Rontheoldwiseeagle
Active member
Each game (other than maybe Georgia State) provides its unique challenges:
Traveling to Hawaii, while entertaining, is never an easy thing, and given it's the first game of CCP's tenure the coaches need to make sure the team is laser focused on what needs to be done. The Rainbow Warriors aren't going to scare many teams this year, so this one will say a lot about how the Dawgs will be perceived - win big and expectations are set; win slim and there'll be some questions; lose and it will really bring out the nega-Dawgs.
Eastern Washington is being picked by some as the #1 FCS team this year, and you know after what happened in 2011 they are going to come in feeling pretty confident. This will be a HUGE test for the defense and we can't afford to let it be close at the end like the last game. History says FBS teams win the vast majority of these games, but you can throw that out the window here. Ball control and red zone efficiency are going to be the keys for this game, because you know the Eagles are going to be salivating when they look at our young secondary.
I'm actually less worried about Illinois than I am EWU - this is a 6-6 team at best (according to most predictions I've seen, with most wins at home) and will probably not travel well this year. This should again be a good test for our defense, but we should be able to move the ball on them fairly consistently and match if not better the score from last year.
Georgia State is going to be a nice tune-up that will allow us to play a lot of our depth and rest the starters for Stanford. If anyone on the first and most of the second team is still playing by the middle of the third quarter, there's something wrong.
4-0 heading into the Stanford game is very doable, but like you said, it won't be easy...
Traveling to Hawaii, while entertaining, is never an easy thing, and given it's the first game of CCP's tenure the coaches need to make sure the team is laser focused on what needs to be done. The Rainbow Warriors aren't going to scare many teams this year, so this one will say a lot about how the Dawgs will be perceived - win big and expectations are set; win slim and there'll be some questions; lose and it will really bring out the nega-Dawgs.
Eastern Washington is being picked by some as the #1 FCS team this year, and you know after what happened in 2011 they are going to come in feeling pretty confident. This will be a HUGE test for the defense and we can't afford to let it be close at the end like the last game. History says FBS teams win the vast majority of these games, but you can throw that out the window here. Ball control and red zone efficiency are going to be the keys for this game, because you know the Eagles are going to be salivating when they look at our young secondary.
I'm actually less worried about Illinois than I am EWU - this is a 6-6 team at best (according to most predictions I've seen, with most wins at home) and will probably not travel well this year. This should again be a good test for our defense, but we should be able to move the ball on them fairly consistently and match if not better the score from last year.
Georgia State is going to be a nice tune-up that will allow us to play a lot of our depth and rest the starters for Stanford. If anyone on the first and most of the second team is still playing by the middle of the third quarter, there's something wrong.
4-0 heading into the Stanford game is very doable, but like you said, it won't be easy...
