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The Wabash football team will hit the road again this week. This time, a trip to St. Louis to play Washington University (1-4) is in store for the Little Giants. Kickoff is slated for 1 p.m. CDT.
The biggest challenge for the Little Giants might be themselves in an effort to avoid the proverbial “trap game.” The team is coming off a huge 27-24 victory at Wittenberg and will travel for the second straight week. Practice times have been altered due to fall break at Wabash. The Washington-St. Louis Bears will be rested coming off a bye week.
“Players have to have the maturity, mental focus, and self-discipline to put the win behind them,” Coach Erik Raeburn said. “We have the 24-hour rule. Whether you win or lose, you get to celebrate for 24 hours or be miserable for 24 hours, but then you have to put it behind you and move on. It's difficult to do in both situations but you don't have a choice.”
Wabash players haven't had to search too hard to find motivation for this week's contest. The team has been reminded all week about the last time it traveled to WashU. The Little Giants lost to the Bears 24-20 in 2010.
“We went in there playing well, but we came out flat and they beat us,” senior left tackle
Weston Kitley said. “It's always tough to keep a team from coming out flat, but hopefully with the reminder so recent it will keep us from taking the game for granted.”
Improved play by the Little Giants' special teams is another challenge.
“We've been terrible on special teams and there's no reason for it,” Raeburn said. “We have to get better effort and better execution. We gave up a blocked punt last week which was essentially a touchdown. We haven't done very well on the return game because we're not getting our blocks up front and not holding anybody up.”
After the blocked punt, the net punting average has plummeted to 29.33 yards-per-punt, which is the second lowest in the conference. Punt returns have only yielded an average of 6 yards.
Offensively, Wabash will face another stingy opponent. Despite the Bears' record, their defense has kept them in every game. Three of their 4 losses have come by less than a touchdown.
“If you watch them on defense you know instantly how good they are, especially their defensive tackle, William Smalls,” Raeburn said. “I could show you five plays and even if you knew nothing about their team, you would pick him out immediately.”
Smalls is a two-time Second Team All-Conference selection and has recorded 29 tackles from his interior lineman spot. Kitley still knows he and the rest of the offensive linemen have to execute their blocks.
“We'll pretty much run the same plays we always run and hopefully they'll be as successful as they have been,” he said. “Wherever he goes, he's going to have to get blocked. He's a good player so at some point we're all going to have to step up and block him.”
The last time the Wabash offense was on the field, it executed one of the most impressive drives in recent memory. The unit killed the final 9:32 to preserve a 27-24 victory at Wittenberg. The 17 plays produced a bruising 48 yards with only one pass attempt.
“Our offensive line, our receivers, and our two tight ends were blocking their tails off,” Raeburn said. “
Tyler Holmes was running hard, and those are tough yards when the defense knows you're going to run on every play
. Chase Belton had some key carries and a big completion to
Charlie Kolisek. It was one of the most impressive drives I've ever been a part of as a player or a coach.”
The offense will need to have the same physicality and mindset at WashU.
Defensively, the Little Giants face another peculiar offense. The Bears run the "pistol" formation, where the quarterback lines up almost as deep as the shotgun but the running back is directly behind him. Raeburn sees its benefits.
“The advantage out of the 'pistol' is your back is still an I-formation tailback where he has better vision from that position and is a little deeper,” he explained. “He can hit some of those cutbacks and those type of things, yet you still have the ability to run the read plays and stuff you can do out of the gun. I think the play-action is better out of the 'pistol' because the quarterback can turn his back to the defense and sell the fake a little bit longer.”
The Bears will look to pound the ball behind senior running back Chris Castellucio. The running game will be of even more importance for the Bears this week since starting quarterback Dan Burkett won't play. He will be replaced by junior Eric Daginella. Daginella only has 22 pass attempts on the year.
“The game plan isn't really for us (defensive backs) to be on run-support,” sophomore cornerback
Houston Hodges said. “Sometimes they'll have a dead side where it's just a tight end. We'll be more on run support but we do the same thing every game. We have to make sure our duties against the pass are done before we come and help on the run.”
Washington University's passing game consists of a lot three-step-drops and play action. Hodges will look for some big-play opportunities against the quick passes.
“I am for the most part a little more aggressive against the short routes,” he said. “Coach has encouraged us to jump some. But I also can't get beat deep because we know what happens there.”
Last week is over. It's been nearly six days since the team's impressive victory over Wittenberg. This Saturday will tell if the team has moved on from that victory.
Little Giant football can be heard on WNDY Radio (91.3 FM) all season long. Brent Harris H'03 and Clayton Randolph '16 will announce Saturday's game. The pregame show begins at 1:35 p.m. (EDT). The broadcast is carried on the Internet on the Wabash College web site
, sports.wabash.edu. Washington University will provide a free, live video feed of the game, which can be viewed
here. Live statistics are also available
here.
