Usually I like to wait until Wednesday to do an analysis. It gives me time to read about the teams, players, etc and watch film. Lucky for me, when I came home for lunch today the Arizona/Cal game was on replay, and I pretty much saw all I need to know.
What surprised me is how much trouble Nick Foles has throwing deep passes. For some reason, I thought he could sling it, but most of his passes go to wide receivers in the flat. Arizona loves the yards after catch. Their formula seems to be throw a pass in the flat on 1st down and hope for at least 5 yards. It seems like they did that every play. And thinking back to last year when Foles torched the Beavs, I seem to remember a lot of horizontal passing. They have a lot of "2nd and short" because of it. I'm not sure how I feel about the Beavs defending that type of pass. One thing I know: Foles doesn't take many seven step drops, and that's going to negate the Beavs' new-found pass rush.
The game will be decided by the Beavers defense, and it will come down to making sound, fundamental, one on one tackles in open space, in the flat. Now that Collins is manning half that area, I can feel comfortable if Arizona decides to go there. Starting Doctor as the other OLB would be a wise move. Paea & Co are going to have to do their damage in defending the run game. There won't be any sacks to be had with Arizona's 3 step drops. What you want to see from the front four is penetration and tackles for a loss on run plays. Grigsby is a solid runner, but injuries seemed to have left him less explosive.
On the offensive side of the ball, I'm concerned. Arizona's stats are inflated due to their first two opponents, but watching them versus Cal they can get after a DI offensive line, and Golden is a good corner. It's a precarious combination–Katz probably throws his first career interception this weekend.
Some key points:
- The Wildcats aren't an offensive juggernaut; the Beavers have a leaky defense.
- The Beavers can score; Arizona can play defense.
- The Beavs return game (i.e. special teams) is playing out of their minds' right now.
Advantage: Wildcats
Advantage: None/Stalemate.
Advantage: Beavers
So, to me this game comes down to (a) the Beavers' defense, specifically in the flat and (b) whether or not the return men can create good field position for the offense. The offense needs a short field.
Oregon State's confidence is riding high right now, which can tilt the scale. However, the Wildcats can match that confidence, and have other intangibles in their favor, such as two weeks preparation and a 4pm kickoff, the hottest part of the day.
I see this contest coming down to the wire. Do not be surprised to see the game go to overtime, or won/lost on a last second field goal or missed extra point. It's a pick 'em game, in my opinion, and I'm begrudgingly giving the edge to the home team.
24-23, Arizona
I saw about the second half of the Arizona/Iowa game and although I saw weaknesses in Arizona, their D-line was terrifying.
Late in the game, when Iowa was making a comeback push, they sacked the QB 4 consecutive plays. 1st down, 2nd down, 3rd down, 4th down. Sack, sack, sack, sack. Don’t know how many they had total, but I know they had 4 in a row. And it wasn’t like the QB was holding the ball too long- the guys were just blasting through the O-line like nobody’s business. And Iowa’s O-line passed the sight test too…which ours doesn’t.
The Beavs have better skill position players than Iowa, good pass blockers, and a mobile QB. The Beavs’ O-line has run blocking issues, not pass.
Also, Arizona was majorly jacked for that game, and still gave up 27 points and barely won.
The Beavs have a very legit shot in this game.
The way you combat that aggressive play is to spot their bread and butter play then use it on them with misdirection.
There’s nothing funnier than watching a defense recognize a play they see all day every day, go to their spots, then discover that it really isn’t the play they see all day every day.
Or maybe we put Darkins on the fly sweep motion, and when the ball is snapped he just takes out the end… on every play… and Quizz just follows his block.
I actually really like that play you just mentioned. Personnel wise it will confuse the opposing defense because they won’t know what to do with Darkins out as a WR. We don’t use FB’s as pass catchers in our offense, especially in the slot. The confusion on their defense as to what to do would be huge. It could even result in them wasting a timeout which makes it worth it, even if it gains nothing. My favorite part though is Darkins running full bore at D-end to take his head off. You can suck the aggression right out of a player that way. Run correctly we could have running lanes on that side all day.
