The Bobcat Nation

First off, I'm still euphoric about that comeback win!

Let me tell you why the Bobcats should have won by a lot more:

1. His name is Gatewood. I hate to say it about one of my favorite receivers in Bobcat history, but he almost single-handedly blew the game for us. Two dropped TD passes, are you kidding me? Scenarios:
1. a - Let's say Gatewood caught his TD pass that was intercepted. (my memory is a bit hazy on what the score was at this time) Cats go up 14-10. I don't remember, did Weber score on that drive? If so, that is a 14 point swing!
b - Gatewood drops the pass but it isn't picked off. We have another chance to get a TD, or at least a FG.
2. Untimely penalties. As usual. 11-120, are you kidding me?????
3. Sloppy run defense.
4. No running game outside of Lulay.
5. 4-13 on 3rd down conversations, see #4.

If we get those 2 TDs, the game is over. Weber goes to the air to try and catch up, and might have been sucessful, but who knows. I sure know that they ran with ease all day.

We kept Weber in the game. Regardless of what anyone says, we damn near beat ourselves this game, as opposed to CP where we were just outplayed and outcoached.

I think this win is a huge step though. We finally got that road win, we showed we can win even when all hope seems lost, and the confidence should hopefully carry over next week to PSU.

One word for our coaching staff: DISCIPLINE!

I'll come out and say it. I haven't been impressed by our coaching staff one bit this year. Their gameplans coming into the week haven't impressed me, and it seems like we throw in the bag and ditch the gameplan we had as soon as something goes wrong. Giving credit where credit is due, they have made good halftime adjustments, just like they always have. It is too late in the season to still look rusty and to still be playing undisciplined football. We will get killed by PSU, EWU, and UM if we play anywhere close to how we played today. We may be able to squeak by Suck State and NAU.

I'm elated by the miracle win, but I think this game just gives other teams another opportunity to pinpoint our weaknesses.

Offensive coordinator sucks. He should be fired.

bobcatmaniac wrote:Offensive coordinator sucks. He should be fired.

Yes, yes, he should.

The good news is that the Cats have lost the turnover battle every game but one, have had a higher than normal penalty problem (mostly the 15 yard variety), have made more mistakes than any year I can remember, have had NO running game outside of Lulay, battled through four weeks of fumbled snaps, no Gatewood for three weeks and a rash of injuries (5 starters out today) and we are still 4-2 (2-0 BSC).

The Bad news: See Above!

gtapp wrote:The good news is that the Cats have lost the turnover battle every game but one, have had a higher than normal penalty problem (mostly the 15 yard variety), have made more mistakes than any year I can remember, have had NO running game outside of Lulay, battled through four weeks of fumbled snaps, no Gatewood for three weeks and a rash of injuries (5 starters out today) and we are still 4-2 (2-0 BSC).

The Bad news: See Above!

Make that four weeks. Just kidding Ricky, you'll bounce back.

Hard for me to disagree, Bozone.

I wonder if Krames longs for those bygone days of that OK running back...I think his name was Ryan-something. It was a long time ago.

This team plays very undisciplined football...it just goes to show you how exceptional they are athletically when they can overcame 3 interceptions and 100+ yards of penalties to win against a good team. Pretty impressive. It helped that Weber didn't know how good they were yet.

One thing is for certain...our guys made plays in the end! and they'll only get better.

Fire Bailey? C'mon! He hasn't dropped any passes or missed any blocks! He also has not let the opponents offense run it down our throats. He wasn't noticable when Weber went 75 yards in 45 seconds at the end of the half either. Why bag on him and give the defense a free pass? The team is putting up good offensive numbers. They could have scored 45-50 points today without the drops. It almost sounds like that other board where winning just isn't enough. Today may not have been pretty, but the outcome was good. Kinda like sausage....not one wants to see it being made, but it sure is good! Get off Bailey!

Bobcats Stun Weber State With Fourth Quarter Comeback

Montana State scores 17 unanswered points to claim 27-21 win.



Oct. 8, 2005



Box Score



Ogden, UT -- Montana State's Jeff Hastings converted on a 39-yard field goal attempt as time expired to give the Bobcats a 24-21 come-from-behind win at Stewart Stadium on Saturday.



