TUESDAY MORNING QUARTERBACK: These aren't your father's Cougs; this isn't your father's Pac-12

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Sep. 29—COMMENTARY

Pac-12 After Dark returns to Pullman this week.

A conference contender from California will be making its way to Martin Stadium for a 6:30 p.m. Saturday matchup under the brand-new bright lights.

A decade ago, that sentence could have referred to USC.

Now, it describes Fresno State. The 3-1 Bulldogs are one of six new football-playing members of the revamped Pac-12 alongside holdovers Oregon State and Washington State.

The Cougars and Bulldogs kick off Pac-12 play opposite one another this weekend.

For the Cougs, 1-3 after playing three Power Four schools within the first four weeks of the season, this week carries special significance.

It represents the first meaningful conference game since the legacy Pac-12 collapsed three seasons ago. Since that collapse WSU has had three Cougar football coaches, three athletic directors and two university presidents.

This game will have a direct impact on the Pac-12 Conference standings. There will be no tongue-in-cheek "Pac-2 Championship" at the end of the year. One of eight schools will be crowned a champion. The last four or five weeks don't matter nearly as much as the next nine.

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"It's a clean slate," said WSU coach Kirby Moore of Pac-12 play. "Our guys are battle-tested. They've played great competition, and with that, they should have their head high confidence. We've got to play a cleaner game for sure. But there's been flashes on all three facets of the program with offense, defense, and special teams, and we've got to carry that over to Saturday."

Moore is right.

These Cougs have shown flashes of excellence through a difficult schedule. Wazzu, a Group of Six team by definition, held its own for at least three quarters with Washington and Arizona and got trounced by Kansas State on the road.

Yes, the Huskies' relevance as a Big Ten team is in question after a three-point home loss to Minnesota on Saturday, but the resources that UW pours into its program AND the experience gap between coaches made the 24-10 Apple Cup final arguably more encouraging than disappointing.

Moore is four games into his head coaching career, not just at WSU, but overall.

The first-time head coach is not perfect, he was never going to be.

But his track record as a successful play caller for the last four seasons — the first of which at Fresno State and the latter three at Missouri — should give you the confidence that, as the kids say, "this guy knows ball."

A high football IQ is kind of a prerequisite for the job, of course. The real money — and the gap between the literal winners and losers of college football games — is made over the course of a game, and particularly at halftime.

"Halftime adjustments" can be a sort of overblown concept. But coaches do alter their plan over the course of the contest. It's a game of chess where coaches not only need to recognize what their opponents are doing, but also come up with a plan to stop them.

Arizona did this en route to a 34-24 win over Wazzu on Saturday in Pullman.

With Cougar quarterback Caden Pinnick hitting a lot of short passes, but making costly mistakes when pressured, Arizona blitzed more as the game went on. Pinnick and the Cougs had no answers for that, generating just 39 yards in the third quarter, with their only second-half touchdown coming courtesy of a Wildcat defender falling down and junior wide receiver Brenden Ganashamoorthy getting wide-open for the 46-yard score that put WSU down by seven with just over 7 minutes left in the fourth quarter.

Credit to Ganashamoorthy and Tank Hawkins for running their routes crisply and seemingly catching the Cats off guard.

Of course, it was not enough.

The Cougs have to find a rhythm on offense, Moore said. Against UW and Arizona, they have had that for just a handful of drives each, and the defense has spent a significant amount of time on the field — 34 minutes versus Arizona.

How can the offense start the second half faster?

"It's execution. It's everyone being on the same page," Moore said. "First play of the third quarter there, we had a shot play called, and I don't necessarily think the details were exactly what we wanted them to be, and then that put us behind (the chains). Then we get a penalty, and so there's a number of things there. It's not just one play, but we all got to be on the same page."

Pinnick, with his turnovers and other errors, has been far from perfect. The offensive line and running backs have struggled to foster a run game in three out of four games and the wide receiver room's depth has been tested with top target Tony Freeman out for the year. Tight ends have also been hit hard with injury; however, Moore said that junior Trey Leckner is back on the practice field and could make his season debut this week.

The process-related issues, from game-planning and adjustments to QB decision-making to poor blocking (see senior offensive lineman Jaylin Caldwell's missed assignment on kicker Jack Stevens' blocked field goal as Exhibit A) are internal issues that, if gone uncorrected, will undo WSU against even the worst of the Pac-12.

But take an average of how excellent WSU played in (the second half) of a 48-7 win over FCS Duquesne on Sept. 19 and how poorly they have looked at times in three losses to Power Four opponents, and you'll probably get a decent look at how Pac-12 play will be.

Against teams of similar stature, the Cougars will be challenged, but should also be a challenge for their opponents.

WSU simply lacks the revenue sharing and NIL budget to contend with the teams it used to contend with on a regular basis. That doesn't mean you'll never see an upset again. It just means you should temper your expectations, especially for a first-year head coach learning the ropes and, to look on the bright side, hanging with opponents until the fourth quarter. Credit defensive coordinator Trent Bray and his unit for a fair share of that success.

Players and coaches are human. That means they're capable of mistakes AND of learning from them.

These aren't your father's Cougs. This isn't your father's Pac-12.

But they are your Cougs.

So, give a first-year coach and his team a chance.

Taylor can be reached at 208-848-2260, staylor@lmtribune.com, or on X or Instagram @Sam_C_Taylor.

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