The Good, Gooder and Goodest of WSU’s near victory

Jó reggelt Budapestről, Magyarországról! Nagyon jó ma veled lenni!

Well, what a game that was last night, don’t you think! The Washington State Cougars almost won! They were ahead for much of the second half! This is a positive development!

As you, the ever-astute and discerning Cougar Football fan are aware, the writers at this fine website took a lot of criticism for being too negative, and casting a poor light on the program in the wake of Nick Rolovich’s refusal to get a life-saving vaccine because reasons. Well if there’s anything this staff is good at, it’s accepting customer feedback and always trying to do better. WSU’s ability to recruit hung in the balance! And after all, the customer is always right, and we appreciate the feedback, regardless of the fact that the loudest voices are largely disingenuous and hypocritical. We’re here to serve!

Given that, let’s talk about all the positivity that came from Saturday night’s near-victory against a really bad - but well-coached! - Utah State team. We’ll do this by first pointing out the highly valuable customer feedback that went into the ol’ suggestion box, followed by CougCenter’s completely realistic read on Saturday’s events. Let’s go have some fun and good vibes!

Cougar fan (from August 20th):

We get you hated the hiring of Rolo, we get you hate him, we get he could win 12 games this year and you would still criticize him, we get you hate that he isn’t doing the exact thing you want him to do, we get you would rather make this a political website rather than a WSU Cougar site. I am vaxxed, but its enough already. Post about the young men on the team that are fighting hard for their coach, and their school. Ask them how they feel about their coach. I bet you they would run through a wall for Rolo, it’s about time as a school, as fans of the school we all love, we support him and those young men who represent our school. Write about the super intriguing Qb battle that’s going on, write about how the O-line is going to be solid, write about how we have the strongest RB room we have had in maybe forever!! There is so much to love about this team, and you choose to try and get our coach fired.

CougCenter: You’re right! We should have written more about the quarterback battle that ended in spectacularly incompetent fashion! We’re positive that Nick Rolovich made a bad decision, but no matter, both quarterbacks are trying hard!

Cougar fan:

What a pathetic article. Cougcenter has turned into a cesspool of leftist think take. You all should be start talking about sports or STFU.

CougCenter: The sports started recently, and WSU scored 23 whole points! That’s not the worst total they’ve ever put up. Not even close!

Cougar Fan:

I want WSU athletics to be fun. When Cougcenter shows some more optimism maybe I’ll be back.

CougCenter: The Cougs have a really good shot at winning next week! They’re playing an FCS team that just lost to Hawaii. Speaking of Hawaii, did you know that our awesome coach was there before he came to Pullman! Crazy! Anyway, WSU will definitely beat Portland State, and we’ll talk about it all week!

Cougar Fan:

Drop all of this and cover sports. I’m tired of what this place has become.

CougCenter: You got it! We’ll get to the sports very soon here! How about now?!

Positive things that happened in the game

• Announcers Jordan Kent and Bob Davie were tremendous! Davie only compared Max Borghi to Christian McCaffrey one time! He pronounced it “McCafferty” but that’s because Bob once coached Zebulon McCafferty at Notre Dame. Classic mixup! And Jordan Kent? I think you mean, “Pullman Royalty” as Bob called him, because of his connection to former CouGreat basketball coach Ernie Kent. Jordan only butchered 5-6 names, out of like 100! Sure, Deon MickIctosh, Halid Habril and Justin Rogers might need some tweaks, but other than that, these guys were on point!
• The Pac-12 Network studio show now features dudes on couches, wearing white t-shirts and black jackets. Kind of a “Night at the Roxbury” feel. I like it! Let’s not pretend we’re professionals, fellas. Throw people off the scent! Solid tactics!
• The offensive line played well for almost half the game! Pretty good!
• All Pac-12 safety Daniel Isom was almost in position to stop a long bomb in the first quarter. I mean, the Utah State receiver caught it, but Isom might have been closer if they tried again!
• Despite multiple instances where the shovel pass play was nearly disastrous, WSU never turned the ball over when running it. Not bad!
• The 5th-year starting quarterback almost made it to halftime without a colossal mistake. Improvement!
• The Cougars got two turnovers on defense, and scored three points on their ensuing possessions. That’s 1.5 points per turnover. Good ROI if you ask me!
• After having prepared throughout the spring and summer training camps, the coaches continuously got plays in late, resulting in several snaps near the end of the play clock. But it only cost them a couple times!
• Jayden de Laura completed 52% of his passes. That’s better than half!
• Travell Harris was able to tie his shoes with his gloves on. I bet I couldn’t do that!
• Cammon Cooper got in the game, and the Cougars ended up scoring on the drive! That’s a really great sign of WSU’s superior quarterback depth!
• The Cougs had a lot of players in the game who I’ve never heard of. I bet they’re all really good!
• Basketball starts pretty soon! Should be fun!

