Colorado State University Athletics
Saturday, September 7
Fort Collins, Colo.
2 PM MT
Colorado State
1-1
38
vs
13
Western Illinois
0-2
1st
2nd
3rd
4th
F
Western Illinois
3
3
0
7
13
Colorado State
14
14
7
3
38
Defense Sacks Western Illinois
9/7/2019 6:58:00 PM | Football
Rams produce seven sacks, 10 tackles for loss in win
FORT COLLINS, Colo. – Energy and passion.
Aspects which are supposed to be constants on defense, as well as emotion, were missing a season ago. Even in a season-opening loss to Colorado a week prior, Colorado State's defense played with those pillars. There were also mistakes, which led in part to a 52-31 loss.
"Man, this year, everybody is bought in," defensive tackle Ellison Hubbard said. "Everybody wants to win. Last year, everybody was like, 'do I want to win or what?' This year, everybody is like we have some talent here, we have the energy, we have the people who want to win. Everybody is bought in."
A week of practice and a crisper effort assignment wise, the Rams' unit was a lot more put together in Saturday's 38-13 win over Western Illinois at Canvas Stadium.
Of the 215 yards the Fighting Leathernecks had in the game, 100 came in the final quarter when the Rams were freely substituting players. So did two of the guest's three chunk plays and the lone touchdown.
"That felt amazing, actually," defensive tackle Ellison Hubbard said. "All that work we put in all over summer and in fall camp. To put that on the field, it felt real good to know that we have that and we're capable of doing that."
After the game, CSU head coach Mike Bobo joked with his junior he preferred second-string Hubbard to the starter, especially after he registered a career-best 2.5 sacks in the contest. It keyed a seven-sack performance for the Rams, their best output since the 2017 game at Utah State.
Toby McBride hit a career-best with two, and Jan-Phillip Bombek had 1.5, one a strip sack -- which he recovered -- for the unit's first turnover of the season. With nine additional quarterback hurries (two each from Jalen Bates, Manny Jones and Devin Phillips), WIU's Connor Sampson was under constant pressure throughout, finishing 22-of-37 passing for 151 yards and the late score.
"I think it was more of a continuation of what we did in the spring and the summer," Bombek said. "Today, we got after the quarterback like we're going to have to do against high-level opponents, like we're going to have to do next week against Arkansas.
"It felt good, but we always know there's more in the tank. We have to step our game up next week in order to achieve the same result against Arkansas."
The first points for WIU were set up by a CSU turnover, the second off a missed field goal from Maxwell Poduska. Even when the Leathernecks made a play, Colorado State regrouped most of the time with one of their own. For Bombek, that was one of the adjustments made after last week's loss.
Bobo was wary of what Western Illinois brought to the table offensively, which made the performance all the better to him.
Again, one would have to go back to the win over the Aggies in 2017 to find a game where the Rams had at least 10 tackles for a loss, which they did Saturday, and eight of them were produced by the front four.
"We were a little nervous coming into this game and what they do offensively, and the big thing was the line to communicate today; that was a message today and all week," Bobo said. "I wanted them to play with relentless effort, and I thought they did. They had a couple drives there when we had some backups in that were probably thinking more than playing as fast as we could, but it was good to get them in. Our team works extremely hard, and it's good to get those guys in. Defense played extremely hard, another unit people doubt, but they are going to continue to work and continue to get better."
As excited as the Rams were about their performance, the common refrain was it won't be good enough down the road, starting with next week as they travel to meet Arkansas. They expect the Razorbacks will want some payback after the Rams rallied to beat them in Fort Collins last year.
Going up against an SEC team is not daunting to Hubbard, and he knows some people may view this game as just a solid performance against an FCS school. None of which is a concern to him.
"I say it doesn't matter who we play, anybody can win on a given Saturday," Hubbard said. "We just have to keep getting better like Coach Bobo said, add on to this. We're going to have to keep executing better, and all the mistakes and penalties we had this week, we have to clean it up. We're going into their home. It's not going to be easy. It's going to be way different this week."
Aspects which are supposed to be constants on defense, as well as emotion, were missing a season ago. Even in a season-opening loss to Colorado a week prior, Colorado State's defense played with those pillars. There were also mistakes, which led in part to a 52-31 loss.
"Man, this year, everybody is bought in," defensive tackle Ellison Hubbard said. "Everybody wants to win. Last year, everybody was like, 'do I want to win or what?' This year, everybody is like we have some talent here, we have the energy, we have the people who want to win. Everybody is bought in."
A week of practice and a crisper effort assignment wise, the Rams' unit was a lot more put together in Saturday's 38-13 win over Western Illinois at Canvas Stadium.
Of the 215 yards the Fighting Leathernecks had in the game, 100 came in the final quarter when the Rams were freely substituting players. So did two of the guest's three chunk plays and the lone touchdown.
