Happy Monday Dawg fans, and welcome to today’s Dots.
The Huskies pulled away late in the 3rd quarter to beat the Colorado State Rams on Saturday night, to start the season 1-0 and extend their home winning streak to 21 games.
I don’t think there was anything too surprising to how Saturday night’s game played out. The players we expected to do well, did well. On defense, individual performances by Makell Esteen, Jacob Lane, Alex McLaughlin, Tacario Davis, and several others stood out – many players having little or no snaps as Huskies before this season. And these were things we’d been expecting or at least hoping to see.
But with a small in-game sample size, I’ve been hopexpecting (I’ve just now invented a new word “hope-xpectation”) to see great things from Demond Williams. I wondered: Will he continue the remarkable passing accuracy he showed in the Sun Bowl? Check. Will his legs be a dangerous weapon? Duh. Will sacks continue to be an issue? Well…
Indeed there were many good things the Huskies did. But there were also familiar areas of concern.
Woo! :
- Demond Williams completed 75% of his passes for 226 yds, 1 TD, 0 Ints, and a 9.4yd avg per throw. Williams also ran 10 times for 90 yds, minus 3 sacks for -22 yds.
- Jonah Coleman carried for 177 of UW’s total 287 rushing yards, averaged 7.4 yds/carry, and the Huskies scored four rushing TDs.
- Denzel Boston caught 5 passes for 92 yards and a TD that was highlight-reel worthy.
- Adam Mohammed and Jonah Coleman caught 3 passes for 60 yds. (love this)
- The young receivers looked pretty good.
- Tacario Davis and Ephesians Prysock effectively took their opposing WRs out of the game.
- Tackling was very good.
- The O-line blocked well running the ball.
Boo! :
- The porous run Defense, flimsy kickoff coverage, an overwhelmeble O-line, and Demond taking sacks that, on this night at least, killed a couple drives.
- In the first half, CSU’s offense alternated between 3-and-outs, or touchdown drives that looked way too easy. CSU’s only scoring drive of the 2nd half culminated with a “Huh?” play that had CSU’s 6’8″ TE running unmarked past confused Husky defenders.
- On the three drives that UW did not score points, two were derailed by 3rd down QB sacks and the third was the snap fumble. The other Husky drives ended in 5 TDs, 1 FG, 2 end-of-half’s.
Jedd Fisch made a comment at halftime that the Huskies were beating themselves. Indeed this first game gives the Dawgs the opportunity to identify and fix things that need fixing if they are to compete against Ohio State and the like…
- “Washington pulls away from Colorado State to pick up 21st straight home victory” Jared Tucker, UW Daily
- Christian Caple perfectly captured my own sentiments with “In opening win, Washington looked different (good) and familiar (not as good) all at once”. Then some day-after reflection: “The Day After: 28 thoughts on Washington’s win over Colorado State”
- “3 takeaways from UW Huskies’ season-opening win against Colorado State” Andy Yamashita, Seattle Times
- Dawgman: “How did Pro Football Focus grade the Colorado State-Washington Game?“
Go Dawgs!!