Sounds like Tecmo Bowl. You had one of four plays, and when the defense picked the same one, watch out….
Sort of what the TE does when they go in motion, but you get a kid going almost full bore that arguably will hit harder than a TE most of the time. Switching a pulling guard for a motioning FB/WR. Mabe even put him in the slot, opposite, and go in motion, then Darkins doesn’t have to drag his but so far and get so winded before the play even starts!
35-20 Arizona
You sir, are overly negative!
Heh, here’s a quote from the Oregonian:
*
Defensive tackle Stephen Paea said the difference in the OSU defense the first three games of the season compared to last week against ASU was pretty simple.
“It’s Pac-10,” Paea said. “Time to go.”
*
There you have it: the OSU defense treats OOC as a scrimmage.
Yeah, saw that one. Don’t really like it. Though I believe they are channeling Riley and his staff…
I was reading some of the articles on O-Live ( really painful with the middle school duck fan comments ) and some of the guys said it would have been great to win the OOC games, but kind of talked like they were prep games for the PAC 10. That there whole focus has been PAC 10. Hopefully they realize that they can’t lose a game and have any hope of the Rose Bowl. Right now they are in contention. Lose to AZ, who knows. We evaluate the Beavs on past performance, but is the team that lost to TCU playing this Saturday? Last year they were inept against Cinncy and AZ then a lot better. Big improvements last week, but almost lost it.
Not too big a worry about heat. This is October now. High for Saturday will be around 88. Cooling off for to be 85 at kickoff and down to upper 70’s by 4th quarter. Still warm enough for cramping. But not exhausting like the upper 90’s to 100 would be. Should see loose fast play. This game is not a Pac10 Champ requisite, but pretty darn close to it. My Orange glasses always pick Beavs anymore.
Didn’t we have the conversation about Foles and his game… that he gets progressively worse as more tape is accrued?
I don’t know if our coaches will pick up his game with so little tape on the wrinkles he’s thrown in this year, but his skills remain the same. He’s going to try to kill us with that same 15 yard fade.
We’ve been seeing more cover-2 from our D in the last couple weeks. If we run some CB blitzes from that formation, we may see some hits on Foles that make him hurry a little. That could put a CB right in the lateral passing lanes, and the safeties would come over the top to stop the intermediate fade.
Now we just need to keep Arizona from running over their left side.
I think every game is a pac-10 champ requisite this year, especially how the ucks are playing (granted their D sucks like always but who needs a D when you put up 50).
I don’t see how the Beavs win this game, we couldn’t stop the flat routes last year and we knew it was coming, by and large that defense was better (that seems odd to say but it is true). I say that we should put Doctor and Collins at OLB and move Pankey to the middle. I don’t like having Pankey on the field but that is a compromise I can live with, it doesn’t change the fact that we sucked at MLB anyways.
I think we should play more zone coverage against Foles and make him beat us deep. Play a bunch of cover 2, keeping the safeties out of the box. The LB’s should have the ability to stay in the box in cover 2 to stop the run. That does give us 7 in the box after all, they will only have 7 because they often go with 4 WR sets. The corners rolled up tight will help stop the outside run and will match the short screen and pop pass routes of UA. The big deal is that the OLB’s have to move quick to the sideline because the UA will try to use 2 WR’s vs our 1 CB to get an advantage in the flats. Against the cover 2 Foles will try to the deep out route to beat us, if he does well then hats off to him (I don’t think he can, need the most arm strength to throw that route). If we still get beat, play a man zone cover 2. Finally mix in some cover 3, moving the OLB’s to flats (especially on third and long). Cover 3 should allow the corners enough time to help with the tackle. Cover 3 also allows us to blitz a safety or MLB without losing too much. Our biggest vulnerability there is over the middle zone. I think mixing up coverages instead of a typical man allows us an opportunity to win the game.
