Mike Leach AP Pac-12 Coach of the Year, Falk and Middleton on the first team
The Associated Press released its All-Pac-12 team on Friday and the Cougars fared pretty well.
Here is a link to the AP's all-conference team.
Mike Leach was named the Coach of the Year after leading the Cougars to a five-win improvement in 2015. Interestingly, although the Pac-12 writers believe Leach had the finest season, it is Stanford coach David Shaw who is up for national coach of the year.
Luke Falk was named first team quarterback, and that's not a surprise considering he led the Pac-12 in passing yards per game by 33 yards and completed 70.7 percent of his passes – no other starter completed more than 68.6 percent of their throws. He also engineered a multitude of fourth-quarter comebacks for the Cougars.
But it may be a little more surprising to the casual fan that right guard Eduardo Middleton was also named to the first team. Middleton had one of the best offseasons of any Cougar and that improved play carried over to the season where, according to Pro Football Focus, he gave up just two sacks in 994 attempts, while also grading out well as run blocker, and not hurting the team with penalties.
Rounding out the first team offense for WSU is wide receiver Gabe Marks, whose 8.2 receptions per game and 14 total touchdowns led the conference.
Left tackle Joe Dahl was named All-Pac-12 second team by the writers, even though the coaches had him on the first team. While Dahl was very effective when healthy, he did miss the final four games of the season, meaning not as many writers saw him as other candidates and he was not able to have the same impact as a 12-game starter.
Defensive lineman Darryl Paulo was named to the second team defense after capping a previously quiet career with a stellar senior season. Safety Shalom Luani's big hits were rewarded with a second team selection. The junior college transfer was a missile at the back end of the WSU defense and quickly earned a reputation for punishing receivers and running backs in the middle of the field.
In the interest of full disclosure, here is the ballot I submitted to the AP.
