... or whatever.
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I think this team will build off of this "ugly" win. Having the bye week there can be some work on breakdowns that occurred and I'm sure they'll be firing much better in 2 weeks when Idaho comes to town. The Griz are still undefeated and right where they want to be! Hopefully they get a bit of rest - because from here on out, it's almost entirely all going to be far tougher games than they've had so far.
Go Griz!
