WSU LB Caleb Francl records game to remember in loss to No. 21 James Madison

HARRISONBURG, Va. – In recent practices, Washington State defenders have been working on getting out of their breaks faster. They’ve been working on trusting their eyes, giving themselves permission to go make a play when they see an opportunity.

“That’s kinda what happened,” WSU linebacker Caleb Francl said.

Francl was talking about a play he made in his group’s 24-20 loss to No. 21 James Madison on Saturday, which forces the Cougars to try and earn bowl eligibility in their regular-season finale next week. It was early in the first quarter, and on their first drive of the game, the Dukes were backed up deep in their own territory.

JMU QB Alonza Barnett III dropped back and rifled a pass over the middle to receiver Isaiah Alston, who was crossing the middle of the field, where Francllurked. As Barnett wound up to throw in that direction, Francl trusted his eyes and got out of his break faster. He sprinted toward Alston, who couldn’t hang on to the ball, deflecting it up into the air. Before it could fall back to the turf, Francl laid out and secured it, snaring his first interception as a Cougar.

“I broke a little sooner than maybe I would have even earlier in the year,” Francl said. “Got to the wide receiver, and he just tipped the ball up in there. Had to go make a play, and I did.”

Francl totaled a team-high eight tackles for WSU’s defense, which was burned on two back-breaking occasions, both uncharacteristic for the Cougars. The first was a 68-yard touchdown pass, which Barnett unlocked by faking the same type of QB keeper the Dukes had run earlier, and the second was a 58-yard touchdown scamper by running back Wayne Knight, who made one jump cut and bolted the rest of the way, untouched, for the go-ahead score in the fourth quarter.

Those registered as strange developments for the Cougs’ defense. Under defensive coordinator Jesse Bobbit, WSU places a huge emphasis on allowing a maximum of five explosive plays per game, which Bobbit calls passes of 20-plus yards and rushes of 12 or more. Through their first 10 games of the season, the Cougars met that goal six times, including in each of their last four games.

That trend came to a halt on Saturday. Both Rogers and Francl gave credit to the Dukes’ offense, which waited until the fourth quarter to unveil their fake QB draw pass, which prompted WSU safety Matthew Durrance to bite and opened space for receiver Braden Wisloski to run right behind him, where he caught a pass in-stride and raced the rest of the way to the end zone. On the other scoring play, both Francl and Durrance were caught pursuing a fake handoff, and they recognized it too late to stop Knight from blazing past them.

But otherwise, Francl looked like one of the Cougars’ best defenders in the game. Credit him for making one of the game’s biggest plays, which arrived in the third quarter. The Dukes had engineered a long drive, and at the WSU 7, faced a fourth-and-1. They handed it to running back Jobi Malary – who was met by Francl before he could reach the line to gain. From there, a host of Cougars stuffed Malary, extinguishing all the momentum JMU built up.

“My job is just to set the edge on my guy. It’s my man going down on him,” Francl said. “So credit to Gavin (Barthiel, linebacker). He kinda took on both blocks. They both went down on him, and I just went off his back side and got to the ball, got to his legs, just tried to wrap him up, and the rest of the guys were there to finish him off.”

Perhaps that’s a good reminder that while the Cougars did yield two massive touchdowns, which the Dukes rode to victory, WSU’s defense did only allow 17 points. JMU scored seven on a pick-six. For the Cougs, that wasn’t enough to head back home with a win – but Francl has been playing some of his best football lately. That’s one trend WSU will want to keep going next weekend, and into a bowl game if it comes.