"That felt amazing, actually," defensive tackle Ellison Hubbard said. "All that work we put in all over summer and in fall camp. To put that on the field, it felt real good to know that we have that and we're capable of doing that."
After the game, CSU head coach Mike Bobo joked with his junior he preferred second-string Hubbard to the starter, especially after he registered a career-best 2.5 sacks in the contest. It keyed a seven-sack performance for the Rams, their best output since the 2017 game at Utah State.
Toby McBride hit a career-best with two, and Jan-Phillip Bombek had 1.5, one a strip sack -- which he recovered -- for the unit's first turnover of the season. With nine additional quarterback hurries (two each from Jalen Bates, Manny Jones and Devin Phillips), WIU's Connor Sampson was under constant pressure throughout, finishing 22-of-37 passing for 151 yards and the late score.
"I think it was more of a continuation of what we did in the spring and the summer," Bombek said. "Today, we got after the quarterback like we're going to have to do against high-level opponents, like we're going to have to do next week against Arkansas.
"It felt good, but we always know there's more in the tank. We have to step our game up next week in order to achieve the same result against Arkansas."
The first points for WIU were set up by a CSU turnover, the second off a missed field goal from Maxwell Poduska. Even when the Leathernecks made a play, Colorado State regrouped most of the time with one of their own. For Bombek, that was one of the adjustments made after last week's loss.
Bobo was wary of what Western Illinois brought to the table offensively, which made the performance all the better to him.
Again, one would have to go back to the win over the Aggies in 2017 to find a game where the Rams had at least 10 tackles for a loss, which they did Saturday, and eight of them were produced by the front four.
"We were a little nervous coming into this game and what they do offensively, and the big thing was the line to communicate today; that was a message today and all week," Bobo said. "I wanted them to play with relentless effort, and I thought they did. They had a couple drives there when we had some backups in that were probably thinking more than playing as fast as we could, but it was good to get them in. Our team works extremely hard, and it's good to get those guys in. Defense played extremely hard, another unit people doubt, but they are going to continue to work and continue to get better."
As excited as the Rams were about their performance, the common refrain was it won't be good enough down the road, starting with next week as they travel to meet Arkansas. They expect the Razorbacks will want some payback after the Rams rallied to beat them in Fort Collins last year.
Going up against an SEC team is not daunting to Hubbard, and he knows some people may view this game as just a solid performance against an FCS school. None of which is a concern to him.
"I say it doesn't matter who we play, anybody can win on a given Saturday," Hubbard said. "We just have to keep getting better like Coach Bobo said, add on to this. We're going to have to keep executing better, and all the mistakes and penalties we had this week, we have to clean it up. We're going into their home. It's not going to be easy. It's going to be way different this week."
Team Stats
WIU
CSU
Total Yards
215
585
Pass Yards
151
396
Rushing Yards
64
189
Penalty Yards
35
97
1st Downs
12
25
3rd Downs
4
8
4th Downs
1
0
TOP
29:32
30:28
1st Quarter
WIU 0, CSU 7
CSU - WRIGHT, D. 75 yd pass from HILL, C. (PODUSKA, M. kick) 1 plays, 75 yards, TOP 0:10
WIU 3, CSU 7
WIU - Erickson, N. 32 yd field goal 6 plays, 10 yards, TOP 1:43
WIU 3, CSU 14
CSU - KINSEY JR., M. 77 yd pass from HILL, C. (PODUSKA, M. kick) 3 plays, 75 yards, TOP 0:54
2nd Quarter
WIU 6, CSU 14
WIU - Erickson, N. 44 yd field goal 6 plays, 42 yards, TOP 2:25
WIU 6, CSU 21
CSU - SCOTT, E.J. 10 yd pass from HILL, C. (PODUSKA, M. kick) 11 plays, 65 yards, TOP 6:10
WIU 6, CSU 28
CSU - KINSEY JR., M. 14 yd pass from HILL, C. (PODUSKA, M. kick) 4 plays, 52 yards, TOP 1:31
3rd Quarter
WIU 6, CSU 35
CSU - WRIGHT, D. 33 yd run (DAVIS, B. kick), 4 plays, 49 yards, TOP 1:30
4th Quarter
WIU 6, CSU 38
CSU - DAVIS, B. 41 yd field goal 8 plays, 38 yards, TOP 4:32
WIU 13, CSU 38
WIU - Tate, Tony 26 yd pass from Sampson, Connor (Erickson, N. kick) 5 plays, 85 yards, TOP 2:15
Game Leaders
Passing Leaders
CMP
0
TD
0
YDS
0
INT
0
Players Mentioned
DE
/ Football
DL
/ Football
DL
/ Football
DE
/ Football
DL
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DL
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