In his Monday media availability, Oregon State head coach JaMarcus Shephard reflected on Oregon State’s success from Saturday night in their win against UTEP.
Shephard also previewed his team’s next challenge this weekend in Colorado State, and the atmosphere they are likely to face in Fort Collins. Shephard also talked about the team’s ambitions now that they are going into conference play.
Looking back at his team’s contest against UTEP, Shephard recognized the importance of his team’s strong performance in the third quarter to retake momentum after a scoring drive by the Miners.
“I’ll say this – we talk a lot about the ‘middle eight,’ the last four minutes of the second quarter and the first four minutes of the third quarter, it’s a very strong indicator for winning in college football games,” Shephard said. “Even at halftime our team was talking about the middle eight. They scored a touchdown on their first drive of the second half, and our players were still determined like ‘we’re going to extend the middle eight through our next drive.’ So our offense did a fantastic job of responding right away, and that’s what we’re looking for from this football team.”
Critical in the Beavers’ win was the performance of their pass rush, which came up with seven sacks in El Paso.
“First and foremost I wanna give a lot of credit to [defensive line coach] Mark Hagen, he’s done an outstanding job with those interior guys. We really challenged Tevita Pome’e this week and said to him that he wasn’t playing on the other side of the line of scrimmage enough for what he’s capable of. And I think he played his best game to date with his performance this past Saturday,” Shephard noted
“I do believe this, that some of our edge rushers are puttin’ a lot of pressure, to collapse the pockets, and now that’s given chances for our interior guys to make plays on the quarterback. I’ve known for years that if you hit the QB enough times, then…they typically start to see things that they shouldn’t be seeing, and coach Macintyre is finding all kinds of ways to hit the quarterback. I do believe this- we’re settin’ the tone early in the game, and guys are settin’ the tone early for what we expect. I couldn’t be happier with that right now, but we need to continue that all season long.”
On the offensive side of the ball, Shephard also took a moment Monday to highlight the continued development of freshman wide receiver Jameson Powell, who secured his first college catches and his first touchdown in Saturday’s win.
“Well to be very clear, I love Jemo, and the competitive edge that he brings every single day, and the flare that comes with everything he does…he better learn how to line up faster, and see the ball snapped, so that we don’t get any penalties. But also you know what, I know he’s gonna make the play. That kid is going to make the play, he’s unafraid out there. He was tracking really high going through fall camp, and unfortunately had that hamstring injury. But he’s a kid we’ve got a lot of trust in. He’s a freshman, so you gotta keep pushing the detail pieces.”
This weekend’s contest will be a new experience for all involved, with Oregon State and Colorado State competing against one another as members of the Pac-12 Conference for the first time. A win for Shephard’s team would get them one step closer to competing for a league title.
“I do get excited about the conference because our goal as a football team is to win the Pac-12 championship and our bowl game with class, integrity, and academic excellence. And so now this is the opportunity to go compete for our goal, and I think everyone in this league has optimism still, we’ve[the conference] played a lot of tight games across the country. I’ve got a ton of respect for Coach Mora, and so it’s fun getting to go into these games, these environments.”
Colorado State head coach Jim Mora, in his first season with the Rams, also has his team off to a 2-2 start, scoring 40.25 points per game with 469 yards per game. The Rams are a top-25 team nationally, in both categories.
“There’s no doubt about it, they’ve hit a lot of explosive plays, Shephard noted of this week’s opponent. “Whether it be on a jet sweep, whether it be on a vertical pass, whether it be in the run game or with their various tight ends, they’ve found ways to hit explosive plays. When you watch the game against BYU, they hit some big ones on BYU even, the score wasn’t an indicator of their offensive ability in that game. I’ve already shown the tape to some of our position coaches and challenged them already, but have also challenged some of our players. ‘This guy right here, he’s gonna put you on his draft highlight if you don’t play the way you’re supposed to.’ They’ve got guys who are capable of doing that, and I think our guys are really fired up about this challenge.”
Oregon State’s season continues Saturday as the face the Colorado State Rams, with kickoff set for 3 p.m. PT on the USA Network.
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