Vandals rein in confidence

The question was asked by a reporter with a straight face, presumably, during a teleconference, but Idaho football coach Dennis Erickson’s answer would have to wait. First, he had to laugh out loud for a second or two.

“That’s the funniest thing I’ve heard since I’ve come back,” replied Erickson, when asked if he was worried about the Vandals being overconfident this week. “I mean, that is funny. Golly dang, I don’t know if you’ve been around the last seven years. We played decent against Michigan State but we’re so far away from where we want to be.”

Really, the Vandals are at a point where they’ve been on numerous occasions during their last six seasons of largely forgettable football – roughly at the crossroads of confidence and caution.

It’s that spot where they’ve just played a marquee opponent tough, in this case Michigan State in a 27-17 loss Saturday. It’s happened numerous times – see West Virginia in 2000, Arizona in 2001, Boise State in 2002 and 2003 and Fresno State and Washington State last year.

In the past, the Vandals rarely have been able to sustain or build off that momentum. Their next chance comes against Washington State in Martin Stadium on Saturday.

“We’ve got to learn to be more focused in the fourth quarter,” tight end Luke Smith-Anderson said. “We had that offside penalty, even though we were pretty good with penalties the whole game. We just have to be more focused because when we go out and execute our responsibilities we move the ball and we score touchdowns against whoever we’re playing.”

Idaho’s effort against Michigan State was encouraging and should promote confidence, but that can erode quickly if the Vandals don’t follow it up with a quality performance against the Cougars.

“We don’t believe in moral victories. However, we believe that we can come into games confident to win,” quarterback Steve Wichman said. “We came into (Michigan State) knowing that nobody expected us to play close to them or even attempt to beat them. But we knew coming in that if we played tight and played a good game it was going to come down to the fourth quarter, which it did.

“This gives us all the confidence in the world, no matter who we line up against.”

Erickson encourages the confidence, but he doesn’t want his players to be satisfied with throwing a scare into a heavily favored opponent. Michigan State was favored by 29.5 points. WSU is favored by 17.

“Our guys are hungry,” he said. “I look for us to come out and play hard every game. If we don’t play 100 miles an hour we’re going to have problems.”

Different defense

Michigan State quarterback Drew Stanton complimented Idaho’s defense in his post-game comments. The Spartans gained 400 yards, but needed a late 65-yard drive to put the game out of reach.

“We weren’t sure what to expect from them,” Stanton said. “We thought that they couldn’t match up with us when we were in four- and five-receiver sets, so we stuck with that most of the game. They seemed much more disciplined than what we’d seen on film in the past and they threw a lot of different looks at us.”

Notes

Erickson said he expects receiver Marlon Haynes, who missed the Michigan State game while tending to academic issues, to be available against WSU. … Receiver Tracy Ford (ribs) made the trip to East Lansing, but didn’t play. He had missed extensive practice time in the two weeks leading up to the game. … Linebacker David Vobora’s 16 tackles ranked as tops in the WAC and third highest nationally. Vobora, whose practice time has been limited by a stress reaction in his leg, should assume a normal schedule this week, Erickson said.