Stay connected for news and updates Follow @sbndenver
Colorado State travels to take on rival Wyoming in their last game of the season in the Border War, with the winner getting to keep the Bronze Boot.
Like us to subscribe
So much for Colorado State backing up their smack talk about taking back the Bronze Boot. Colorado State was shut out 44-0 against rival Wyoming and finish the season 3-9. The win for Wyoming gives them their first conference win of the season and they too end the season with a record of 3-9.
Colorado State was never able to get anything going on offense as Wyoming was pressuring ram quarterback Pete Thomas all afternoon. The Wyoming defense forced two turnovers and had six sacks.
The Ram defense had missed tackles all day which allowed Wyoming to gain the extra yards, and they were unable to stop the running game. The player of the game was Wyoming running back Alvester Alexander who set a Wyoming school record with five rushing touchdowns and racked up 147 yards with a 6.4 yards per play. Wyoming quarterback Austyn Carta-Samuels had one of his best games of the year with 263 yards on 23-32 passing and had 46 yards rushing most of which was gained on a pass back early in the game for a big gain.
Colorado State again suffered to find a rushing attack, but that is to be expected when the Rams were down 23 points at the half. The leading rusher was Chris Nwoke who had 63 yards on 11 carries. Quarterback Pete Thomas who has shown what a good quarterback the past few games was unable to get anything done today. He ended up with with 97 yards passing on 16-for-33 attempts.
Wyoming scores again by way of Cowboy running back Alvester Alexander who scored his fourth touchdown and has surpassed the 100 yard mark on the day with a total of 127 yards. His latest touchdown was a 29 yard touchdown run.
Wyoming's Alvester Alexander scored his third touchdown on the game as Wyoming is starting to put this game out of reach for the Rams. Alexander so far has 90 yards on only 13 carries which is a 6.9 average per run. The score was a 21 yard scamper by Alexander which featured some botched tackling by Colorado State.
Colorado State can get nothing done, and where in the heck did this Wyoming team come from they have been bad all year. The Wyoming defense is dominating the Ram offense by causing pressure on the Rams and has force two turnovers.
At the end of the half when Colorado State was making a run to get some points, but they Rams fumbled the ball near the Wyoming 10 yard line to end the half. That fumbled was a reviewed play and was overturned after initially being ruled down.
Wyoming has been able to do what they want against Colorado State. Wyoming's latest drive was a brisk eight play, 56 yard drive in only 3:14 which resulted in quarterback Austyn Carta-Samuels scoring on a zone read where he kept the ball on a four yard touchdown run. Colorado State will need some magic to comeback from the 23 point deficit they are in.
Wyoming scores their second touchdown on the day by running back Alvester Alexander who pulled off a 34 yard touchdown run to extend the Wyoming lead 16-0.
Wyoming who is looking for their first conference win, pulled out a bag tricks to score first in today's Border War. Wyoming quarterback Austyn Carta-Samuels threw the ball behind the line scrimmage to wide receiver T.J. Smith who then threw the ball back to quarterback Carta Samuels who then took the ball to the endzone on a 38 yard gain, but the play was overturned during a review as Carta-Samuels step out of bounds at the one yard line.
Then on the next play Wyoming scored a touchdown on an Alvester Alexander one yard touchdown run. The extra point was bothed, so Wyoming ended up with six points.
Then on the next Colorado State possession quarterback Pete Thomas threw an interception which then led to a 20-yard Wyoming field goal. Early on in this game the Wyoming Cowboys lead the Colorado State Rams 9-0.
Colorado State and Wyoming have been playing against each other in football for 102 years with the winner getting the coveted Bronze Boot. With every rivalry comes the smack talk and Colorado State has fired up their first zinger:
"You could go ahead and quote it. I will be the first person to grab the boot after winning this game. It's my last game. What the heck?"
That came from Ram linebacker Ricky Brewer, who did not play in last year's loss to Wyoming due to an unspecified year-long suspension.