Obviously, there were so many positives to take away from Saturday that I don’t have time or space to list them all. Unfortunately, I saw some negativity in the postgame comments.

Cougar Fan:

That was obviously abhorrent, clearly awful coaching, and I think a 1-5 record (in the way he’s lost) has given you enough to see that you start making phone calls and plans for the offseason. I’d be happy as hell if he turns it around, but he looks entirely outmatched in the Pac12… by a mile.

Come on, Rolovich has done so much to earn our trust! Give the guy a chance! None of this is his fault!

Cougar Fan:

They sucked tonight. This team looked ill—prepared, distracted and worst of all, entitled. They were what Leach railed against in his first few seasons here, expectant of a W just because they are a PAC-12 team and Utah State is not.

They certainly were not the most excited to play and they honestly were out-hustled the whole night.

And they were not helped by coaching staff that was too cute all night. They had no answer for the hurry-up of USU, or for the smallish D line that kept shooting the rushing lanes and getting pressure all game.

CougCenter: Give Utah State credit. They scored double digits three times last year, out of six games! That’s half of their games with 10 or more points! Pretty formidable opponent for our Cougs! And those Mike Leach tirades where he threw his players under the bus were totally appropriate and definitely the main reason WSU was good while he was here!

Cougar Fan:

We beat Portland and Stanford. I don’t give a flying fig about vax status. I care about can you coach football at this level and through 5 games this guys is over this head and a really bad 4 game losing streak after getting lucky to win his first game last year. This really looks like a whiff by Chun.

2-10??!! That is the opposite of a positive frame of mind! These guys are going 11-1! Just like the 0-1 Washington Huskies fans are thinking this morning! Who’s with me??!! Gotta say, I’m disappointed in some of our fans. We’re all about positivity here!

As for yours truly, today was great! (really, it was). I had some good Hungarian beer, took an evening cruise on the Danube and pretty much forgot all about our soon-to-be back on top football team!

This Week in Parenting

Lots to share, but I’ll keep it short. We were having a snack this evening, and tried some local paprika paste with the cheese and crackers. It was quite good. When talking about the spiciness, both boys said, “You think it’s gonna come but it never comes.”

Sheila MacRae! Audrey Meadows! Art Carney! Good night everybody!

Football

Aggie-nizing: Washington State surrenders two late scores, sustains crushing Week 1 defeat | The Spokesman-Review
The Cougars, whose program has been beset recently by less-than-ideal news off the field, had chances to boost morale in what felt like a must-win opener.

Recap and highlights: Washington State drops first game of season to Utah State | The Spokesman-Review
A heavily favored WSU team led by a single point at halftime and by as many as 12 in the second half, but Utah State mounted a comeback in the fourth quarter and scored the go-ahead touchdown with less than a minute to play to win 26-23 at Gesa Field.

Squandered opportunity on 2-yard line leaves Washington State fans scratching their heads after Utah State loss | The Spokesman-Review
In total, the Cougars made five trips to the red zone and wound up with just 23 points. The Aggies got to the red zone five times and scored 26 points.

Non-Sports

Ramstein Air Base Becomes Temporary Refuge for Afghans - The New York Times
About a fifth of all people evacuated from Kabul were brought to Ramstein Air Base in Germany, where they await the next leg of their journey, to the United States.

There's a psychological reason anti-vaccine misinformation is so hard to fight | Salon.com
A psychologist explains why it's so hard to get someone to back down from their position — especially online.