MSU outscored the Wildcats 17-0 over the final quarter as quarterback Travis Lulay ran and threw his way past the Wildcats. Lulay scored on runs of 31-yards and one-yard, and had a completion of 19 yards to Tremaine Murray to set up the game-winning field goal.



The Wildcats controlled the game early behind the running of Zach Hall, the receiving of Lynzell Jackson, and some excellent red-zone defense.



Jackson opened the scoring as Ian Pizarro hooked up with the talented receiver on an 18-yard scoring play to cap off a seven-play, 67-yard opening drive. The two hooked up with just two seconds remaining in the opening half on a 12-yard scoring strike and the Wildcats took a 17-10 lead at the break.



Zach Hall's three-yard TD run with 9:33 left in the third quarter made the game 24-10, but the Wildcats would not score again.



The only MSU scores in the first three quarters occurred on a field goal and as Daryl Rogers recovered a Pizarro fumble in the WSU endzone.



Three times the Bobcats entered the Weber State red zone only to be turned away by the Wildcat defense. The Wildcats twice intercepted Lulay in the end zone. The first came on the first of two John Collins interceptions. The second came as Nick Greene ended a Bobcat drive. The final time, WSU turned away the Bobcats from the three yard line with a Brady Fosmark sack. The resulting field goal attempt was no good due to a botched snap.



With 11:02 left in the fourth quarter, the Wildcats had the Bobcats in a fourth-and-seven situation. MSU, in desperate need of a score, went for the first down. Lulay narrowly eluded a sack and was able to break the run for the first of his two TD runs.



On the ensuing Weber State drive, the Wildcats were moving the ball only to have a Pizarro pass go through the hands of Jackson and into the waiting arms of MSU cornerback Andre Fuller.



Lulay immediately hit Murray on a 38-yard pass play that kick-started a six-play, 64-yard scoring drive that also ended on a fourth-down Lulay TD run -- this one coming from a single-yard out to tie the score at 24-24 with 4:41 remaining.



After a failed drive by each team, the Wildcats got the ball back on their own 25-yardline with 1:21 left. After four straight runs by Hall, the 'Cats threw deep, only to have the ball intercepted at the MSU 20 and returned to the Weber State 41. The play set up the Bobcats for their final strike to end the game.



The game-ending field goal is the second for Montana State over the Wildcats in as many years. Last year, the Wildcats led 17-0 at the half in Bozeman, Mont. only to see the Bobcats score 20 straight ending with a game-winning kick.



Lulay ended the game with 142 yards and two TD's on 18 carries, and 283 yards on 18 of 41 passing with three interceptions. Murray caught seven passes for 119 yards.



Hall led the Wildcats rushing attack with 173 yards and one TD on 35 carries. Sione Havili had his best day as a Wildcat with 12 carries for 72 yards. Jackson caught three passes for 72 yards and two touchdowns. Pizarro finished 8 of 19 passing for 136 yards with two TD's and two interceptions.



The Wildcats fall to 2-4 on the year overall and 1-2 in Big Sky play, while the Bobcats improve to 4-2 overall and 2-0 in the conference. Weber State will be home next week for Homecoming as Sacramento State comes to Ogden.

083190 wrote:Fire Bailey? C'mon! He hasn't dropped any passes or missed any blocks! He also has not let the opponents offense run it down our throats. He wasn't noticable when Weber went 75 yards in 45 seconds at the end of the half either. Why bag on him and give the defense a free pass? The team is putting up good offensive numbers. They could have scored 45-50 points today without the drops. It almost sounds like that other board where winning just isn't enough. Today may not have been pretty, but the outcome was good. Kinda like sausage....not one wants to see it being made, but it sure is good! Get off Bailey!

Naw --- don't fire Bailey. I was just agreeing with Bozone that it appears that the Cats are getting schooled by superior game plans, but luckily half time adjustments are working.

But, you have to admit, the offense has taken a ton of bad penalties this year, and our offensive run blocking is...well...offensive.

It's clear that our guys are not mentally prepared for these road games. This has always been a problem for the Kramer Bobcats. Where is the emotion? Great coaches know how to get their teams mentally prepared for these types of games. Kramer has been in the business long enough to know how to do it. Now it's time to get it done!

