Hey, what, some GOOD news coming from WSU-ville these days?  It's true.  Per Paul Wulff yesterday, senior defensive end Kevin Kooyman is coming back next season!  As you know, Kooyman suffered a knee injury after the first game of the year and hasn't played since.  This is, uh, yeah, WELCOME news for next year's team.  Boy do they need some strength and experience along the defensive line.  It's been the same beating of the drum, week after week, with young kids up front getting overwhelmed at the point of attack.  Here's hoping Kooyman continues to rehab successfully and comes back 100% for next year.  Interesting that Wulff said that Kooyman will not need surgery after all.  You wonder if hey, he's already not playing this year, wouldn't a quick procedure on his knee maybe speed things up and make sure he's good to go in 2010? 

Grippi's latest has some other updates as well, including a possible return for Chima Nwachukwu and Jay Matthews in the secondary.  Good news there.  Chima's not the most physical player in the country, but he is one of the best tacklers on the team, second only to Xavier Hicks with 56.  On this young, thin defense, they need his leadership and ability back there in the last line of defense.  On offense, Tyson Pencer is probably out with the ankle sprain, so Steven Ayers will step in at left tackle. 

Meanwhile, Jeff Tuel's status is uncertain with the kneecap subluxation injury.  They haven't ruled him out, but it doesn't sound great either.  We'll have to wait and see how he responds on Tuesday to get a real idea of what's up.  Even if he does survive the week of practice, just how much he'll have to give on Saturday could be a little dicey.  UCLA's got some big uglies on defense, and with our patchwork O-line?  Just please, WSU coaches, it almost goes without saying, but BE CAREFUL with the kid QB!  While game experience is crucial to improvement as an NCAA quarterback, there has to be a line somewhere as to what you are willing to risk with a young talent like Tuel.  We all want to win, but don't want to ruin the youngster in the process, you know?

Also of note - Grippi reports Wulff gave the kids the day off on Sunday.  We touched on this on Saturday after the game, but the team just looked ragged out there.  The defense especially, when they couldn't get Arizona off the field and the offense sputtering for most of the day, well, they had a fatigued, end-of-a-long-roadtrip look to them.  I'm sure if you watched it you could agree on that. 

Finally, this week's blog poll.  Enjoy:

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Florida
2	Texas
3	Alabama	1
4	Cincinnati	1
5	TCU	3
6	Boise State
7	Georgia Tech	2
8	Iowa	1
9	LSU	1
10	Pittsburgh	3
11	Oregon	8
12	Southern Cal
13	Ohio State	3
14	Miami (Florida)	3
15	Houston
16	Utah	2
17	Arizona	1
18	Penn State	7
19	Oklahoma State	4
20	Wisconsin	1
21	Virginia Tech	1
22	Oregon State
23	South Florida	1
24	West Virginia
25	Brigham Young
Last week's ballot

I'm guessing many of you probably found something else to do today, and/or will do something else tonight rather than watch the replay of the latest crushing?  Just same old, same old.  I did catch some of it on channelsurfing.net (thanks to Nuss for the tip) and it looked pretty awful.  Poor execution, poor tackling, manhandled up front, you know the drill.  Sort of like when we used to have NBA basketball around here, and the Sonics would be on the last leg of a road trip and just get run off the court?  It was a lot like that, a team that looked, well, tired. 

Oh, and more injuries came down the pike.  Tyson Pencer is going to be out again, just as he was coming back, down with a high ankle sprain.  But the worst of all, the great hope of the program in Jeff Tuel hurt his knee (a subluxion of the kneecap?  OUCH.).  We'll see what develops there.

Meanwhile UCLA beat UW and rolled up over 450 yards of offense today.  Have to keep your crimson chin up right now...but it doesn't seem like it's going to be any easier next week, does it?

Enjoy the rest of your weekend, and as always, GO COUGS!

Top O' the morning to you Cougs.  Another flag Saturday, waving in the cool November morning breeze.  Great work yet again by Will Walker for the screen cap and those on the ground.  You serve Coug Nation well!

Meanwhile, a "Friday Night Lights" update, and a strong game last night for future Coug QB Connor Halliday.  The Ferris QB threw three TD's in a 21-10 win last night against a previously-unbeaten Wenatchee team, as the Saxons advance in the playoffs.  Didn't see his final passing line, but a poster on Cougfan said the radio broadcast mentioned 22-for-38, 284 yards and 3 TD's.  There was also this quote, from the Wenatchee head coach:

“He’s the real deal,” Devereaux said. “I’ve been coaching here for 15 years, and he’s the best quarterback I’ve seen. He reminds me a lot of Drew Bledsoe when he was at Walla Walla in the 80s. He’s a stud.”

Hello My Crimson Compadres!  Your old pal Longball here to get things started on a Football Friday.

Well, last week we all saw our bowl hopes for 2009 go up in smoke as Notre Dame took our Cougs behind the proverbial woodshed for fateful loss number 7. It was a big step backwards for the Cougar offense that showed some life against Cal. There's really not much to make of it, if you ask me. We simply are not very good... yet. I am pretty confident that this week we are in for more of the same as we travel to Tuscon to play an Arizona squad that is one bizzaro bounce away from being in the conversation for a Pac 10 championship.


So, another week, another blow-out and we all have provided our analysis of this recurring event ad-naseum, so I won't even go there. Instead, there are a couple Cougar items I need to take on as a proud Pullman Greyhound.

First of all, I am a couple weeks late on this, but Johnny Forzani has some explaining to do to my good buddy Joe. Against Cal, Forzani caught a Jeff Tuel bomb for a touchdown and as he crossed the goal line he leaped in the air in an imperfect, but unmistakable interpretation of a touchdown celebration patented years ago by my good buddy Joe. A touchdown celebration forever known as the Monster Mash.

The first known Monster Mash occurred on a cold fall evening in Sandpoint, ID in 1994. The Pullman Greyhounds had traveled north that night to take on Sandpoint on their march to the 1994 WIAA playoffs. The Hounds controlled the game from start to finish, but it was Joe who delivered the real nail in the coffin when he took a handoff, broke 15 tackles and rumbled about 120 yards for a touchdown. I was putting together a highlight reel with some of my friends that year and as we watched the tape of this run we knew as he broke the first tackle and sprinted out into the open field that we had one humdinger of a highlight on our hands.  But just as we were brought out of our seats by the sheer Eric Dickersonian awesomenesss of the run,  something happened that turned it from a bruising display of speed and power, to pure comedy gold for the ages. As he approached the goal line, Joe leaped in the air with all the dainty, unadulterated glee of a wee schoolboy. He did this while holding the ball over his head with both hands and as he landed delicately in the end zone he brought the ball down as if to spike it, but did not let go of it. We were stunned.

And then we laughed... and laughed and laughed and laughed until it hurt. We re-wound that play again and again and laughed harder every time. It was the only play to be included in both the highlight and the blooper reel we put together that season. I am not 100% sure how it got the name the Monster Mash, but as best I can recall it was Joe himself who dubbed it that. He simply said, "Oh yeah, that's the Monster Mash". As if he had planned it that way all along. Joe went on to play for the Cougs and was a member of the '97 Rose Bowl team, so I hope that Forzani was paying homage to a fellow Coug, rather than plagiarizing another man's touchdown celebration. Still, while I prefer to give him the benefit of the doubt, it would have been nice of him to give Joe a shout out on Cougar's All Access last week when he discussed his "unique" celebration.  NOTE - here's the Forzani celebration in question from the Youtube video, around the seven-minute mark. 

Keep going....there's more.....