Kramer’s absence won’t worry Wulff
Paul Wulff admits it might seem a bit strange at first.
But don’t expect Eastern Washington’s eighth-year head football coach to get overly emotional about not seeing his former boss and close friend Mike Kramer on the Montana State sidelines on Saturday when the 13th-ranked Bobcats come to Woodward Field for a Big Sky Conference game at 2:05 p.m.
“Sure, to a certain degree, it will be a little bit weird,” Wulff said. “But I’m just not one of those coaches that looks across at the opposing head coach and really worries too much about it.”
“It’ll be different, obviously. It’s been seven years that we went against each other, from a university standpoint. But at the same time, our intent is to really focus on our football team and what we have to do to play well and, hopefully, come away with a win.”
Kramer spent six years as EWU head coach before taking over at Montana State after the 1999 season. Wulff, an assistant under Kramer during those six years, was given the Eagles’ head coaching job when Kramer left.
Both were on former EWU coach Dick Zornes’ staff in 1993, meaning they had been mutually involved in the Eagles-Bobcats rivalry for the past 14 years.
Eagles’ health improves
EWU’s injury situation still isn’t pretty, but it’s not as bad as it appeared heading into last week’s game against Montana.
Starting wideout Tony Davis (shoulder) and starting center Chris Carlsen (knee) remain sidelined and will not play in Saturday’s game. But defensive lineman Lance Witherspoon (ankle) and linebacker Makai Borden (toe) are expected to play extended minutes against MSU.
Glanville feared snap
Portland State coach Jerry Glanville said his decision to go for a two-point conversion and the win with 6 seconds left in last Saturday’s 44-43 loss to Northern Arizona was based on the problems his Vikings had earlier in the game with long snaps.
“We were having a little bit of a hard time,” Glanville said in reference to a pair of bad snaps, one of which set up an NAU touchdown and another that resulted in a two-point conversion return for the Lumberjacks. “We’d given up nine points when we were snapping the football in punt or field-goal situations, and I didn’t want to put it in the snapper’s hand as much as I wanted to put in the quarterback’s hand.”
Grizzlies leave home den
Top-ranked and unbeaten Montana, after playing its first five games at home, takes to the road for the first time on Saturday to face Sacramento State in Sacramento, Calif.
“I like road games,” said UM coach Bobby Hauck. “We have a veteran team, and we’ll have very few kids on this trip who haven’t traveled before.”
Weber QB reinstated
Weber State quarterback Cameron Higgins was reinstated to the team, the Associated Press reported, after prosecutors said there was not enough evidence to charge him with shoplifting.
Higgins, a redshirt freshman who started the past two games, and two teammates were cited for shoplifting at the campus bookstore Monday.
Quick kicks
EWU’s Tom McAndrews, a 4.0 student-athlete and senior tight end out of Mead High, is one of 40 Football Championship Subdivision semifinalists nominated for 2007 Draddy Trophy given annually to the player who best exemplifies the combination of academic success, football performance and community leadership. … K.J. Gerard has intercepted five passes in NAU’s first six games.