SEATTLE — If the sight of an unchecked receiver running down the middle of the field for the eventual game-winning touchdown didn’t bring back enough bad memories for the University of Washington football fans, then maybe another 400-plus yardage total from an opposing offense did.
A more experienced, supposedly improved UW defense looked awfully familiar on Saturday afternoon. The Huskies’ 23-17 loss to Brigham Young University begged the question as to how far UW’s defense has really come.
“They gave us a chance to win the game,” head coach Steve Sarkisian said after BYU piled up 408 yards and 23 first downs. “There were some things that we didn’t help ourselves with.”
While UW’s defense certainly kept the Huskies in the game, and even rose up to make some key third-down stops in the second half, BYU coach Bronco Mendenhall put it best when he said his Cougars “made plays when we needed them.”
The most obvious came on BYU’s lone passing third-down conversion of the second half. Playing against a blitz package that didn’t provide nearly the quick pressure that the Huskies needed, Cougars quarterback Riley Nelson dumped a short pass over the middle to wide open running back J.J. DiLuigi, who turned and ran untouched for a 48-yard touchdown. That play, which came with 41/2 minutes left in the third quarter, accounted for the game’s final points.
“It was just a great call by them, getting one of their best athletes in space,” senior linebacker Mason Foster said after Saturday’s loss. “It’s something we’ve got to work on. For the most part, we did a good job, but it’s just one of those things where they caught us on a certain call.”
The blitz left only two linebackers in coverage, and when middle linebacker Cort Dennison moved to his left to pick up a receiver on a corner route, it left the middle of the field exposed. The closest player to DiLuigi was linebacker Victor Aiyewa, who was a few yards away and gave fruitless chase over the final 40 yards.
Defensive coordinator Nick Holt said the lack of pressure on the quarterback was more of a factor in the big play than anything.
“The quarterback was able to stay in the pocket a little bit longer,” he said late Saturday night. “We didn’t do the pressure exactly correctly. One of the D-linemen got out of his rush lane, ran into the pressure guy, (and) they had a big, old window to throw the F-route.
“It was a good call by BYU, and we didn’t execute our blitz. You hope it doesn’t happen, but it happened right there, and we’ll learn from it.”
Holt said that the 48-yard touchdown didn’t necessarily remind him of last year’s Arizona State game, which saw a Sun Devils slot receiver run down the middle of the field and catch a 48-yard touchdown pass in the closing minute. Aiyewa, who was playing safety at the time, seemed to be out of position on that play, but Holt never pointed a finger at one specific player.
He wasn’t singling out anyone Saturday, either.
“When you blitz, there’s a tradeoff,” he said. “We were blitzing, they hit the right guy on the wrong blitz, and we didn’t blitz correctly. We didn’t blitz correctly; we didn’t execute correctly.”
Saturday’s touchdown also underscored a deeper problem for UW’s defense in that the Huskies were unable to generate much of a pass rush Saturday. UW, which lost all-time sack leader Daniel Te’o-Nesheim from last year’s team, didn’t have a single sack Saturday while giving up 262 passing yards.
“They did a really good job on their protections schemes,” Dennison said. “The center did a really good job. He was always moving his head, so we really couldn’t get a read on the snap count. And that’s huge. If you can’t get that extra step, it’s huge.”
The Huskies’ defense got off to a good start with three-and-outs on each of BYU’s first two possessions. But after a roughing-the-punter penalty gave BYU new life on its second possession, the Cougars unleashed a no-huddle offense and marched deep into UW territory. While that drive ended in a missed field goal, it set the tone for an offense that would score on its next two possessions and pile up 201 yards in the first half.
The Huskies, who have 17 returning defensive players with starting experience, gave up two more scoring drives at the start of the second half before settling in and allowing just four first downs the rest of the way.
The most frustrating part for Holt was that UW couldn’t generate any turnovers.
“We couldn’t get any turnovers to help the offense,” Holt said, “and that was really it.”
On the positive side, the Huskies only allowed 23 points and were generally stout on third downs — BYU was 5 of 16 and didn’t convert any of its third downs in the fourth quarter.
In the end, the Huskies felt like their defense could have done more but were quick to point out that the BYU offense was one of the better ones they’ll face this year. There is still plenty of time to prove that this UW defense isn’t like some of the units in recent years, and maybe this Saturday’s game against Syracuse can provide an opportunity to prove it.
“There were some really good things out there,” said Holt, whose defense allowed 400 or more yards in seven of the Huskies’ first nine games in 2009. “We hung in there tough. We did some good things as far as the base calls and executing things. There were some guys who were at some new positions and didn’t do what they were supposed to do.
”.. Our kids really hung in there and battled, got the ball back for the offense in the fourth quarter. So there were some positives things about it.”
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