THE FRONT ROW with MARK NELKE: As openers go, Idaho-WSU was one of them
Coeur d'Alene Press | UPDATED 3 months, 1 week AGO
IDAHO ATHLETICS The Idaho Vandals football team is partnering with The Field Rush to wear "Fightin' Taters" helmets in Saturday's home opener against St. Thomas, scheduled for 1 p.m. at the Kibbie Dome in Moscow. Part of the celebration will be the 70-foot-long Big Potato Truck, noting Idaho's potato industry. Spuddy Buddy, the Idaho Potato Commission's mascot, will also be in attendance. Kyle Little, The Field Rush's graphic designer, is the creator of the logo. Fightin' Taters T-shirts will be available for purchase.
Maybe the best thing about first games during the college football season is when they’re over with.
Win or lose, fans overreact.
Then the teams play their second games, and things come a little more into focus.
It’s not a sexy one, but that’s the take from last Saturday’s Idaho-Washington State game at Gesa Field in Pullman.
Both teams struggled to surpass 200 yards in total offense, which is hard to do in today’s wide-open era of football.
Idaho showed it could run the ball against an FBS school, and the Vandal defense was stellar.
WSU didn’t display the high-octane offense of recent teams, but the Cougs were able to move the ball when they needed to score and win the ballgame.
Both teams will probably show some different things this week, both at home — Idaho vs. University of St. Thomas, and WSU vs. San Diego State.
And then we’ll move on.
HERE’S A statistical oddity: All five of Idaho’s punts on Saturday night came inside WSU territory.
In this era of fourth down and you only live once, you’d think maybe Idaho would have gone for it at least once.
But a look back at the play-by-play suggests punting was probably the right call each time.
Fourth and 5 at the WSU 49 yard-line (after third and 6 at midfield)
Fourth and 12 at the WSU 40 (after a first and 10 at the Cougar 38)
Fourth and 21 at the WSU 44 (after a first and 10 at the Cougar 33, followed by a holding penalty and a 3-yard rushing loss)
Fourth and 13 at the WSU 47 (after an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty on Idaho quarterback Joshua Wood turned a potential third and 9 in to a third and 24).
Fourth and 10 at the WSU 46 (after losing 4 yards on third down)
Now MAYBE the first fourth down would have been worth going for, but at that time of the game, and that point in the season ... probably best to kick it away.
I THOUGHT of Jason Eck a few times last weekend.
One time was when Idaho, trailing 10-7 late in the fourth quarter, forced a fumble and recovered it at the WSU 11 with 2:21 remaining.
Three plays later, the Vandals faced a fourth-and-3 at the Cougar 4.
Eck was a gambler when he was head coach at Idaho the past three seasons, before moving on to New Mexico this season.
He tried onside kicks and fake punts and went for it on fourth down. Sometimes it worked, and Vandal fans got fired up. And sometimes it backfired, and Vandal fans wondered what the heck he was doing.
You can probably guess what he would have done in that situation.
First-year Idaho head coach Thomas Ford Jr. took the 21-yard field and a tie game, opting to leave it up to his defense to stop WSU, which it had done most of the game, and either get the ball back in the closing seconds or take it to overtime.
As it turned out, the Cougars marched down the field and kicked a 32-yard field goal to win the game.
Not saying one way was better than the other, just different.
VANDAL FANS had to be proud of their coach, standing up for his players, screaming at the WSU side during the post-game milling, claiming one of the Cougar players had perhaps celebrated a bit too much on the Idaho sideline after the game.
But Ford and first-year WSU coach Jimmy Rogers hugged it out on the field afterward.
Also thought of Eck on Monday night, watching former Vandal receiver Jordan Dwyer catch nine passes for 136 yards and a 27-yard touchdown for TCU in a 48-14 dismantling of the North Carolina Belichicks on ESPN.
That’s the good-news-for-players, bad-news-for-fans world of college football we live in these days — particularly at the smaller schools.
Coaches have moved on for years, but now players move on as well, lured by NIL — and you can’t blame them.
It’s happened at Idaho after the last two seasons, and it happened big-time at WSU after the 2024 season — the Cougars have 75 new faces this season.
So enjoy these guys while they’re here.
It will be curious to see what these rosters look like in 2027, when Idaho and WSU are scheduled to meet again.
Mark Nelke is sports editor of The Press. He can be reached at 208-664-8176, Ext. 1205, or via email at [email protected]. Follow him on X (formerly Twitter) @CdAPressSports.