Monday, November 7, 2011

'Cats Win! Linfield escapes rat trap in a 42-38 victory over Whitworth.



A win is a win. At the end of the day what mattered most is the ‘Cats dug deep after a most lackluster 1st half and pulled out a 42-38 victory at Whitworth’s Pine Bowl. The game on Saturday took place in three acts. Act one was without a doubt the worst 1st half of football the ‘Cats have played all season long. Silly penalties, turning the ball over, and mental lapses paired with some great play from Whitworth put the ‘Cats in their 1st deficit at halftime all year long. Act two, was the ‘Cats getting back to playing Linfield Football and raking Whitworth for 28 consecutive points and suffocating the Pirate offense while taking a commanding 17 point lead. Then the third and final act was the last 7 minutes of the game where I felt the ‘Cats took their foot off the gas in coughing up the ball at the Rat 33 yard line, missing a wide open TD pass that would have ended it, and Linfield giving up the longest play from scrimmage of the year that gave Whitworth life and a chance to pull off a huge upset. Thankfully, the ‘Cats responded and put the game on ice with a big 3rd and 10 Mickey Inns to Buddy Saxon conversion. It was a roller coaster of a game but going back to my first thought: Linfield won.

So what did Saturday mean for the ‘Cats? I think Coach Smith nailed it perfectly in the post-game huddle when he said that when this team is not hampering themselves and focusing on playing Linfield Football, the ‘Cats are a force with be reckoned with. On the other side of the coin, when Linfield is making mistakes, turning the ball over, and not sharp the ‘Cats can be average. I think Saturday was an opportunity for this team to learn a great lesson about who they are. When this team is on their game and zeroed in on the task at hand, they’re going to be pretty hard to beat. When they’re not doing those things…. Whitworth can happen. So that’s what we’re going to find out next week from OUR Wildcats in a high stakes regular season finale. Are the ‘Cats going to be on their game or are they going to give an improved Lewis & Clark a chance to beat them at the ‘Catdome?  Thankfully, we'll find out soon.

The Good, The Bad, The Ugly

The Good

Wildcat resolve: I’ll write more about this in “The Ugly” but there wasn’t panic during halftime. Instead the ‘Cats came together and decided they were not going to lose that game. Some teams might have folded up the tents but Linfield knew that 1st half wasn’t who they are. It was an unfamiliar position for this year’s team and they handled it beautifully.

Special Teams balled out: 4 blocked PAT’s? Are you kidding me? What a tremendous effort by the defense/Field Goal block team. Those 4 points wound up being the margin of victory for Linfield and just is another example of the ‘Cats special teams have so many ways to hurt you. Besides the PAT’s being blocked, the coverage’s were excellent and we’ll talk about Drew Fisher and the Punt Return team a little bit later. Another great effort.

Offensive Line Play: The O-line brought it on Saturday. They did a tremendous job in pass protection.  So well, that at times, Mickey could have busted out a guitar and played Freebird before getting off a pass. Along with pass protection, I though the run game blocking was solid and allowed the ‘Cats offense to pile up 455 yards of total offense and 42 points. It was a good day’s work for the guys up front.

Punt Return Team: Huge. Over the past few weeks the ‘Cats have blocked multiple punts for touchdown but Linfield knew Whitworth does a very good job in protection. Linfield turned their attention to the return game and the result was a near Linfield single game record for punt return yardage. Drew Fisher finished with 124 punt return yards which is 5 yards short of the single game record set by Tony Agcaoili vs Southern Oregon in 1995 (129 yards). The returns set the ‘Cats up with great field position and got the ‘Cats rolling. On top of that, Fisher's running style is about as entertaining as it gets. 

‘Cats passing game: Linfield QB Mickey Inns was a wrecking machine in tossing for a career high 344 and 5 touchdowns against only one pick. Actually, I thought Inns could have gone over 400 yards on the day as they just missed on one or two potential deep balls. Mickey completed passes to 9 different Wildcats on the day and looked in total command of the Linfield offense.

2nd half pressure: A big reason why I thought Whitworth’s passing game was able to get off so well that 1st half was the lack of QB pressure. The ‘Cats have been able to make quarterbacks feel very uncomfortable throughout the entire season but didn’t get any heat that 1st half. The 2nd half was a different story as the ‘Cats defensive front was getting multiple hits and sacks on Whitworth and that pressure was a key cog in getting the game back in control.

The Bad

11 penalties: I’ve been complaining about this for weeks and it finally bit the ‘Cats hard this past weekend. If the ‘Cats would have been able to keep the laundry on the field limited it would have solved some the ills of Saturday. They were killers: extended Whitworth’s 1st scoring drive, put Linfield in bad field position multiple times; took away 1st downs, aided Whitworth’s last scoring drive of the 1st half, and stalled potential drives. I think you get the message. The ‘Cats have to clean this up now.

Giving up 38 points: Linfield’s defense has been 100% dominate all season long but had a dreadful performance during the 1st half and at the end of the game vs Whitworth. I don’t believe for a second that Linfield’s defense was exposed because the body of work is too extensive to think otherwise. This game reminded me in so many ways of that 2009 UPS game where a stout Linfield defense laid a big ‘ole egg versus UPS that caused a lot of fans to hit the panic button. It was an anomaly in 2009 as that defense played incredibly well for the reminder of the season and I feel Saturday was the same thing…an anomaly. It was bad but this Linfield defense will bounce back.

4 turnovers: 2 of those turnovers created short fields for Whitworth and led directly to two touchdowns, the ‘Cats fumbled on the Rats 5 yard line that took away a Linfield scoring chance, and the other turnover the Rats picked off a pass at the deep in their own territory. Factor in the 11 penalties along with the 4 turnovers and it’s remarkable the ‘Cats dug deep and found a way to win.

The Ugly

1st half effort: This was a rather easy call. The ‘Cats did so much self-inflicted damage during that first half in making the long walk up to the locker room I was curious in how Coach Smith, the staff, and the players would respond. When I walked into the field house (visitor’s locker room) there were no chairs being thrown, players freaking out, and not even a raised voice in anger by Coach Smith. It was just the opposite. That makeshift locker room was all about working it out and coming together. There was no panic but just the believe that if the ‘Cats could correct some of their issues they could storm right back and that’s just what happened. It was comforting to witness the process. Bullets were flying, things were breaking down all around the ‘Cats, and Whitworth was playing at their top gear. In all of that chaos and adversity our ‘Cats were able to take a step back and work it out. That’s a true mark of a great program and of a great team. There’s nothing ugly about that.

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