Speaking of coverages, people mention that Hardin got beat deep on a couple of deep middle routes, I haven’t seen the specific play but I would like to argue that this is probably a scheme issue rather than a Hardin issue. Banker is known to do hybrid man schemes where they do in fact pass the route along like a zone but the scheme is still routed in a man coverage. For instance a deep middle route might pass to a safety if the safety’s man runs a short route as Hardin’s man runs a deep post. This shortens the amount of running that Hardin has to do while also providing safety help. The best way to describe this is a very complex Man-Free (Cover 1-Free). I am not a fan of it but that is just me. The bright side is it has given Mitchell some great plays on the ball, largely due to scheme. Don’t get me wrong Mitchell is a great player but he is helped by scheme.
Overall, Beavs lose 42-27. We will get sacked like crazy just like last year and will bleed in the flats. Zona rushes for over 200 and passes for over 300, most coming on short routes and YAC. Katz throws 1 or 2 INTs and 220 yards. Quizz runs for 85 yards and 1 or 2 TDs.
I don’t see them getting the rushing yards. I can see some short passes go long with YAC, making for a couple big plays. But I don’t see the ‘grind it out on the ground’ mentality on this Arizona team.
I don’t think they grind it out, they effectively run the ball when you spread out of the box to cover their short passing game. They will pull most of their offense out of the box and beat you on the outside with the short passing game. They essentially wait for you to pull players out the box, then they run inside with a zone block scheme to gain a bunch of yards. Our LB corp struggles, especially our MLB. They will average like 8.0 ypc against us simply because we cant stop them man for man. UO uses the same idea, they just run first instead of pass first.
No defense can take away everything, but a good defensive scheme can take away the other team’s favorite plays, and make them beat you with something else.
Obviously, Foles loves to take a 3-step drop and throw the short-to-medium routes, especially to the outside. Banker surely knows this (after Foles killed us with those passes last year at Reser), and will scheme against these routes. Cam Collins at OLB will help such schemes.
I think this Saturday’s game turns on Banker’s success in taking away these short-to-medium outside routes.
If we can force Foles to opt for longer routes, that will force Foles to go with a deeper dropback (not his standard quick 3-step dropback). And that will give us a chance to pressure Foles in the pocket. Sure, Foles may complete some longer passes, but it’s worth the risk. Better that than letting Foles and the ‘Cats complete 80% of their passes to the wideouts in the flat, and ding us to death.
He also likes throwing the quick slant. He beat Cal on that pass.
Agreed. It’s mostly about the short, quick pass with Foles. He’s tall, so he can take a short drop and still see and throw over the D-line.
Banker needs to scheme with this in mind. Chuck the AZ receivers at the line of scrimmage to disrupt timing on the quick hitters. Drop LBs (or even DE’s) into coverage from time-to-time, to take away the quick slant over the middle. Coach the D-line to get their hands up asap when they see a short pass coming. Etc.
It won’t be easy, but there are ways to disrupt the short passing game that Foles favors. Banker needs to get Foles out of his comfort zone, and make him opt for longer routes. If OSU can limit the ‘Cats short passing game, we can win on Saturday. I don’t think the ‘Cats long passing game or their running game are good enough to beat us….
I dunno if dropping our DE’s into coverage is a great idea. Maybe if we had LeGrone or Victor Butler still.
The Huskers do it sometimes, and I hate it. Do it in rare occasions, like if they sniff out a screen, but don’t take a pass rusher out of the equation, and also expect them to cover WR/RB/TE types. They did it a few times vs. K-State last night and got burned. Pressure on the QB is more important. Sometimes open receivers don’t catch passes because the QB is running for his life or on his back!
I was thinking 2008 Victor Butler picking it off in the end zone verse ASU to seal the deal. Although that wasn’t the plan. Butler just sniffed it out. I found a cool interview while I was searching for when that happened.
http://espn.go.com/sportsnation/dallas/chat/_/id/34075
Yeah, I just don’t like ‘scheming’ it that way. It creates mismatches. Chase Thomas picked one off for Stanford doing that against ND I think? Or, was the Ducks game…? If you sniff it out, fine.
I think what hurt us so much last year is that there was so much unknown concerning Foles. With the speed at OLB hopefully we can stop the short passing stuff but then they can just run it. It really comes down to tackling in space (doesn’t it always?)
On offense we should test the waters with the zone read. If AZ DE’s are in the backfield every play that could open up some cutback lanes for Quizz. Also we might have to move the pocket to open up the passing game.
