HB Arnett’s
COUGAR SPORTSLINE
801
372 0819
hbarnett@fiber.net and hbarnett@xmission
Vol. 28,
Issue 5, September 3, 2007
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HALL AND
UNGA ROUT AND RATE IN 20-7 WIN OVER
It really was as
easy as it looked.
With questions
galore surrounding this 2007 BYU football team, the Cougars had most of the
answers in a 20-7 opening day win over the Arizona Wildcats last Saturday
afternoon in LaVell Edwards Stadium.
Was Max Hall going
to be as good as the hype that has trailed the redshirt sophomore for the past
two years since he arrived on the BYU campus? So far, so good.
He didn’t
have a top-ten passing performance against UA, but it was good enough to get
your attention, when considering the opening performances of the pantheon of
past BYU quarterbacks.
Completing 26-39
passes for 288 yards, 2 touchdowns and no picks, was a pretty commercial outing
for a BYU quarterback, but it definitely ranks in the top ten of opening debuts
for a Cougar signal caller.
Can he get better?
You bet. That was the beauty of it all. Hall has plenty of room for
improvement, but he also appears to have plenty of ability to do just that.
Geographically
Good?
We watched Harvey
Unga play in high school. There was no question that he definitely passed the
Timpview test when he prepped for the Thunderbirds.
We heard rumblings
from BYU coaches on how special Unga was projected to be, but we also heard
rumblings from Cougar fans who wondered just how good can a
Geographically
speaking, he is very, very good.
The redshirt
freshman rushed for 67 yards on just 15 carries. He also caught 9 passes out of
the backfield for 127 yards. Did we mention that he also scored two touchdowns?
That was two more than any tailback from
While Unga's
rushing numbers weren't staggering, it was impressive. There were numerous
times when he was just a half step away from breaking off some serious runs.
More
Impressive
As impressive as
the numbers were for Hall and Unga in their first official Cougar outing, here
is a number that is even more impressive.
The BYU offensive
line allowed only one clear shot at Hall from the Wildcat defense. That was
when All-American Antoine Cason came off a corner blitz in the first quarter.
Other than that,
BYU's offensive front played extremely well in allowing a Cougar running game
to materialize and a pass rush on Hall to evaporate.
This was a very
good UA defense that BYU was able to move the ball against.
The BYU defense
also turned in a nice performance. They totally dominated the
While he didn't
have any sacks, we were impressed with the outside speed rush of Chris Bolden.
BYU has not had a speed rush option in their defense for as long as we can
remember.
Overall it was a
nice get-out-of-the-gate performance by the Cougars.
Concern
There was one area
of concern, however. BYU's special teams play was spotty and the Cougar kicking
game was extremely shaky.
Adjustments and
improvements have to be made in these areas, or it will come back to cost the
Cougars some wins.
With the win over
the Wildcats, Bronco Mendenhall now has won his first opening game since taking
over the BYU program.
Bronco's Borg Assimilates
According to
Wikipedia, the on-line interactive dictionary, BYU's defense and the Borg, have
a lot in common.
Here is the
Wikipedia definition of the Borg:
The Borg are a
race of cyborgs in the fictional Star Trek universe, first introduced in the
Star Trek: The Next Generation TV series. They are characterized by relentless
pursuit of targets for assimilation, their collective consciousness that
enables rapid adaptability to almost any defense, and the ability to continue
functioning properly despite seemingly devastating blows. They have become a
powerful symbol in popular culture for any juggernaut against whom,
"resistance is futile."
Here is the Cougar
Sportsline definition of the BYU defensive effort against
Bronco's Borg is a
roster of defensive players that exhibit maniacal effort, exactness of execution
and mastery of assignments. They are characterized by the relentless pursuit of
targets for assimilation, their collective consciousness that enables rapid
adaptability to almost any offense, and the ability to continue at a high level
of play despite seemingly devastating blows due to unexpected injuries to key
players. They have become a powerful symbol in BYU lore for reflecting the
personality of their defensive coordinator and head coach. Like The Borg, they
are a defensive juggernaut against whom "resistance is futile."
Latest
Episode
The latest episode
of Bronco's Borg, which played out in LaVell Edwards Stadium last Saturday
afternoon, saw BYU dominate Arizona with the final credits rolling on the
scoreboard showing a 20-7 victory.
For the Wildcats
of Arizona, resistance really was futile. Just how futile, was exhibited in the
stats of the first two quarters.
Bronco's Borg held
UA to just one first down and only 41 yards of total offense.
Going into the
fourth and final fifteen minutes, the BYU defense had only allowed 3 first
downs.
The fictional TV
Borg is not known for their on-screen attractiveness and flashy facade. They
just keep marching forward against any and all that opponents can throw against
them.
Ditto for the BYU defensive
Borg. They don't have the most athletically attractive assets of speed, agility
and strength, but like the Borg, the parts are interchangeable and they just
keep coming after offensive foes.
We admit that we
didn’t start out being a Star Trek fan when it first came on the air. It
eventually grew on us.
Past
Issues
You can go back
and read issues of our newsletters for the past two seasons and document the
fact that Bronco Mendenhall wasn't our defensive darling either.
Jean Luc Picard
and Star Trek was an acquired television taste and so were Mendenhall's
defensive philosophies. We thought his mantras of "fully invested, band of
brothers, higher bars etc, were more fantasy than football fundamentals.
We were wrong.
