Big Sky notebook: Oregon still poses tall task for Eastern Washington, despite drop in rankings

Imperfect as they are at predicting any game’s outcome – especially early in the season – the week’s AP college football poll removed one potential upshot of an Eastern Washington upset this weekend in Eugene.

It wouldn’t come against an indisputably ranked team.

That’s because after losing 49-3 to preseason No. 3 Georgia, though the Oregon Ducks remained at No. 24 in the AFCA Coaches’ poll, they dropped out of the AP Top 25, a significant tumble from their preseason No. 11 ranking.

Still, the task before the Eagles on Saturday – toppling the first of two FBS opponents they’ll face this season – is significant and substantial.

“When you’re playing an FBS opponent, a Power Five opponent, it does mean more,” Eagles coach Aaron Best said during his Tuesday media availability. “Just like anything, when the reward is a little bit more, you’re usually willing to do a little bit more to grasp the reward.”

Eastern began last season with a victory over UNLV, the program’s 11th against an FBS team. The Eagles are 2-11 all time against the Pac-12, including a 61-42 loss at Oregon in 2015. But even though those two victories came when current EWU players were children – Eastern won at Washington State in 2016 and at Oregon State in 2013 – Best said those victories do matter heading into Saturday’s game.

“Even for coaches who were part of that special day, those are just memories – but those are memories that you keep forever,” Best said. “It does add a level of belief when your school has done those things, because you have done it. If you’ve never done it, you think you can do it, but you haven’t done it, so there’s no data to prove (it).”

Eagles wide receiver Nolan Ulm acknowledged that yes, Oregon is coming off an ugly defeat. But this is still a good defense, Ulm said, despite what it put on film against the defending national champions.

“This week is an incredible opportunity for us,” Ulm said. “So, we’re going to come at them just like they’re going to come at us.”

Big Sky teams are 0-6 this season against FBS opponents, but they have six more such opportunities this weekend, including Idaho’s game at Indiana and Portland State’s at Washington.

New QBs make their marks in the Sky

Eagles senior quarterback Gunner Talkington was one of a handful of new Big Sky quarterbacks to have a strong conference debut last weekend.

Among the most notable was that of Portland State sophomore Dante Chachere, who completed 24 of 37 attempts for two touchdowns and two interceptions as the Vikings let a late lead slip away in a 21-17 loss at San Jose State. Chachere played minimally as a backup last year behind Davis Alexander.

At Montana, Lucas Johnson completed 15 of 24 passes for 208 yards and four touchdowns – while also rushing for 76 yards – in the Grizzlies’ 47-0 dismantling of visiting Northwestern State. Johnson, a redshirt senior, transferred to Montana during the off-season after previous stints at San Diego State and Georgia Tech.

At Cal Poly, under coach Beau Baldwin, redshirt freshman Jaden Jones took all the snaps under center in a 35-7 loss at Fresno State. Jones finished 20 of 38 for 211 yards and a touchdown, and he also led the Mustangs in rushing with 59 yards.

In relief quarterback duty for Northern Colorado, Jacob Sirmon finished 22 of 33 for 249 yards and two touchdowns (plus an interception) in a 46-34 loss to Houston Baptist. Sirmon is originally from Bothell, Washington, and was highly recruited out of high school, starting his college career at Washington before transferring to Central Michigan and to Northern Colorado.

Still, it was Talkington who was honored by the conference as the offensive player of the week after a five-touchdown performance.

“He set the bar high in his first start,” Best said. “Now we’re going to keep him at that standard. He wants to be held to that standard, too.”

Gilliam sets UC Davis career record

Ulonzo Gilliam Jr., picked as the conference’s preseason offensive player of the year, surpassed UC Davis’ career all-purpose yardage record on Saturday after he amassed 150 yards in a 34-13 loss to Cal.

The redshirt senior has 4,630 yards in his career.

EWU’s career all-purpose yardage list includes five players with more than Gilliam’s current total: Jesse Chatman (4,791), Taiwan Jones (5,021), Shaq Hill (5,234), Eric Kimble (5,934) and Cooper Kupp (7,038).

Kupp’s total ranks second on the Big Sky’s all-time list. First is Charles Roberts, who gained 7,112 all-purpose yards from 1997 to 2000 at Sacramento State.