Pankey’s 15 tackles (14 downfield) are the worst thing that could have happened last week. Based on everything I’m reading, he’s going to be starting opposite Roberson, so not sure how much “speed” will be out there.
These coaches take forever to figure it out. It’s going to be beyond frustrating if Collins does not start the game.
Pankey definitely has his drawbacks and I think Collins needs to be on the field way more but I don’t know that I am feeling you on Doctor just yet. We’ll see, it really doesn’t matter who starts because everyone will play and whoever is getting it done will finish.
What I saw from Doctor is he’s fast in getting to the location, but doesn’t finish off plays (slightly undersized). He should improve. And even getting to a spot is sometimes enough to force the flow in the direction of other defenders. It’s better than what Pankey offers.
Angry, I agree 100% about you said about Doctor. He doesn’t finish plays and does get hung on blocks from time to time. Thing is Pankey has the same exact problems, why not put Doctor out there, at least he has more speed. Pankey’s 3 years of experience has helped him make 1 friggin’ play. Give Doctor a chance to improve for the future.
I’m going to go against the tide and pick OSU to win a low scoring game.. 17 – 14.
My rational is this:
We know Arizona will run a pass 1st, run second offense. In the passing game, we know their tendency is to throw short to intermediate routes and look for YAC. We also know Foles doesn’t run much.
On defense, I believe Banker will build on the scheme leveraged successfully against ASU to keep speed on the edge, and pressure on the QB. If Roberson is back, hopefully Banker goes more Nickel package and replaces the MLB with Collins as the extra safety, with either Roberson or Pankey moving to the middle. This would allow the defense to play pass 1st without an appreciable drop off in run support.
On offense: Hopefully Langdorf will give Arizona a dose of their own medicine. We should hit them with quick drop ( 3 Step) passes to the flats, slants, and bubble screens. To slow down the Arizona D Line we should hit them with middle screens and draws. In the run game, speed sweeps or pitches to get to the edge instead of running up the middle. Mis -direction will be required to run against the superior D Line of Arizona.
Would like to see the cover QR and JR, and throw in Wheaton’s speed in short routs.
Design some QB runs. Take advantage of Zona’s aggressiveness. Fly sweeps aren’t probably going to be as fruitful.
I suppose you make Foles burn you deep as we needed with Boise. Same sort of Offensive philosophy, no? Seems like they have similar styles.
I have a question that has bugged me for 10 years. It might have an easy answer, but I haven’t heard it. The Fiesta bowl beavers were in a three way tie for first. They beat the ducks, the ducks beat the dawgs and the dawgs beat us. Why did WA go to the Rose Bowl? The ducks beat them, so the ducks should have gone, but we beat the ducks, so we should have gone. If any in house historians have an answer, I would appreciate it.
Because Oregon had two loses that year.
(tie breaker rules)
Simple, we were ranked 4th in the Nation that year and so how it went at the time was like this: #1 and #2 teams played for NC at I believe the Sugar or the Orange bowl that year, while the #3 played at the Rose Bowl and the #4 team played at the Fiesta Bowl. Rose Bowl #3 played against the #1 Pac-10 team…Us, but we were ranked 4th, so we went to Fiesta instead, so that left it open between the ucks and the huskies. Rose Bowl took huskies. Can’t remember what Oregon was ranked at the time. So that should be your explanation in a nut shell. :)
In a three (or more) way tie, the Pac-10 compares the record among all the tied teams. All three first-place teams were 1-1 against each other. In 2000, the next tie-breaker was to compare the OOC results; OSU and UW were both 3-0 but UO was 2-1, so UO dropped out. Now that a team’s been eliminated you go back to the first tiebreaker, where OSU got eliminated because it lost to UW.
Nowdays, the second level tiebreaker is to compare the teams’ records against those ranked farther down; if this were the case in 2000 they would have compared OSU’s, UW’s, and UO’s records against Stanford, who was in fourth place, and then against ASU, UCLA, and UA who were tied for fifth.
Of course, that wouldn’t have solved anything then because the only losses in the first-place cohort were against each other. This was only to illustrate the procedure.