My abbreviated recap: we won -- fantastic comeback -- Weber must feel snakebit against us. Numerous questions still.
1. Do we just lack the horses to stop the running game? Teams run inside on us and on the edge on us. We're a tad late in the season to be sucking this badly against the run, even with a new defensive scheme. We've had injuries at key positions, but we weren't exactly world beaters against the run before them. Scheme or personnel problem or both?
2. Do we just lack the horses to have a running game of our own outside of q.b. draws and scrambles? We're a tad late in the season to be averaging less than 3 yds. per carry each game at running back.
3. Is it a coincidence that we have a buttload of penalties every game (I don't believe myopic refs can be blamed for it all); also we typically give up a touchdown at the beggining and/or end of the first and the beginning of the second? These seem to be coaching issues. WTF?

1) I just happened to catch a comment made by the announcers during the game that 5 of our top 8 D-lineman were gone. Combine that with losing a 2-time All Big Sky LB and another LB who would've undoubtedly made All Big Sky this season, and you see why we're struggling against the run; however those struggles appear to end after halftime. WAIT! I've got an idea!! Let's make our halftime adjustments BEFORE the game starts since we can be pretty certain that teams are simply going to try to slam the ball at us!! What a concept!

2) I REALLY don't know why our running game (besides #14) is so anemic but we came into this season KNOWING that it cost us the win vs EWU last year; I thought the coaches & players were determined to get better running the ball. It simply hasn't happened to date and I'm not sure that it can or will at this point. From all the preseason info I read/saw/heard, I thought we were going to have a big, nasty bunch of lineman capable of simply blowing D-lines off the ball but it isn't so. Coach Mac and his players no doubt understand the importance of establishing the run as we head further into October & November, so I HOPE they get better in a hurry. I do think one area to focus on is driving into JD's head every single day the importance of hitting the hole first, THEN looking for a lane to exploit. If JD ends up as our "featured" back for most of the rest of this season and dances around like he did yesterday, we'll have NO running game.

3) Penalties? I have no idea how you go about stopping them but they are CLEARLY a problem for this crew. If we continue to commit them as we have the past few weeks, it WILL cost us games against teams like EWU, PSU, the Griz, and in the playoffs. The false-starts by our O-line are unforgivable to me; how hard is it to see the football with your peripheral vision and WAIT until it moves, ESPECIALLY when we're running so many silent counts when Travis is in shotgun? From this point on, ANY personal fouls (with the exception of face-masks) should be dealt with pretty severely the following week.



I'll add 2 more gripes to this list; areas that I feel we MUST improve on if we hope to go no worse than 3-2 the rest of the way.

First, our zone pass defense. Every week I get more frustrated seeing receivers running completely unguarded down the middle of the field. As experienced as Hunter & Fuller are at this point, can't we start mixing in more man-to-man? It appears to me those 2 can handle it and the middle of our zone is as soft as a warm marshmallow right now.

Second, our pass rush is ANEMIC. I thought one of the plusses of pass rush from the 3-4 is that the offense knows a LB or 2 will be coming but they won't know which ones or where they'll come from. Well, from my perspective, it doesn't appear that our LB's are getting anywhere near the QB (with the exception of Daly's big hit on Pizzaro's roll-out). If a lineman gets his hands on our blitzing LB's, they simply overpower us; when we get them locked on a running back, I've not seen many times that our LB can get past them quick enough to pressure the QB. If we can't figure out a way to put consistent heat on opposing QB's in the next month, there's no way we beat EWU with Meyer back in the pocket and Kimble running through our secondary.

083190 wrote:Fire Bailey? C'mon! He hasn't dropped any passes or missed any blocks! He also has not let the opponents offense run it down our throats. He wasn't noticable when Weber went 75 yards in 45 seconds at the end of the half either. Why bag on him and give the defense a free pass? The team is putting up good offensive numbers. They could have scored 45-50 points today without the drops. It almost sounds like that other board where winning just isn't enough. Today may not have been pretty, but the outcome was good. Kinda like sausage....not one wants to see it being made, but it sure is good! Get off Bailey!

The fact is that with the athletes we have we are underacheiving. The Griz are scoring more points a game than we are and they have one guy. We have the best QB in our history and 2 pretty good recievers and so on but our offense is still middle of the pack in the Sky. You would think with the guys we have we would be putting up bigger numbers. I think we win in spite of Bailey not because of him. I am scared when Lulay leaves.

