Rocky road for offense?

For an offense that has struggled in recent weeks, the last thing it needs is to face a Rocky Long coached defense.

But that’s what Wyoming faces Saturday when it plays at San Diego State. Former New Mexico coach Rocky Long is now the defensive coordinator at San Diego State, and he brought his 3-3-5 scheme from Albuquerque to San Diego. The defense hasn’t been dominating, but it wreaks havoc on opposing offenses with the numerous ways and angles players come after quarterbacks.

“It’s a great scheme and one you don’t see a whole lot which makes it difficult to prepare for,” UW coach Dave Christensen said.

UW’s offense has scored just 10 points, allowed 13 quarterback sacks and failed to surpass the 250-yard mark in total offense during its recent three-game losing streak. In two of those games the Cowboys didn’t score.

Nothing stands out statistically from San Diego State on defense, other than it’s fourth in the Mountain West Conference in passing defense (208.4 yards per game).

Christensen doesn’t like to see what UW did in the past since this is his first year as the coach, and he would be better served not to see how the Cowboys did against Long’s defense while he was at New Mexico.

UW was 2-8 against, lost eight of the last nine and scored 10 points or less six times.

As offensive coordinator at Missouri the previous eight years, Christensen faced Long’s Lobos twice. New Mexico won at Missouri 45-35 in 2005 and Missouri won at New Mexico in 2006 27-17.
___________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
See Wednesday’s paper for a look ahead to some of the other games in the Mountain West this week, including the latest “Game of the Year” in the league between No. 4 TCU and No. 16 Utah. Can you believe Utah is a 17-point underdog?

Also see stories on some of the trials and tribulations in UW’s secondary, and on yet another verbal commitment for 2010.