Bold Predictions Revisited: Football Season Recap

The college football season or least the regular season has end. This was a fairly interesting season on the Mountain West front. Even at one point you had 3 teams that were ranked in the top 25 in the conference. Before the season started I wrote a piece that detailed 6 bold predictions for the upcoming season. Time to revisit those predictions as to see if those came to fruition.

Prediction: Nevada will have a top 10 passing offense in the nation

Result: Wrong. The Wolfpack finished with the 24^th best passing offense in the country. Averaging 285 yards a game. Ty Gangi finished the regular season with 3,131 yards passing good for 20^th. Gangi will look to add to those stats when they take on Arkansas State on December 29^th in the Arizona Bowl. With a monster game he could move into the top 15.

Prediction 2: New Mexico will begin a search for a new head coach mid-season

Result: I’m giving this one a push. Though New Mexico didn’t make a coaching change at the end of the season there were rumblings that a change could happen. However, the AD of New Mexico choose to give Davie another chance. With the Lobos coming off back to back 3-9 seasons in which both seasons ended with seven game losing streaks. It’s safe to say that the fans and the school need to see significant progress in 2019 for Davie to stay as coach.

Prediction 3: Colorado State will go into their bye week with a 4-1 record.

Result: Wrong, very wrong. If I could put a sad face emoji on this one I would. As a CSU alumni this was a very disappointing season. The Rams win into their bye week with a 1-4 record. I will however give myself credit for correctly predicting the SEC split. The Rams upset Arkansas coming from 18 points down but got blown out at Florida. The worst last of all this was the Illinois State game. The Rams are pushed around by an FCS team that made them look small and soft. The Rams finished with the 3-9 record, losing their final fives games.

Prediction 4: Boise State will go undefeated and crash the NY6.

Result: Wrong. For the first couple games of Boise State season they looked like they were going to blow everyone out by double digits. However, an early game in Stillwater against Oklahoma State it all came crashing down. Now Oklahoma State is a pretty good team, but that wasn’t a great performance from Boise. After starting the season 2-0, the Broncos would lose 2 of their next 3 games including a six point loss to San Diego State. A team that has given them issues in the past. The Broncos would finish the regular season on a 7-game win streak before losing and a revenge game to Fresno State in overtime of the Mountain West championship game. Still a good season but it would have been better if a berth in the NY6 was there.

Prediction 5: Wyoming will take a significant step back despite the top defense.

Result: Wrong. The marking this as wrong because, I assumed they would come only when maybe 3 or 4 games. And it did look that way for a while until they made a quarterback change. They went with the true freshman Sean Chambers and the kid played well. He showed similarities to Josh Allen, running a lot of your quarterback keepers and read options. Only throwing the ball when they needed. Nico Evans ran for over 1,000 yards. Tyler Vander Waal did come back later in the season for an injured Chambers and helped them finish 6-6. The defense was stout and kept them in games. Wyoming was the odd team out of the bowls this season, which is still head scratching to this day. This team could still be an issue next season.

Prediction 6: UNLV will be the most improved team in the conference

Result: Wrong. This award goes to Hawaii. UNLV Had a rough season. Finishing the year 4-8 in a year that some people saw as a make or break year for coach Tony Sanchez. However, Coach Sanchez got the Bob Davie treatment and was given another year. It will likely be his last chance too, as they are moving to a new stadium with the Raiders coming to town. The Running Rebels lost several games by double digits including a 50-37 loss to San Jose State in which it was their only win of the season. They did get a big conference went over San Diego State if that makes fans feel any better. The bottom line is UNLV will have to win at least 7 games next season for Tony Sanchez to keep his job. Seeing that schedule its going to be very tough.

Well there it is, it was not a good showing for me in the predictions department. They were bold predictions which are always supposed to come from left field. It was an exciting season for some and dreadful for others. Maybe next season will be much improved for me predictions wise!