Correct, the loss to Wisconsin did the Ducks in.
Thanks. No one has ever explained how the process went. I really hope the Beavers take care of business and don’t have to hope someone else gets beat to make it in.
Beavers will win, 32-28.
I’ve got to think Collins see the field a ton, if not starts at OLB after his monster performance on Saturday.
Pankey’s “one memorable play” was more than that for me…while he made several tackles several yards down field, he played more inspired football than I’ve seen out of him that 12 years he’s been a Beaver.
Hardin responded well – I didn’t see blown coverages, or bad beats…although I oddly didn’t see Threet throw his way much…maybe he missed the scouting report?
Threet looked slow, and that made us look fast. Foles will do some damage with his feet and the nickel and dimers to the flat and short sideline fades – he’s a decent baller and he’ll get his. I also think we’ll get “ours” against him. Look for us to jump a route for a pick six early to set the tone.
Katz showed great improvement, and hit several of the passes he overthrew in attempts 1-3 this season. Look also for him to utilize quizz, but not in check downs – Langsdorf will run designed swing passes to Jaq. as option 1 in the read progression.
Interesting to see if we run a zone coverage scheme on Saturday to force the deeper ball and give us more time to get to Foles.
Coworker is a Wildcat – chicken wings and beers with him for the game on Saturday. I’d like to fix a separate batch of crow for the asshole…it’s getting deep in the office these days.
By the way, I make the best chicken wings in the world. Just sayin’.
Go Beavers…beat the Wild-Pussies!
-GWH
PS: Eff the Ducks.
I saw a stat by Cliff Kirkpatrick that amazed me (I had forgotten it from last year). Collins was second on the team in tackles last year, despite the fact that he didn’t even start every game. How the heck does a guy like that night start? Move Pankey inside and start him at OLB. Talent has to count for something.
I first thought the Beavs would win, too. It’s going to be close. I see the Beavs with the lead in the 4th before making a boneheaded play/penalty to lose the game. I also don’t trust Banker to start the right players, so Arizona will get a score or two before you see the correct personnel on the field.
The “Cover 1” leaves only one safety deep to help out on long routes, and dares the QB to throw the long pass, but it can do a good job stopping the shorter routes.
Does Banker ever utilize any variation of the “Cover 1” defense? This might be a good way to force the issue with Foles.
That is his defensive scheme. Cover 1=man. He rarely features any pure zone schemes. His base defense is a man with both safeties free over the top to help out. From there he mixes in zone schemes where the CB’s are in man and the rest of the D is in a zone. If the CB’s aren’t in man they are in cover 2 (2 deep coverage zones provided by the safety) to help in the flats. He also uses a cover 4 to stop the long ball late in the game (4 deep coverage zones). He rarely uses a cover 3 (3 deep coverage zones) because it doesn’t make sense with two safeties.
And no it doesn’t force the issue with Foles because the short screen beats it very well, see last year.
So….Doe has finally reneged and is with Wisconsin now. Surprise.
Why doesn’t Oregon State just send out a bulk mailer to all HS players nationwide, with OSU highlights and a virtual tour of campus, etc…then just leave it open for anyone to apply to play for them if they liked what they saw. Reply via e-mail or phone and a Coach will return you call.
That’s all that is happening anyway. We seem to never ‘steal’ one from anyone else legitimately. They either are no-stars, were injured their Sr. year, academically ineligible, or were just offered too late by someone bigger/better, if at-all.
Hey man, stop criticizing the head coach. What are you, some kind of Duck? ;)
I can’t think of a guy we poached. Maybe David Ross? I forget if he ever officially committed to Nebraska, though. Don’t think he did…
Simi Kuli was a Nebraska recruit, and I think Lyle was too. But I think Suh got poached out of OSU by Nebraska twice basically? Seems Maurice Purify was an OSU recruit that went to Nebraska…you’d be surprised (or maybe not, you see the same stuff I do) how many recruits have the Beavs and Huskers on their list at the same time. Then, their’s Owa, who shafted both shafted both NU and OSU!
Was Wheaton a hole commit at any point?
