The Colorado State Rams got a late fumble recovery by Guy Miller to secure a 24-23 win over the Weber State Wildcats. CSU caught a huge break when Cameron Higgins fumbled the exchange on the CSU 11 yard line with 42 seconds left allowing the Rams to kneel out the clock.
Grant Stucker had something in every category by catching an opening drive touchdown, throwing for one touchdown, and one interception. CSU got out to a 17-6 lead midway through the 2nd quarter and looked to be in control.
Weber State once again fought back against a Mountain West Conference opponent behind Cody Nakamura's two touchdown effort. Nakamura had ten catches and 75 yards with both touchdowns coming in a 4:20 second span at the end of the 2nd quarter. Tim Toone added 7 catches for 85 yards while giving the Ram secondary trouble most of the day.
The winning points came off an Eric Peitz 2 yard touchdown catch that was originally called incomplete by officials. After the review overturned the incomplete call the Rams went up 24-23 with 8:31 to go in the 4th quarter.
Weber State looked like a high quality division II school and gave the Rams a tough time on both sides of the ball. The Wildcats gained 258 of their 316 total yards through the air as their ground game was stagnate. The yards per rush by both teams were nothing to be proud of as the Wildcats averaged 1.6 and the Rams with 2.7.
After coming off a big victory against Colorado Buffalos then watching the Buffs get creamed by Toledo everyone had questions in their minds about the Rams. Were they for real or the Buffs were just that bad? Against Weber St we got closer to an answer, or did we? The Rams were bad on 3rd downs going 0-8 while allowing the Wildcats to go 11-21 on 3rd downs. The Rams were killed in the time of possession battle by 17 minutes.
The offense did not look sharp on any drive besides the opening week, which is the second week in a row. Leonard Mason looked good carrying for a 4.1 yard per carry average as the feature back but wore down in the second half. Mason follows his blockers and looks better then a kid getting his first start at the FBS level. John Mosure and Shelley Smith were both sidelined by injury hurting the CSU run game.
Rashaun Greer had 6 catches for 162 yards receiving, that was after a couple drops that could have had him above the 200 mark easily. No other Ram receiver had more than 1 catch on the day.
So what exactly are the Rams this year? I think we look back to last year at the team that slid by a Sacremento State team at home and continually got better all year and eventually earned a bowl game. This team will continue to get better game by game. For now it looks like they will have to use their defense to keep them in games while Stucker learns the offense.
This next section is a thumbs up, thumbs down look at the Rams effort. For those of you who don't know who Fum McGraw is click his name for a little history.
Fum Would Be Proud of the Rams run defense. They held Weber State to almost nothing on the ground and early on Alex Williams was making everyone forget about Ricky Brewer being suspended for the year at middle linebacker. Williams finished with 7 solo tackles and 4 assisted tackles.
Fum Would Be Upset at the Ram offense. They were held to a poor 2.1 yards per carry and converted ZERO third down opportunities. They abandoned the inside running game once again in the second half and it made them easier to cover. Mason was running wide or it was a pass, the Wildcat defense could have left the short middle open all day long.
Fum McGraw Motivating Player of the Game is Rashaun Greer with his 7 catches and 162 yards. Just think if he had not dropped a few more and we could be talking about a historical day in Rams receiving history.