COLUMN: Make spring football legitimate
If there was ever a thing that could delay me gushing my feelings about spring football and all the excitement for a new season that comes along with it, it would have to be a Cinderella run through the NCAA Tournament by a mid-major basketball team.
Seeing as how there were two of those this year, and an irresistible prompting for me to explain the finer points of why professional hockey is superior to all other professional sports, spring football hasn’t had its regular amount of publicity coming from Section F that we’ve seen in previous years.
The making up for lost time though, begins now.
If there is one thing that this team has needed better production out of the past two seasons, it has been defense.
If there is one thing that has shined brighter than anything else for Utah State football this spring, it has been defense.
When head coach Gary Andersen arrived in Logan right after he had led the University of Utah to an undefeated season and a dominating win over Alabama to cap things off, Utah State fans were eternally optimistic that Aggie defenses would soon have that same kind of fire that his defenses at Utah had, but over the first two years, that level of play just hasn’t quite been there.
It may have been the personnel here, a lack of depth, or just the fact that Andersen was the head coach and had handed the defensive coordinator duties to someone else. Consider all three of those issues now remedied.
As if it weren’t enough of an indicator of things that USU has four players that coaches see as too good to risk injuring in spring with Bobby Wagner, Kyle Gallagher, Levi Koskan and Quinn Garner, the fact that the guys behind them have stepped up and looked like stars themselves speaks to where the defense currently stands compared to where it has been.
While the front seven have undergone some construction switching from a 4-3 to a 3-4 defensive front, it hasn’t stopped the lesser known players like Jake Doughty, Zach Vigil, Connor Williams and Tevita Vaifoou from using their opportunities to get first-team reps to show that these positions, for the first time in years it seems, have some real depth.
But the real excitement comes simply from the seeing-eye test. That’s where this team’s defense looks to be for real. They are swarming the offensive units on every play it seems, flying to the ball and laying hits with reckless abandon. And that’s all without four of the best players on the defense wearing their pads and participating in contact drills.
Rather than just take my word on everything though, come out Saturday and see for yourself. Not to diminish the credibility of my word when it comes to such matters, because my word is obviously credible as all hell, but it’s the spring football game. You should be there anyway for the sake of entertaintment. You should be there for the sake of supporting our football team. You should be there because going to the spring football game is what you do when you are a legitimate college football team and fan base.
If there’s been one recurring theme for me over the past year or so, it’s that if you want to be legit, and be seen as legit, you had better act legit.
This year has seen plenty of that at Utah State, whether it is the crowds moshing and crowd surfing in the closed streets for a massive concert, packing the hell out of our student section for a win over BYU on national television or the 500 or so people that made up the Aggie Stampede for a few of this year’s home football games. That’s all without mentioning that the Utah State student section for basketball became a trending topic on Twitter during one of the home games on ESPN for how amazing of a showing our crowd displayed.
But now it’s back to football again, and it’s time to keep this trend alive.
Just like how things such as the winning team, losing team and I believe chants would be nothing special if it weren’t for everyone involved, the same can be said for the spring football game. Just a few fans filling the stands would be nothing special, but if thousands of students showed up, imagine the motivation that would create for the summer for the football program.
It’s simple strength in numbers. A few students and it’s nothing of significance. A few thousand and it’s something special that gets everybody’s attention.
Be there Saturday to make this thing happen. Make it as legit as it should be.
Matt Sonnenberg is a senior majoring in print journalism. Matt is an avid fan of Aggie athletics and can be found on the front row of every home football and basketball game. He can also be reached at matt.sonn@aggiemail.usu.edu.