Eagles won’t flinch
Forget the big-name opponent, the 60,000-plus fans expected to be on hand and all of the added pressure that comes with trying to prove oneself against a seemingly superior college football team.
Eastern Washington coach Paul Wulff expects his Eagles to simply go about their business this afternoon when they step up a level to take on Brigham Young University in a non-conference game that kicks off at 2:35 PDT in LaVell Edwards Stadium in Provo, Utah.
“I look at it as a great opportunity for our kids,” Wulff said of facing a Football Bowl Subdivision power like BYU on its own turf. “It’s not that big a deal. Most of our kids, at this point, have done it enough now that we should be able to go in there just focus on what we have to do to win the football game.
“I expect us to be competitive.”
Playing guaranteed-money games like this one are nothing new for the Football Championship Subdivision Eagles. Last fall they played two of them, opening their season with a 56-17 loss at Oregon State before suffering a 52-3 thumping at the hands of West Virginia the following week.
Those two lopsided defeats seemed to set the tone for the rest of the year, with the Eagles finishing 3-8 and suffering their first losing season since 1998, when they finished 5-6 under Wulff’s predecessor, Mike Kramer.
This time, however, Eastern (4-2 overall, 2-2 in the Big Sky Conference) has had a chance to build some confidence against other FCS teams – and earn the respect of BYU coach Rocky Mendenhall and his Cougars (4-2 overall, 3-0 in the Mountain West).
“From what I’ve seen to this point, Eastern Washington is a very capable and solid football team,” said Mendenhall, who is in his third season at BYU. “Offensively, they’re (averaging) close to 500 yards per game and 35 points. And defensively, they play with a lot of heart and, I think, very well coached.
“As many teams have found out, I-AA (FCS) doesn’t necessarily mean a lesser opponent. There will be no change in emphasis on our part.”
Eastern’s offensive will again be triggered by sophomore quarterback Matt Nichols, who has already thrown for 1,837 yards and 16 touchdowns – numbers that stand up well to those posted so far by his BYU counterpart, Max Hall.
Hall, a sophomore transfer from Arizona State, has completed 152 of 254 passes for 1,974 yards and 12 TDs. But in last Saturday’s 24-14 win over UNLV, he threw three interceptions.
On past BYU teams that relied so heavily on the passing game, a performance like that one Hall put on last weekend might not have been enough to nail down a win. But this year’s team, Wulff noted, is not as one-dimensional on offense as those that featured the likes of Jim McMahon, Steve Young and Ty Detmer under center.
“They’re way more balanced than in the old days,” Wulff said. “They want to run the ball now, and they’ve got a running back who is very big and physical and hard to bring down.”
That running back is redshirt freshman Harvey Unga, a 6-foot, 221-pounder, who torched UNLV for 177 yards and a touchdown on 25 carries.
According to Mendenhall, Unga’s best physical quality is his unique combination of size and speed.
“With the versatility he provides – a big body that can move quickly, change directions and catch the football – there is just really no end to the ways we can use him,” Mendenhall said. “We’re only limited, maybe, by our imagination.”
It helps, too, that Unga operates behind a veteran offensive line that Wulff calls “the biggest I’ve ever seen in my life.”
BYU’s interior line features four returning starters and averages just less than 6-5 and 310 pounds per man, which means Eastern’s undersized defensive front could be in a for a long afternoon.
“They’re massive,” Wulff said of the Cougars’ O-linemen. “And they’re very good football players, too.”
Notes
Eastern will receive a $325,000 guaranteed purse from today’s game. … The Eagles are 7-14 against FBS teams and 0-3 against current members of the Mountain West Conference. … BYU is one of five FBS teams that ranks in the top 21 in both total offense (462.8 ypg) and total defense (313.3 ypg). … The Cougars’ two losses have come on the road to UCLA (27-17) and Tulsa (55-47). … In the other two games it has played against FCS schools, BYU beat Murray State 43-9 in 1998 and Eastern Illinois 45-10 in 2005.