This third-year coach is obviously on to something real and rewarding for
Cougar fans.
As
In almost three
decades of doing this, we never thought we would ever use the term dominating
defense and BYU in the same sentence. That is twice now that Bronco Mendenhall
has proved us wrong.
UCLA
WILL BE A BETTER TEST
Despite the
decisive 20-7 win over
The same can be
said for the Cougars’ upcoming opponent. The UCLA Bruins are coming off a
decisive win of their own. They slapped Stanford around last Saturday in
What we don't know
is if UCLA is that good or if Stanford is that bad.
All of those
questions should be answered next Saturday when the Cougars travel to the Rose
Bowl to try and win their second game of the young season.
The Bruins are a
balanced offense that will test the BYU defense. Against Stanford, they rushed
for 338 yards and passed for 286 yards.
Those passing
stats were accumulated by former BYU qb Ben Olson. He was 16-29 for 286 yards,
five touchdowns and no interceptions.
BYU's defense can
give up those kind of passing numbers to Olson and still win this game, but
only if they can control the ground game of UCLA.
That will be the
deciding factor here. BYU has to at least limit the effectiveness of the Bruins
rushing attack.
Conversely, they
have to be able to maintain at least a threat of a ground game to have a chance
in this game.
We don't expect
that to happen. We like UCLA in this spot and call the Bruins to put a damper
on the early enthusiasm of this season. The early odds makers feel the same
way, but they think the game will be more competitive. They have established
UCLA as an 8.5 point favorite.
The game will be
televised live on the Versus network. Kickoff is set for 4:30 pm Mountain time.
We call it UCLA 31
BYU 17.
FOOTBALL FLUFF AND STUFF
Final roster cuts
for the NFL took place this past weekend. Only two BYU rookies made the grade.
John Beck will be on the Miami Dolphins roster and Daniel Coats made the
Cincinnati Bengals roster as a tight end.
Cut were Zac
Collie from the Eagles, Cam Jensen from the Seahawks, Jake Kuresa from the
Saints, Curtis Brown from the Bengals and Jonny Harline from the Colts.
Jacob Bower, the
former BYU quarterback, who opted to transfer from the Cougar program last
January, got his juco career off to a nice start at Bakersfield JC in
Two names that
were on BYU's recruiting radar last year were Houston Cassita, a running back
from Jordan HS, and Simi File, a big defensive nose guard from Cottonwood HS.
Fili signed with
Is Bronco
Mendenhall mellowing with old age? We doubt it, but he has softened. We
actually saw him smiling in the game against
Normally, nary a
smile will cross his lips until the final second has ticked off the clock, but
we did see a significant smile shared with his defensive players as they were
coming off the field with just over a minute to go in the game against
In recruiting
reviews, junior running back Adam Timo of Snow Canyon HS in St. George, rushed
for 91 yards on 22 carries this past Friday.
Sausan Shakerin,
the top running back is
After an opening
week of Mountain West Conference action, it looks like there might be some
teams that were overrated and some that were underrated.
Based on what we
saw last weekend, we think there are two teams that likely won't win the
conference title, certainly could determine who does.
It still looks
like TCU and BYU will be the top dogs in league play, but either
The Pokes thumped
Basketball
Briefs
The Tyler Haws
recruiting sweepstakes is already starting to amp up. Haws is the 6-4 guard
from Lone Peak HS in
Haws and his
Haws averaged 35
points per game in
The talented guard
has already made several unofficial visits to both campuses. The latest we saw
was when he was at BYU with his father, former BYU player, Marty Haws.
BYU was practicing
in the field house for their trip to
Every BYU coach,
made a point to visit with the pair. You would expect it for coaches when they
get a free and legal chance for contact with their top recruiting priority for
2009.
You know it is a
special recruit, however, when hugs were given the pair by the coach's wife
during that same visit.
Haws is also on
the UCLA recruiting radar and on the verge of becoming a serious national
caliber recruit.
Many local Cougar
fans have seen Haws play during the televised state playoffs in
Out of state fans
can get a glimpse of him in December when
The tourney will
take place Dec. 28-29 and will be televised on the Versus network.
In addition to La
Cueva HS, the host team for the tourney, national powerhouse programs St.
Anthony HS from
Here's a note from
a subscriber who has been active on the local AAU basketball scene for the last
few years and closely associated with the Utah Pump 'N Run team.
He indicates that
BYU may have a big-time sleeper on board with the commitment of Charles Abuou,
the 6-5 wing from Logan HS.
Here is what he said:
"It
should be noted that at two of the largest tournaments the Pump 'N Run attended
this year, I was told by numerous coaches of opponents and observers from other
teams alike that they felt that Charles Abouo was either the best player or at
least one of the two best players in the whole tournament that they watched
play. That is really saying something since the tournaments we are talking
about had 172 teams in them! No one could tell who the 5-star recruit was
versus a virtually unknown (Charles) when matched up against each other. The
kid really has made great strides in his game and has what can't be
coached...athleticism galore!"
Abouo will play
this coming season for
TELEVISION
TIMETABLE
BYU vs.
UCLA
Saturday, Sept. 8 at
Kickoff: 4:30 pm Mountain
Time
TV: Versus Network
BYU vs.
Saturday, Sept. 15 at
Kickoff: 7:00 pm Mountain
Time
TV: CSTV
BYU vs.
Air Force
Saturday, Sept. 22 at
Kickoff: 1:00 pm Mountain
Time
TV: Mtn Network