Short fields and tough spots: WSU's defense has made the most of the circumstances

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Oct. 13—PULLMAN — In his long college football journey, Keith Brown has learned the importance of tuning out the noise. During Washington State's fall camp, he deleted all social media off his phone, understanding that if he wants he and his unit to reach their potential, they can't get sucked into the distractions.

Heck, he doesn't always look at the scoreboard. Last month, in his WSU team's home setback against Arizona, he went into halftime not knowing the score. He had to ask a teammate to find out, he said.

Turns out, that's part of the reason how Brown and the Cougars have done their part on defense, using herculean efforts to keep their team in games when their floundering offense has left a lot out there. At least for Brown's part, he's done his best to ignore the problems his team's offense is having, even if it means jogging out there for extra series thanks to turnovers.

"Just continue to compete," Brown likes to tell his teammates.

As WSU defensive coordinator Trent Bray makes his return to Corvallis, where he worked as Oregon State's head coach for the 2024 season and part of the 2025 campaign, the Cougars will have to do a lot of competing to pull an upset. The Beavers, who opened as 17.5-point favorites, own one of the country's most prolific offenses, engineered in large part by quarterback Brayden Atkinson and true freshman wideout Jesse Legree.

Which leads to this question: How does WSU's competitiveness on defense factor into a matchup with such a productive OSU offense?

"I don't think it affects it at all. It's just another opportunity to go out there and compete," Brown said. "I'm sure our entire back end is just excited for the challenge, ready to do what they're supposed to do. No matter who we're playing, no matter what the rankings are and stuff like that, we always wanna go and play our best."

As WSU's offense earns all the headlines, turning things over to redshirt freshman quarterback Owen Eshelman over the struggling Caden Pinnick, perhaps a look at the Cougars' defense is in order. Bray's group has consistently held its own in the face of daunting circumstances, many of which have been caused by WSU's offense, which has lost nine turnovers — seven from Pinnick.

First, consider this statistic, which paints the picture of what the Cougars' defense is going through: In BCF Toys' field position value rankings, WSU ranks dead last in the country, No. 138 of 138 FBS teams. In simplest terms, this means the Cougars are averaging the worst starting field position in the country, when averaging the drives their offense starts at the drives their defense starts at.

Whittle that down to just the starting field position WSU's defense has averaged, though, and the problem becomes even clearer. The Cougars rank second-to-last nationally in that category, checking in with a mark of 65.2 — which means on average, opponents are starting drives at about their own 35-yard line. Only one other team, Rice, gives opponents better starting field position.

To be sure, though, this is not an indictment on WSU's defense. It's the opposite, an explanation behind some of the scores the Cougars have given up. In Washington State's 17-16 loss to Utah State over the weekend, the visitors lost the lead in the fourth quarter, when a fumble from tight end Jack Pedersen set the Aggies up at the Cougar 19. Three plays later, they jogged into the end zone to take the lead for good.

That reality is best illustrated by BCF Toys' defensive short field rankings, which measure how often a defense has to jog out with the opponent starting at its own 40 yard line or further. The Cougars' defense has been handed those situations 25% of the time. Only 15 other defenses have met that fate more often.

All of that, though, only serves to make this WSU defense's accomplishments even more impressive. In Friday's game, defensive end Linus Zunk and defensive tackle Jirah Leaupepetele each earned sacks. The Cougs forced seven punts. On the season, they've forced five turnovers, about middle of the pack nationwide.

In six games, WSU is allowing 23.7 points per game, which is fifth in the Pac-12. Maybe that doesn't sound very impressive — but then you consider what this group has been up against. That's when their outings click, the genius behind Bray's operation zooms into focus.

"We're a very connected team," Brown said. "We have our captains group chats, leadership meetings and stuff like that, and we just continue to reiterate that we're a team at the end of the day. The last thing you wanna do is divide the team. There is no division. We're one team. I think honestly, we're just as close as we were going into week one. So I'm still excited for rest of the season."

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