Quinton Bradley heard the chirping and boasting. The Idaho offense, which went for over 1,000 yards offensively in the second scrimmage, let their confidence be known to the defense before hitting the Kibbie Dome field Saturday for the third and final spring scrimmage.
Spencer Farrin | Courtesy
Running back Kris Olugbode takes a toss to the right side during the Idaho’s third scrimmage of the spring on Saturday. He ran for 64 yards and a touchdown on the day.
The junior defensive end and his defense ultimately won the game, holding the Idaho offense to only 11 touchdowns and numerous turnover on downs during the last scrimmage Idaho will play before Friday’s Silver and Gold game.
“We was in the chalk room doing a little too much talking, we thought we were going to do the same thing as last week,” senior wide receiver Dezmon Epps said. “We came out with the same emphasis and then the defense came ready to play.”
Four of Idaho’s offensive touchdowns came because the offense was set up only 25 yards from the goal line. Still, the run defense was stout and blitz pressure was getting to the two Vandal quarterbacks.
Once the offense was backed up to 65 yards away from the end zone, quarterbacks redshirt freshman Matt Linehan and redshirt sophomore Chad Chalich had more problems trying to manufacture touchdown drives.
“We made the offense feel like they couldn’t do nothing, we had Chad not even being able to throw the ball,” Bradley, a junior defensive end, said. “We were tired of the offense scoring so much. I kind of felt like it was pitted against us sometimes. Today we just came in with a mindset of don’t let them in.”
The competitors for Idaho’s starting quarterback position combined for only six touchdown passes, five of them belonging to Linehan. Linehan also tossed the offenses’ two interceptions.
Idaho coach Paul Petrino declined to say whether or not the competition is going either way, even if the eye test may favor Linehan. He tossed 364 yards to Chalich’s 195 yards — the caveat being Chalich’s still recovering throwing shoulder hindered him to 14 less passing attempts than Linehan. The battle will likely carry into the fall.
“I need to watch it on tape but I wouldn’t walk off the field thinking there was any separation (between the two),” Petrino said.
The defensive effort didn’t help either of their causes on Saturday.
Bradley had three of the five sacks on the day, which in itself doesn’t measure the amount of pressure the Vandal quarterbacks were under. The 55 percent combined completion of Linehan and Chalich (44 percent for Chalich alone) was because of being forced out of the pocket and having to attempt to make difficult throws.
The defensive line play was so inspiring that the secondary decided to join the fun as well. Deep balls that weren’t contested in the first two scrimmages were challenged on Saturday.
Late in the scrimmage, a perfectly placed Linehan deep ball to Deon Watson was met by the backhand of sophomore cornerback Desmond Banks for one of his three pass break-ups on the day. Banks accounted for half of them in the secondary, four were batted balls from the defensive line.
Junior cornerback Jayshawn Jordan had two of those pass break-ups. Though he’d probably point to his hit that put wide receiver Buck Cowan on the ground after a catching a pass in the flat as his accomplishment of the day.
“Overall I was happy with it, because we kind of needed a scrimmage where the defense would come out and I still wouldn’t say they won because there was 12 touchdowns but there was a lot of plays,” Petrino said. “Probably, by far the loudest hitting it’s been, there was some big hits all day long so that was really good to hear.”
Sean Kramer can be reached at [email protected]