I try pretty hard not to play the blame game around here, but a game like yesterday leaves you searching for answers.
Since I'm not some kind of film guru when it comes to football -- I'm much more comfortable breaking down what teams are trying to do in basketball -- I'm going to just pass along some interesting quotes I ran across and leave you to post your own theories in the comments as to how yesterday came about:
- Hawaii WR Greg Salas: "We hit ’em deep last year with a couple of those (pass plays), and we got ’em again with the same stuff."
- Salas again: "Man-to-man. Playing off. Great feeling. Some teams get out of it, they stayed in it. It was great."
- WSU DB Chima Nwachukwu: "It seemed like they were well-rehearsed for what we were doing. We have to do a better job of disguising our coverage."
- WSU defensive coordinator Chris Ball: "The toughest thing we have to do as a staff is convince the kids that they can win football games. You can’t expect coaches to come out and get them fired up. Players are responsible for getting themselves ready to play mentally."
- Nwachukwu: "It seems like we need something to spark us at the beginning of the game. That put us in a bad position, because (Hawaii) came out ready to go."
- WSU center Kenny Alfred: "We’re a team that has to learn how to start. Starting and finishing are both crucial."
- Hawaii LB Blaze Soares: "We're Warriors, and we want to be known as the hardest-hitting defense in the country. Game by game, we want to prove that. It's a bold statement, but I think we have talent to do it.
- Soares: "We wanted to go out there and play for the people of Hawai'i. We know our economy is very bad. We play 60 minutes of football, and that's when our fans' problems go away. They're focused on UH football. We have to go out there and make our fans happy for 60 minutes, and not let them think about real-life problems. We want them to go out and have fun watching us play."
- Hawaii DE Paipai Falemalu: "It was fun. Our seniors hyped us up. Rocky (Savaiigaea), Blaze and R.J. told us to go out there with an attitude and hit hard."
- Hawaii safety Spencer Smith: "Blaze was right. He wanted us to hit hard and play hard for Hawai'i. That's why 'Hawai'i' is on the front of our jerseys. When we win, the Islands are happy. When we lose, the Islands are sad. I think everyone is happy now."
- Hawaii coach Greg McMackin: "I wanted our guys to know we weren't coming over to try and eke out a win, like we did last year (in a victory over Washington State at Aloha Stadium). We were going to attack their tail and go after them. I know we're a team that can attack on all three sides of the ball. That's our personality."
- Salas: "We came out, and we came out fast. We were hungry."
- McMackin: "There are so many teams that run a no-huddle, it doesn't bother us any more. If they bring in other people, we have enough time to bring in other people."
- Hawaii LB R.J. Kiesel-Kauhane: "They would call a play, and then we would call a play, and then they would call an audible and then we would have to call an audible."
- Hawaii center John Estes: "Frankly, Central Arkansas is a much better team (than Washington State). All this stuff about struggling against a I-AA team ... a football team's a football team. We knew we were going to beat Wazzu. We should've put up 70, but we made a lot of mistakes."