Our special teams have probably lost the game for us. I know we weren't that close but they had great field position every drive and returned one for a touchdown. We will never win a game like that. I do agree though, Lopina is our QB for sure and we do need more push up the middle. with all that said, i saw many bright spots.(The flea flicker, the 2 passes Lopina- Karstetter, the drive to the 1 yard line, and the hit by Block on Owusu.) Overall, the score could easily have been 20-24-Stanford and been competitive.

Special teams were far from it, good call. Not just the TD off the kickoff that sealed the game either, but just the chunks of yardage given up that killed. Sherman broke about five tackles on that one punt return and nearly took it to the house, and that just puts stress on the D. That said, they cleaned up special teams after they were so awful in game one of '08...and well, we know what happened everywhere else! Don't want to parallel '09 with '08 yet, but the openers had some similar looks beyond just the score.

After the first drive, during which we sure seemed to control the line of scrimmage, I expected us to pound the ball the rest of the game. I'm all for mixing it up with the occasional pass, but sure seems like we didn't take advantage of one area that we may have had been successful. Plus, control the running game, control the clock, keep the ball out of their hands. Long story short: seems like we should have run way more.

Just napped away Sunday afternoon. Despite the L, Cougar Football Saturday still kicks ass!

After seeing us play this game, I predict a 1-11, (0-9)season with the exact same level of play. But if we improve our special teams and make bigger plays on defense, I predict 7-5 (5-4)losing only to Stanford, USC, CAL, Notre Dame and Oregon State. They had better improve starting this week.

Can't imagine why you would possibly need a nap Hoot! And couldn't agree more, Cougar Football Saturday still does kick ass.

Let's see what happens with the oldest coaching axiom(crutch?) ever - teams always make their biggest improvement from week one to week two...although I think we wrote about that a year or so ago, and found that it's pretty much bulls*it when it comes to the Cougs in the last 10 or so years? But whatever, we'll see. Sounds as though Hawai'i has some major issues, barely beating Central Arkansas and trailing in the 4th quarter.

Was anyone else (who actually likes CPW) annoyed with him playing Lobbestael from the 4th quarter on? Yeah, we were probably toast by then, but I wanted the score and the game to remain competitive (if only in feeling).

It felt exactly like the USC game where we (understandably) had to show up, but it was obvious from the first snap our only goal was to get through without getting hurt.

We treated that game like a practice and didn't even try to compete. When CPW reinstalled Lobbestael, it felt like the whole game was a practice, we weren't trying to compete anymore, and the result didn't matter to him. It felt like one of the Junior High basketball games I coach where everyone gets to play, you'd like to win, but it's more important that everyone gets playing time--the score be darned.

If Lopina had played the fourth that game would have been a 10 to 13 point loss instead of the bad loss it looked to be.

Cougfan.com is reporting that we nailed two huge recruits (both 3-stars) that visited on Saturday. That makes for numbers 9 and 10.

CPW was looking hesitant at times, he was going to punt on 4th down with 10 minutes left in the 4th quarter on the Stanford 40yd line, so we all yelled at him and he took a timeout and went for it (and failed, but it's the thought that counts...?). Maybe he had Lobbestael in because the kid has a stronger arm downfield? Oh, Lobbestael is also really really good at answering the red phone that goes off on the sideline.

Nice to hear on the recruits! I know we had a lot of them in town, and they were roaming the field before the game, taking it all in. I wish the crowd would have been bigger and given them a better feeling of what gameday can be like in Pullman, but what can you do? Glad to see some commits come out of it though.

Can't disagree with the Lopina feel. He looked good. Hopefully the two-QB stuff will end here shortly?

I had my original thoughts after being at the game, but I held off comment until I watched the replay. I hate to pick on one kid, but Brandon Jones is terrible, he is LeJuan Gibbons reincarnated if anyone remembers him from the mid 90's. That guy cost us a lot of big plays, though he did have one nice tackle on special teams. Let's hope his sore ankle was the problem, though I don't really think so. Later in the game, Simmons looked to be decent at the corner position.

Besides the special teams already mentioned, the thing I think they really need to clean up is the tackling. There were a ton of missed tackles. The only one I saw actually hit Toby Gehrhart and knock him backwards was Bland. Man that kid is a stud. I too im intrigued by Hoffman-Ellis, he seems to bring in some much needed speed.

Overall, the offense looked way improved over last year and will keep games closer just by staying on the field longer. If they would use Mitz in the redzone more, they may get more 6's than 3's. Oh and Karstetter in the corner more please. The defense does not look very good as a whole. There are a few bright spots, but the D-line and Cornerbacks do not look good, at least after one game. I think Turpin came on toward the end of the game and looked good though.

In watching the game on TV and hearing from my father-in-law, a season ticket holder, we saw similar things. There is hope for the future, the team seems to be buying into what CPW is doing, and most importantly, we look like a football team on both sides of the ball -not yet thought on special teams. What I really liked was that I could tell on tv that the guys were making adjustments and playing hard/well the whole game. That really says a lot about the program, big strides from last year.