Is there any info about the Grant kids? I have a pipe-dream of them and Todd Peat committing. ;)
Wheaton was a uo verbal and was ‘stolen’ away by OSU.
It happens both ways people.
Wheaton never committed to the Ducks.
http://www2.registerguard.com/cms/index.php/duck-football/comments/some-clarification-on-wheaton/
He’s just a player both teams recruited and was a Duck lean/rumor because of his family.
Not to rub salt in this wound but Tramaine Thompson (Kenzel Doe Sr.) seems to be coming into his own at KSU as a redshirt freshman. I don’t think we would be having this conversation if Tramaine decided not to spurn Corvallis for the bright lights of Manhattan.
Tramaine Thompson stats:
http://rivals.yahoo.com/ncaa/football/players/181910
Well, we’ll see how he does against the Husker secondary tonight with potentially two first round Corners covering him…it’ll be a good test for him.
Does Thompson start? I thought I saw him in on 3rd downs and punt returns.
He’s probably a year or two off from being a big time threat. He’s off to a nice start is all we’re saying.
Maybe not. With Thomas rushing for about 150+ per game, I’m not sure they have a ‘starting’ WR at this point!
Thompson is a good comparison. Equal talent, and I feel equally disappointed in the loss.
The Beavers could probably field an all-star team with the recruits poached the past five years.
“Coffee is for closers”, right?
I guess ‘poached’ may not be the best description…seems all someone other than a handful of schools in a BCS conference (and some not!) would need to do is just offer these kids, then bye-bye Beavers.
@osbeavs: “Cover 1=man.” I could be wrong, but I think Cover 0 = man. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zone_defense_in_American_football#Cover_0
Cover 1 is a bit more complex: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zone_defense_in_American_football#Cover_1
And here’s the key point: “The main weakness of Cover 1 schemes is the lone deep defender that must cover a large amount of field and provide help on any deep threats. Offenses can attack Cover 1 schemes with a vertical stretch by sending two receivers on deep routes.”
Playing Cover 1 or some variation of Cover 1 could help the Beavs stop the AZ short passing game and generate some pressure on Foles. However, the risk is that vertical routes open up, giving Foles an opportunity to beat us deep.
It’s a tradeoff (as is true of all football defenses — you can’t defend everything…) but I’d rather make Foles beat us deep than let Foles and the ‘Cats dink us to death with a high completion percentage on slants and outs.
Okay, I give cover 0=man but lets be honest, no one calls cover zero. Most people call a cover 1 because it is plain foolish to not have a safety. Often people call cover 1 a true man and a cover 1-free your definition of a cover 1. If you really want to dive into Banker’s philosophy he plays a cover 1 variant with two free safeties in a deep zone. My point is, he doesn’t play a cover zero, nor do many defensive coordinators unless they are blitzing a safety.
Cover 1 is your most basic of schemes seen, it is the first pass defense taught at the youth level (if it isn’t then something is wrong with the coaches). Shortly after cover 1 is taught then cover 3 is taught. The beavers don’t use much cover 3, they use 2 sometimes, then 4 rarely and 3 like never. I think that if you play cover 2 you will more likely accomplish your goal silver. Since you are reading wikipedia, see the Tampa 2 as the best example of Banker’s version of the cover 2.
Anyways, silver the numbers really are just semantics because if you begin to look at college and pro level schemes they have things like cover 12.
Agreed that a lot of this is semantics, and not all that important.
Key to me is that Banker somehow schemes to take away from Foles the short passsing game (slants and outs from a 3-step drop). Make Foles take a 5-7 step drop, and make Foles throw deep passes, in order to beat us. That’s not his game. It will make Foles uncomfortable, and likely lead to turnovers and other mistakes by Foles.
Exactly which scheme is best to accomplish that goal? I’m open to anything that will do the job. I hope Banker is, too….
Taking away the slant is more about CB technique than a defensive scheme. The CB needs to be in man coverage to defend it, and the CB needs to be tight on the WR. At that point, he can defend it in two ways:
1. Line up a the line of scrimmage cheating to the inside (i.e. inside shoulder of the WR).
2. Playing straight up, giving the WR the route, but then coming from behind the WR to slap the ball away. This requires great closing speed, and if your CB doesn’t have that, many times it’s called for PI.
