Nevada Wolfpack vs Hawaii Warriors

October 26th, 2008 kNuke Posted in NCAA Football | No Comments »

The Hawaii Warriors went through 3 quarterbacks and was outgained 481-331, but still managed to defeat the Nevada Wolfpack 38-31 in thrilling fashion.  With 20 seconds left in the game, Greg Alexander lofted a TD pass to Malcolm Lane for the victory.

Offense: Finally, decent QB play…  Greg Alexander was 17-22 for 205 yards and 2 TDs.  Alexander was nimble enough to make plays with his feet and on the money with most of his throws.  He’s earned the starting gig for the rest of the season.  Hopefully now the offense will open up a little bit.

The offensive line played poorly again.  At least the coaches tried to help the offensive line by leaving Daniel Farmer in to block.  Ryan Mouton looked good, but I worry that the defense will suffer as he tires throughout the game.  Michael Washington and Malcolm Lane finally showed up and it’s about damn time.  I’m still not sold on Washington, we’ll see what he does next week.

Ron Lee’s offense actually scored second half points!  I give him credit for playing Alexander and not letting the game slip away with Inoke Funaki.  I liked all the deep shots as well.  I didn’t like the conservative play calling once Hawaii was up, but overall, this was Lee’s best game thus far.

Defense:  The defense did score a TD, but once again were unable to stop the run.  Nevada is a great running team, but 308 yards is ridiculous.  If Colin Kaepernick had any accuracy, the Wolfpack would have rolled up 45 points.

Special Teams: Malcolm Lane belongs back there, no question about it.  His kick returns were excellent.  Tim Grasso had 3 punts inside the 20 and JoPierre Davis looks like he should be on the field more often.

Coaching:  I didn’t care for the conservative playing calling when up by 14 and the defense didn’t have a great gameplan to stop the run, but a win is a win.  Whoever made the decision to bring in Alexander deserves the gameball.

Final Word: Hawaii kept its bowl hopes alive and may have found a quarterback.  Is this a blip on the radar or has the Alexander legacy begun?