Eastern Washington Preview

Oregon State's first opponent is Eastern Washington University, or as Herd likes to call it, the "Harvard on the Palouse".

EWU had a great season in 2005 winning the Big Sky title and going to the Div. 1-AA playoffs. They lost their first round game to Northern Iowa, but they return a ton of players with a least some starting experience. Only 5 players that are expected to start on Thursday are making their starting debut. They are a always a good 1-AA team and are predicted to finish second this season in the Big Sky preseason poll.

Coach Paul Wulff has lost some key players from last year's championship team. The QB, best reciever, and best defensive player are all gone. The 2005 QB, Erik Meyer, won the Walter Payton award for the best player in Division 1-AA! The reciever finished second to Jerry Rice in career TD receptions in 1-AA with 46. So their record setting offense of 2005 has a few holes to fill.

Let's take a look at both sides of the ball for 2006.

Offense
The Eastern Washington offense is self described as this:

Eastern’s offense under Wulff has now led the Big Sky Conference in total offense in four of the last five years. The attack enables the Eagles to
throw the ball a little more, utilize more short and intermediate passing routes, simplify formations and gives quarterbacks more freedom to change plays at the line of scrimmage.

But the Eagles haven’t lost sight of their bread and butter for the past two decades – the running game. Eastern will always feature outstanding offensive linemen, with a stable of talented running backs. In nine of the past 11 seasons, Eastern has had a 1,000-yard rusher. In Eastern’s first 86 years of football, only three 1,000-yard performances were recorded.

So we know they will have somewhat of a ball control offense. Since they are breaking in one or possibly two new QBs they will definitely keep the passing game simple. The running game looks like it has the most potential with Ryan Cole and an experienced line returning.

Apparently EWU will be trying both QBs in the first few games to see how each QB does. They are focused on the Big Sky season and these games don't really matter much to them. They have a junior, Chris Peerboom, who went to Jesuit HS in the Portland area and a redshirt freshman, Matt Nichols. Everything coming out of the EWU athletic dept. points to both playing significant minutes in the first couple of games.

What it all means for the Beavs
Looks like a lot of short passes and running. They will look to control the clock and keep the Beavers offense off the field. If the Beavers defense is as good against the run as it was last year, then the Eagles offense is going to have a lot of short drives. Also, the Eagles gave up a ton of sacks last season (53) with virtually the same offensive line that they will have against OSU. If the Beavs can't get a sack or two against this team or at least a lot of pressure, then it could be a long season for the secondary.

Defense
The Eagles had an OK defense last season giving up 23 ppg but they gave up points in bunches to some of the better 1-AA teams. Apparently, they had a hard time tackling people and that would lead to big plays. Their strength is their safeties as they return both all-conference players. The CBs are new and the defensive line is a question mark. Our offense has to be licking its chops.

What it all means for the Beavs
Their defense allowed 160 ypg in rushing last year so combine that with poor tackling and an undersized d-line and Yvenson Bernard better have a heck of a day. I want to see some serious running numbers from our o-line and RBs. The safeties and their secondary could cause us some problems. They only allowed 203 ypg passing last season. Luckily they only had 9 INTs all season so that shouldn't be a problem (knock on wood).

Prediction
I think that the Beavs offense will come up big. Anything less than 30 points should be a disappointment. The defense needs to show that it can create some havoc against this team. Ultimately the score doesn't matter, but how does the team look does. They need to establish early that their d-line and secondary is better. Still it should be about 34-14.

Quick Facts
* EWU is a Division 1-AA school that plays in the Big Sky which is the same conference as Portland St. who we opened with last year.

* In 2005, EWU set 27 team records and 4 Big Sky records for player and team achievements.

* EWU has never had a losing season under current head coach Paul Wulff (6 seasons) and has a 7 season streak of winning seasons.

* Coach Wulff played under former OSU head coach Dennis Erickson at WSU in the late 80's.

* Since 1982, Eastern is 7-12 against Division I-A teams.

EWU Articles

Eastern faces rugged start - Seattle P-I

Eastern Braces for Tough Tests - Kitsap Sun