Cheating to the inside is the best strategy for the Beavs, since their CBs aren’t super quick. It also gives opportunity for an interception rather than just a batted ball. The downside is the CB becomes susceptible to slant/go or in/out patterns, so the safeties to be aware of what the CB is doing.
Great attendance this year is helped by the schedule but HONESTLY has more to do with Valley View pricing. I expect 97-98% of fans will renew for next year so I don’t expect a blip. With Pac-12 starting there is just a fervor going on. Pat Reser is one of our better donors. No doubt. It would be fitting to finish the west side soon and finish the original Raising of Reser for both sides. I think 2014 is probably when they start that after a few years of sellouts. A new west side would basically just replace all the current west side seats and then be a bunch more Valley View seats (3500 or so) that could then be sold. I am very confident with the same pricing that they would sell in a matter of 3 months or less. Bottom line is that our stadium will look AMAZING when both sides are done and we need it for recruiting and to expand the Beaver Nation fervor another notch up. We can and will almost surely wait on the south endzone but we need to start fundraising for the new west side NOW!
I agree that completing the stadium will help with recuiting. As nice as the East side looks, we still play in a stadium that is only 50% complete and is pretty weak compared to the majority of the conference. At least if they started the fundraising we could tell recruits that the stadium will be completed while they still play for the Beavs. Once it is completed it will be one of the best in the Pac 10/12 and it will definitely help with recruiting.
Actually, the stadium expansion is already fully funded right now through donations. It’s just the sellouts that are holding back the expansion to the West side. It’s not that we don’t have the money for it, we do. We just don’t have the fan base to have any reason to expand. Remember how many sellouts it took before they talked expansion to the East side? It took a long time, but ya all of the 180ish million $ is raised. We will need at least 2-3 more years of sellouts in order to expand the East side. I’m thinking if they add the West side, they will also enclose the South endzone at the same time to finish the project. If we don’t have sellouts against WSU then I would say that would need to change before we have a full season sellout.
These games will and are true sellouts…CAL, USC, and Civil War. Those 3 will not have an empty seat except maybe the loge and suites sections.
Even all club seats are gone for Cal I hear. Total sell out already I think. WSU is gonna fill strong too. There is just good buzz this year and people are coming for the gameday experience and excitement for the Oregon State program and the future Pac-12. It is my guess they will wait with the south endzone 5 or more years after the new west side, but if they did it all at once it would be very cool too. That involves moving the jumbotron to above the Valley Football Center. I heard there is still big interest for more Valley View seats..like they have the demand to sell 2000 more right now..so if the new West side is built in 2014 and gets us to 50K total and 3500-3700 new Valley View seats I think they will sell in a couple months max. You have to realize that the Pac-12 will be bigger and crazier by then and the Ducks, Bears, Huskies and Utes all have expansion plans in the near future. The sooner we get that new west side done the sooner we look like a top tier national program. It will help recruiting and a big chunk of it is replacing current seats. I think they could build it after the 2012 season and it would sell out for almost all games the following season. Beaver Nation is energized and the fanbase is growing! GO BEAVS!!
All these decommitments bring up a few questions for me. What are the other programs saying to make the recruits decommit? Once a recruit commits to OSU does our coaching staff take it for granted that the player is coming for sure? Do other programs view our commits as easy pickins? It’s a little frustrating.
One name …
Rahmel Dockery
Here’s hoping OSU bottled up some of this magic from 2008 and uses it this weekend:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcBZerJx9Vs
Sometimes I’m not sure what Riley is talking about. From Cliff:
“It’s not a whole different game,” Riley said the difference between ASU and Arizona. “It just has to be amped up. It’s a theme for this game. It’s a good example for our lives to get better to win. You anticipate the good teams to get better as they go. If we don’t it’s going to be a bad day. It’s a great example to continue to win.”
What the hell does this even mean? It looks like incoherent drivel.
Sometimes, I don’t think Riley realizes those “Chip Hilton” books he read as a child were fiction!
Beavs 34 – Zonies 26