Its Apple Cup week, and for the second year in a row, one half of the in-state rivalry is working through year 1 of a complete program overhaul. In 2024, the Jedd Fisch’s Huskies were picking up the pieces that were left in the wake of the post-title game exodus, and now this year it’s WSU’s turn to reset the program under a new regime. After four years with Jake Dickert at the helm, the Cougars are now led by former South Dakota State HC Jimmy Rogers, who brought much of the Jackrabbits’ core with him to form the nucleus of his 2025 roster.
Wazzu got the better of the Huskies during the 2024 rebuilding year, which was also the first year of the reimagined post-realignment rivalry. However, while the Apple Cup has been a close fought game in recent years despite notable differences in the respective teams’ success, the outlook is fairly pessimistic from Coug fans heading into this year’s matchup. Despite heading into the game at 2-1, it feels more like a moral 1-2 start for Wazzu. A tight 13-10 win over FCS Idaho to open the season was an inauspicious start despite the victory, and this past weekend’s 59-10 meltdown against North Texas further highlighted the team’s deficiencies, particularly on offense.
The Scheme & Personnel
As a part of the program overhaul, Jesse Bobbit has been installed as the new DC under Rogers. Bobbit, the former SDSU defensive coordinator, is a young up-and-comer in the coaching ranks in just his fourth season as a position coach or coordinator in the college ranks. The former SDSU linebacker was a member of the Jackrabbits’ coaching staff during both of their FCS title runs in 2022 and 2023, but his experience outside of his alma mater is limited to just two seasons as a graduate assistant at WSU in 2020 and 2021.
With his limited experience outside of the Missouri Valley Conference (FCS), where offensive philosophies tend to revolve around ground-and-pound run games of yesteryear, Bobbit’s own defensive schemes also tend to lean on heavier base personnel. Instead of the speed-oriented 4-2-5 base defensive personnel that we’ve seen out of Dickert’s solid defenses, we should expect to see more 4-3 base personnel out of the Cougs in this year’s match up. The 4-3 personnel is a bit of a misnomer considering that their SAM linebacker is SDSU transfer Caleb Francl, who is listed at just 6-1 and 195lbs, but his skill set does align better with the LB position.
Up front, the bones of the defensive line are carry overs from last year’s roster with a few key additions that came over with the new staff. DEs Raam Stevenson and Isaac Terrell are key returning contributors in the pass rush, and 6-6 DT Max Baloun bolsters the defensive interior as another seasoned vet.
In the defensive backfield, Jamorri Colson is the only starter on the depth chart that was a member of the ‘24 team. Fellow CB Colby Humphrey and safeties Tucker Large and Matthew Durrance are all SDSU transfers. Humphrey and Large were both All-MVC honorees last season, so they have a track record of success, albeit at a lower tier of football.
Keys to the Game
Let’s take a moment to temper expectations a bit. Yes, we did drop 70 points on UC Davis, and yes, WSU just gave up 59 points to North Texas. However, we shouldn’t necessarily expect another 70 point outing for our Huskies. Many of the points that the WSU defense gave up to UNT were off of short fields after offensive turnovers. It will be exceedingly hard for our defense to match UNT’s 5 turnovers to set up quick scoring possessions, but we should definitely be able to string together efficient or even explosive drives when we do get the ball.
UNT was able to get push up front and open rushing lanes for their RBs, and the WSU LBs and DBs struggled to make tackles in space. Some of those missed tackles were a result of bad angles, but others were simply out run by speedy backs. Additionally, there were several times when UNT was able to hit on perimeter runs like toss plays and sweeps. This leads me to think that either the schematic shift from using hybrid OLB/DE EDGEs to bigger bodies hasn’t firmed up their edge setting or they are intentionally spilling plays against certain looks. Given that we have a deep stable of RBs, including both Jonah Coleman and Jordan Washington who have speed to burn, I think we’re going to see a heavier mix of perimeter run plays between the 20s before hammering the lighter WSU interior in the red zone.
Personnel packages may also be a key piece of our offensive game plan. Given WSU’s preference to stay in base 4-3 personnel rather than nickel personnel, we should both encourage it and manipulate it. Fisch’s preference is to run 11 personnel, but he has utilized 12 personnel (1 RB & 2 TEs), 21 personnel (2 RBs & 1 TE), and 20 personnel (2 RBs, 0 TEs) in the past. 12 and 21 personnel is conventionally the personnel groupings that base 4-3 defensive personnel is used to combat. However, we have the versatile players that can be deployed in ways that can pose issues. Instead of playing 21 personnel with a RB and a FB in an I-Formation, we could play Coleman and Washington in the backfield out of a shotgun look and pass out of it to get their LBs in space. In 12 personnel with Quentin Moore and Decker DeGraaf at TE, does WSU stick with 4-3 personnel with a 195lb SAM trying to hold up against the run versus either a 260lb or 245lb TE? That seems like a bad idea until you consider that shifting into nickel personnel probably gets even lighter personnel on the field. With that kind of mismatch in size, why wouldn’t we try to go heavy and pound the ball? Our play action game is looking good, and DeGraaf is a good enough receiver that I think we can still run our full complement of vertical concepts with him as the #3 receiving option on the field.
We’ll find out on Saturday, but I suspect this will be another strong game on the ground for the UW offense.