After giving some thought to branding, I felt it was necessary to call an audible on what I had been doing previously. Because seemingly everyone now has something that they call "Pick Six" and I am not like anyone else, it was time to rebrand the Football reaction posts.
It may not have been necessary but I wanted to stick with Football jargon and I think it will end up being an even better series of posts.
With that, I introduce the sorta newest piece:
The classical definition for Slobberknocker is a literal hard hit. I'm going to play off that somewhat in a more figurative manner. While in contrast, and maybe more obviously, the Naw's are things that shouldn't have happened and/or need to change.
With the Bison getting the first chance at meaningful play on the Football field, they get to lead off the revised approach! Spoiler alert, there will be a lot of Slobberknockers!
A Phenom in the Making?
Every time NDSU gets a player who was widely recruited, up to & including FBS schools, it sets a bar of intrigue, possibility & even expectation. I'm not saying that each of the young men will live up to that because a 100% hit rate is just about impossible. What I am saying though, is that through one game, Trey Lance looks like he will live up. Sure, this season will come down to how he does against the top of the Valley and in the playoffs but how can you not be impressed by what he did yesterday?? Whether he was throwing or running, he was clearly ahead of everything that Butler tried to do just to slow him down. In only his first start, I don't think it could have gone better. But I would be surprised if this is the best that he does this year, as crazy as that sounds!
Fresh & Tight
One of my semi-bold predictions for this season was that the two highly touted, young tight-ends would finish atop their position group. If yesterday was any indication, yeah that's going to happen! While finishing with only four receptions, Noah Gindorff & Josh Babicz hauled in three touchdowns. I speculated that Christian Watson may be the red zone threat as early as this year and he will undoubtedly get a good share of scores but because of their size and athleticism I may have missed what was right in front of me. These guy's are going to be a problem for other teams for years to come and yesterday was just a start!
Old Faithful
But the Bison have plenty of seasoned players on the squad as well. Before moving away from the offense I have to mention how good Ty Brooks looked. Yes, it would have been nice to do without the fumble but even teams as overmatched as Butler was have guys looking to make plays and the defender made a good one that time! It will still be a committee approach, as demonstrated during the game but the senior leader looked ready to go for one of the best single seasons in the school's history.
The Music Man
Speaking of guys who are primed to fill some big shoes with their own exploits, James Hendricks balled out yesterday! Now that he is able to focus in on just playing Safety and will be the chief of that bunch, it's safe to say that he'll be able to have impacts the likes of yesterday's on a very regular basis!
Strong Outside
Hendricks' job is made easier by what appeared to be the next lock down defense on the outside with both Marquise Bridges & Josh Hayes coming into the season firing on all cylinders! Interceptions and pick sixes are great but if they can merely breakup passes as they did yesterday then the whole of the defense gets all the more scary! And just for the record, I'd expect INTs to follow closely to the PBUs if they can play all the upcoming receivers as they did Butlers!
With the team from Grand Forks coming down next Saturday, yesterday's performance may quickly be out done! But for all the things that I already said and some of the more modest positives, it's an easy final call about game #1!
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