After going scoreless in blowout loss to Kansas State, WSU's offense has real questions to answer | Analysis

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Sep. 12—MANHATTAN, Kan. — After the blowout had finally come to an end, after Washington State's offense wrapped up a scoreless day in a lopsided loss to Kansas State here on Saturday afternoon, Cougar quarterback Caden Pinnick didn't have much to say.

What were some of the main problems on offense?

"We just lost," Pinnick said. "Next question."

What was holding back WSU's passing offense, which produced just 65 yards?

"Good team," Pinnick said. "We lost."

Do you feel like OC Matt Miller's playcalls are putting your offense in the best positions to succeed?

"It's not for me to say," Pinnick said. "We just gotta get better."

Whatever you think of his approach in this scenario, Pinnick didn't provide many answers for the way WSU's offense languished in this 34-7 loss, dropping the Cougars to 0-2 for the first time since 2016. For the game, Pinnick completed just 9 of 20 passes for 65 yards, becoming the first WSU signal-caller to pass for fewer than 100 yards in one game since Jeff Tuel did so in 2010. The Cougars' scoreless offensive showing is also the program's first since 2010, when Paul Wulff was head coach.

Needless to say, that's not company WSU coach Kirby Moore wants to keep. Even in the program's most listless offensive outings, like a blowout loss to Arizona in 2023 or a shocking road loss to Cal in 2017, the Cougars managed to put up points on offense. That wasn't the case here in Manhattan, where WSU couldn't even find a way to punch in a garbage-time touchdown, which the Cougs did even in a road rout against North Texas last season.

There's also this problem: In Saturday's game, the WSU offense converted just 2 of 12 third downs. Add that to the Cougars' effort in last weekend's Apple Cup, when they went 0-for-11, and they have started the season with a 2-for-23 conversion rate on third down. That's barely 9%, which requires rounding up.

We could sit here all day and write superlatives about this WSU offensive game, but you get the point already. The Cougs looked bad. Overstating just how bad might be a challenge. What's more interesting is how many of this unit's problems are because of the circumstances — facing a Big 12 team on the road on a short week, going up against a talent disparity, being without top receiver Tony Freeman — and how many could the Cougars conceivably turn around?

"Still first and second down. You go back to that," Moore said after the game, referencing the biggest problems with his team's offensive effort. "I don't know the exact third-and-long and XL numbers, but I think that was fairly high again. We gotta create explosives in those situations. Trying to put together eight, 10, 12-play drives versus a defense like K-State, that's gonna be pretty difficult."

Moore had a point about his team's problems generating chunks of yards on first and second down. The Cougars' average yards-to-go on third down was 9, which is unsustainable against just about any opponent, much less a Power Four one like the Wildcats.

But here's the thing: WSU faced exactly the same problem in last week's Apple Cup against Washington, which is the reason this feels discouraging for the Cougars. They didn't make any meaningful adjustments.

Headed into this game at K-State, much of WSU's offensive success figured to hinge on the speed with which offensive coordinator Matt Miller could make adjustments. That cost WSU in the Apple Cup, when the Cougars found success rolling out of the pocket and running to the outside — but that took Miller three quarters to realize.

Against Kansas State, Miller didn't appear to have learned his lesson. The most striking example came in the second quarter, when the Cougars were facing a third-and-2 from the Wildcats' 37. Miller went with a middle run for running back Kirby Vorhees, who gained just 1 yard. It felt like the kind of play call a coordinator makes when he was already planning on going for it on fourth down, and at the plus-37, that's a fine idea.

The problem was the play Miller went with next: a QB keeper up the middle for Pinnick, who was met immediately at the line of scrimmage, turned away for no gain and a turnover on downs.

That prompts what is beginning to feel like a pressing question: Is Miller's play calling putting the Cougars in the best positions to succeed?

"We gotta look at that," Moore said. "Naturally, I think just the third and fourth down — that was probably a big one there in the first half. They did a good job. They stopped us. You look at that sequence there of plays and kinda the numbers and what the defense did as well."

Before we go further, we should detail this bit of context: WSU is in the midst of one of the most grueling opening schedules in the country, going on the road to face Washington and then Kansas State. The Cougars were expected to lose to UW by about 24 and K-State by about 19. These are not the kinds of opponents that the Cougars will face in Pac-12 play, which is when we can probably start judging this team in earnest, not against Power Four opponents at their houses. These two games are a tall task for just about any team in the country, not just Washington State.

Still, the Cougars' play calling has left much to be desired, no matter the opponent in these first two games. On that front, in Saturday's game, a few other sequences stood out like sore thumbs. After a weather delay, the Cougars got the ball to start the second half. They were riding a nice wave of momentum thanks to safety Jaylen Thomas' pick-six to end the half. If they could put together a scoring drive here, they could pull within one score and make things interesting.

Instead, here is how WSU's drive unfolded: False start on right guard Nick Bakken. Vorhees rush for 6 yards. Pinnick incompletion. Pinnick incompletion. It was a quick three-and-out for the Cougars. Their defense went on to surrender a long touchdown rush moments later, putting the Wildcats up 24-7.

"Just gotta execute," Pinnick said when asked about that sequence.

Bakken's false start provides a nice segue into the other part of this problem for WSU, which is its offensive line. The Cougars' front five permitted two sacks, according to Pro Football Focus, with the third sack chalked up to other reasons. Left tackle Ashton Tripp, who gave up one of those to star edge rusher Wendell Gregory, finished with a PFF pass-blocking grade of just 1.9 — about as bad as it gets. Right tackle Jaylin Caldwell, who subbed in in the second half, registered a figure of 11.9. And left guard Kyle Martin, who was benched to start the second half before returning later in the game, finished with a mark of 30.7.

The numbers are a bit better in the run-blocking department. Bakken graded out really well, finishing at 85.5, which is far above average. Jonny Lester, who started at right tackle before moving inside and later getting benched when the game got out of hand, was at 74.4. Caldwell and Tripp each checked in around the mid-60s.

Perhaps what stands out most: Martin finished with a run-blocking grade of 49.4. Pair that with his pass-blocking grade, the aforementioned 30.7, and you start to see a problem. You go back to last week's Apple Cup, when Martin earned a pass-blocking grade of 8.7 and a run-blocking grade of 38.1 — both lowest on the team — and the problem becomes even more serious. Could the Cougars reconfigure their offensive line, the way they did in the second half, when Martin went to the bench?

It's important to note that those numbers could change, in either direction, as PFF amends their grades in the next day or two.

Whatever is going on along WSU's offensive line, it's not helping the Cougars' offense, which got just 45 rushing yards from Vorhees and 29 from Maxwell Woods, the second straight game each has been held under the 50-yard mark. To their credit, WSU coaches mixed things up on the offensive line in Saturday's second half.

Is that the culprit behind these two miserable outings from the Cougs' offense? It's entirely possible. What about the play from Pinnick? That's also a real possibility. Next week, WSU hosts FCS Duquesne, which should be an easy win for the Cougars. It's likely they'll bounce back, and that could give them real momentum going into the following game, a home matchup with Arizona.

Still, WSU's offensive outing here on Saturday won't inspire much confidence. The Cougs' offense, their play calling, will have to improve in big ways to change that.

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