Purple rain: Offense clicks after early struggles
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1 comment [ View ]By JASEN ASAY
Standard-Examiner staff
jasay@standard.net
OGDEN -- Perhaps the heavy rain at the start of Saturday's game was an early indication, but Weber State finally ended its drought against 10-time defending Big Sky Conference champion Montana.
When it rains, it pours. In this case, WSU didn't just beat Montana for the first time since 1998, the 'Cats dominated most of the game for a 45-28 victory.
"We beat them convincingly," said WSU safety Scotty Goodloe, who recovered two fumbles as the 'Cats forced four turnovers. "It's not a shock. I don't want anybody to say we barely blew by them. We put points on the board and we forced them into bad situations and took advantage of the turnovers."
After struggling their way through the first quarter, dealing with the always-difficult-to-handle Grizzlies as well as the rain, the Wildcats scored 35 of the game's final 42 points for the team's first win over the Grizzlies in 10 years.
"For this program I think that this is a signature win," said WSU coach Ron McBride, who compared the victory to his first over BYU as Utah's head coach. "But you can't get too cocky because of next week."
The Wildcats (4-2, 2-0 Big Sky) don't get much time to enjoy the win with next week's game at Montana State already on the minds of the players and coaches. But there definitely was time following the game to enjoy the feeling that none of the current Wildcats had experienced before.
The loss was the first conference setback for the Grizzlies (4-1, 0-1 Big Sky) since their final game of the 2005 season when they lost to rival Montana State. Montana went 16-0 in league play over the past two seasons and also had a 25-game regular season winning streak snapped at the hands of the Wildcats.
"This was certainly a game (Weber State) pointed to year in and year out as the big game on their schedule and that's how they played today," said Montana head coach Bobby Hauck. "They played great."
It was the Grizzlies, however, that started out great, taking leads of 14-3 and 21-10 in the first quarter. Montana quarterback Cole Bergquist scored on a 7-yard run to give the Grizzlies the 21-10 lead with 8:43 left in the second quarter. Bergquist threw for 273 yards and two touchdowns with his first coming on a 75-yard pass to Tyler Palmer that gave Montana the 14-3 lead.
While Montana's senior quarterback was starting off well, Higgins had a hard time getting going. After completing four of his first seven passes, Higgins was intercepted in the back of the end zone.
"That was kind of my fault, the offense got off to a slow start," Higgins said. "The pick I threw was my fault it shouldn't have even gone that way."
Higgins finished the game completing 21 of 30 passes for 237 yards and four touchdowns.
The Wildcats scored three straight touchdowns, including Mike Phillips' second touchdown on the half which came on an 8-yard pass with 15 seconds left, to lead 31-21 at the break.
"That last drive of the second half was huge," McBride said. "To go down in a two minute drill and score was huge."
Trevyn Smith, who led WSU in rushing with 158 yards and a touchdown, scored the first of the three with a diving catch in the end zone on a 30-yard pass from Higgins. Then Brendon Doyle ran 20 yards for another WSU touchdown.
As the Wildcat offense stated clicking, the defense became stingy. On Montana's possession between Smith's and Doyle's scoring runs, WSU defensive back Terrell Cloud intercepted Bergquist's pass and returned it 26 yards to Montana's 23-yard line.
"That was real key for us because we knew for us to have a good chance to win we needed to get some turnovers and get the ball to our offense," Goodloe said.
The Wildcats kept the pressure on Bergquist all afternoon, which enabled the offense to put the game out of reach with a 28-yard scoring pass to Bryant Eteuati with 8:41 remaining. WSU sacked Bergquist seven times for a loss of 35 yards while Beau Hadley also grabbed an interception.
Weber State 45,Montana 28
At Stewart Stadium
Montana 14 7 0 7 -- 28
Weber State 3 28 0 14 -- 45
First quarter
Montana--Reynolds 10 run (McKnight kick), 8:47.
Weber State--Williams 42 field goal, 6:07.
Montana--T.Palmer 75 pass from Bergquist (McKnight kick), :17.
Second quarter
Weber State--Phillips 28 pass from C.Higgins (Williams kick), 12:02.
Montana--Bergquist 7 run (McKnight kick), 8:43.
Weber State--Smith 30 pass from C.Higgins (Williams kick), 8:27.
Weber State--Doyle 20 run (Williams kick), 6:23.
Weber State--Phillips 8 pass from C.Higgins (Williams kick), :15.
Fourth quarter
Weber State--Smith 5 run (Williams kick), 14:43.
Montana--Ferriter 4 pass from Bergquist (McKnight kick), 10:31.
Weber State--Bry.Eteuati 28 pass from C.Higgins (Williams kick), 8:41.
A--3,753.
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Montana WSU
First downs 20 20
Rushes-yards 40-115 31-192
Passing yards 295 237
Passing 16-32-2 21-31-1
Return yards 10 23
Punts-average 3-39.7 3-38.3
Fumbles-lost 2-2 0-0
Penalties-yards 8-82 11-92
Time of possession 30:59 29:01
Individual statistics
Rushing--Montana, Schulte 3-32, Reynolds 13-30, Schmidt 2-14, Bergquist 16-12, T.Palmer 1-9, Selle 1-9, Wood 1-5, Brooks-Fletcher 1-4, Klaboe 1-0, Team 1-0. Weber St., Smith 22-158, Doyle 1-20, C.Higgins 2-7, Bry.Eteuati 1-3, M.Mailei 1-2, Lee 2-2, Team 2-0.
Passing--Montana, Bergquist 14-26-2-273, Selle 2-6-0-22. Weber St., C.Higgins 21-30-1-237, Team 0-1-0-0.
Receiving--Montana, T.Palmer 4-115, Mariani 4-71, Ferriter 3-45, Beaudin 2-16, Pfahler 1-35, Schulte 1-7, Schmidt 1-6. Weber St., Bry.Eteuati 7-74, Smith 4-54, Phillips 3-39, Nakamura 3-35, Toone 2-31, M.Mailei 1-4, Carpenter 1-0.
come on Weber fans, let's get out to the games. Way to go WSU offense