I tried to post last night but in my stupor i must have lost it so...

the offence played according to the game plan...pass...and our receivers let us down or it would have been an early exit for weber...consequently they were in it until the end...but we come out with a win...hopefully the receivers pick it up the rest of the year...that works for me...

the defense did not blitz against weber because weber did not pass much and had only one completion in the second half...why blitz??...contain and stop the opponent...we did...and held them to about 100 yards the second half...i like that...

adjustments are called adjustments because rarely is a defensive or offensive scheme durable enough to contain the opponent from the beginning of the contest to the end...the cats adjust pretty well both offensively and defensively during the week and during games...the way they are supposed to...i like that too...

tho all of us may not like the way we win when things don't go according to the game plan or scheme...i personally am pretty damn thankful for the "w"...

let's look ahead one game at a time and have some faith in the coaching staff and players...

in closing i will admit i don't always like the way the offensive scheme is assembled by the oc but yesterday it worked...

now i will see if i can post this thing...

Some of my thoughts after watching the game live.

First Gatewood was very off yesterday. I agree with the above that if he catches those 2 TD's it was game over early on. In his defense, he has been fighting a respiratory ailment for weeks now and was very unhealthly. You could hear him weazing as he came in and out of the locker room - not making excuses just reporting what I was told and heard. Murray was big again and Guinn had a couple of nice catches. Roosevelt looked good and was open for a TD but the ball was tipped away. From what I was told we will see a lot more of the 5 wide sets so get used to it.

On the 3 INT's. The first and last were all on Travis, the second was obviously Ricky's. Travis made it happen at the end but he really didn't have a great day. His mom said it best after the game when she was told his passing stats - "Those suck". I expect to see a lot better next week.

The lack of a running game is on the lack of trying not execution. Evin looked good on his limited attempts and should have gotten more. Travis is going to wear down if we expect him to produce 400 yards of total offense every week. He was so sore yesterday that he could barely kneel down to say hi to my kids. We have to find a way to take some heat off of him.

Our run defense is really bad right now. I know the injuries have a lot to do with that but regardless, we can't stop a run on 3rd and 10 knowing it is coming. That has to improve or we won't beat a good team and Weber was not a good team. Let's hope Mac and/or Clive are back next week that will help some. From talking to several people I think Clive will be back but I doubt Mac will be. I also talked to Kolone and he said he is healing well but several other people told me he is a long way off yet. And the pass rush - don't even get me started.......

The penalties were terrible again. The first series both of the 15 yarders were legitimate and aided the first TD big time. That has to change at some point or we won't win - period. I really don't understand why we do it but it is out of control.

Weber's facilities, crowd, and overall gameday experience are really bad. It was like watching a high school game with a bunch of old people. The crowd was never a factor and I think we made more noise than they did at times. NDSU's fans were better in Bozeman than Weber's at home. I guess they really are a basketball team.

I know we won and that is great but we sould have beat that team by at least 2 TD's on the road. If we want to come out of Portland with a W next week we have to play more like we did against OSU and SFA. Since then we have become more inconsistent and that isn't going to cut it.

1) If Ricky has what I had the last week, I can completely understand the kind of day he had yesterday. That cold simply takes away all energy and I applaud him for playing.

2)Wycat, that's great input for those of us just watching the game. I also applaud your commitment to travel and watch our 'Cats play. I hope to meet you at future home and away games.

3) I think it's time for the captains to call a player's only meeting. Every season there comes a time when the players need to get together and motivate themselves without the coaches present. This is where things like mental mistakes can be brought up and dealt with. Also, the motivation and mental preparation issues can be handled here also. I personally see these meetings as great re-commitments to the season. And, in my opinion, that time is now!

bobcatmaniac wrote:Offensive coordinator sucks. He should be fired.

Is he the one who was dropping passes?

E is right in the regards of you give Lex the ball on 3rd and 24 and he runs 68 yards for a TD, and you look good. You throw a pass to a wide open guy in the endzone and he drops the ball, and people bitch about the play calling?

barechestcat wrote:1) If Ricky has what I had the last week, I can completely understand the kind of day he had yesterday. That cold simply takes away all energy and I applaud him for playing...

Some joke about a guy not being able to "catch a cold" comes to mind...