Then there is this by former Ram quarterback Kelly Stouffer who is lecturing Wyoming quarterback Austyn Carta-Samuels about to not blame others for your bad game:
ACS needs to keep his mouth shut. ... ACS, listen to me, as a leader on your team, you can call yourself out and blame yourself like [Utah's] Jordan Wynn did after their last two tough losses. He put it on his shoulders. You can call yourself out, but don't call your coaches out and don't call your teammates out. A quarterback has to lead by example first. You're the face of the program, or at least you want to be, you have to do the right thing. That was not the right thing.
Looks like it is Wyoming's turn to provide a little smack talk. However, they own the ultimate trump card as they won last year's game and have control of the Bronze Boot.
(Sports Network) —The one team in the Mountain West Conference still without a league victory, the Wyoming Cowboys give it another go this weekend as they host the Colorado State Rams in the annual border war and fight for the Bronze Boot.
The Cowboys are down to their final game of the season and at this point they have just two wins to show for their efforts, yet neither of those have come against teams from inside the Football Bowl Subdivision. Last Saturday, the Pokes were sent to the loss column for the sixth straight time as they bowed to UNLV on the road in Nevada, 42-16.
As for the Rams, they too are closing out a dismal campaign this weekend as well. While CSU has just one more win than Wyoming, the Rams have posted all of those versus FBS foes and two have come in conference versus UNLV and New Mexico. However, last weekend the Rams failed to perform well at home and were slapped around by the BYU Cougars in a 49-10 final.
CSU owns a 54-41-5 advantage in the all-time series, but last year it was the Pokes who secured a 17-16 win in Fort Collins.
The offense for the Rams was nowhere to be found on Saturday afternoon, at least not until Pete Thomas tossed a 22-yard touchdown to Raymond Carter with 3:07 remaining in the fourth quarter of a 39-point setback in the final home game of the season. Thomas finished the outing 28-of-42 for 292 yards and the score, but he was also sacked twice and intercepted two times. Trailing from the very beginning, the Rams could not afford to waste time and effort running the ball, which is why they finished with just 83 yards on 24 attempts. The efforts of the running backs this year for the Rams have been under-whelming thus far, averaging just 117.4 ypg to rank sixth in the conference and 99th in the nation. Thomas has done everything he can just to keep the group competitive, throwing three touchdowns in two of the team's three victories, but otherwise he's been below average given the tradition of the pass-happy MWC. Nevertheless, Thomas has thrown for at least 250 yards in three straight games, so at least he's fighting until the very end.
Not only was the Colorado State offense on vacation against the Cougars, so was the defense as it allowed Luke Ashworth to turn his only four receptions of the meeting into 113 yards and four touchdowns, tying a Mountain West record for TD catches in a single outing. The pass defense gave up 242 yards and the run defense another 284 yards and two touchdowns, so nothing was working right for the Rams as hard they tried. Nevertheless, Ricky Brewer reached 100 tackles for the season as he tallied a team-best 13 stops and Mychal Sisson came up with 12 tackles and had a pair of forced fumbles in the futile effort. Brewer may be the one with a team-leading 101 tackles at this stage, but the more potent hitter for the Rams all season has been Sisson who has 13.0 tackles for loss, 3.5 sacks and six forced fumbles, all of which lead the team at the moment. Sisson also has a pair of fumble recoveries and one of four interceptions for the squad as well.
Alvester Alexander ran for 92 yards for the Cowboys last weekend, but with 72 yards coming on a single run on the team's first play from scrimmage it meant he did little after that in the loss to UNLV. The Pokes did have a passing touchdown in the outing, but even that didn't come from starting quarterback Austyn Carta-Samuels who was limited to 13-of-22 through the air for just 108 yards and an interception. Instead, that scoring toss came from wideout David Leonard, his lone attempt of the contest. Alexander now has 645 yards and nine rushing touchdowns to his credit this season, yet the team as a whole is still ranked just 103rd in the nation with 111.1 ypg on the ground. Carta-Samuels showed tremendous promise last season for the Pokes, but this time around he has just nine scoring tosses, against eight picks and that, combined with limited running capability, has produced one of the weakest offenses in college football.
While the Wyoming offense was struggling to find an identity last week, the defense was opening gaping holes for Omar Clayton and his teammates to generate six total touchdowns. Granted, the pass defense for the Pokes gave up just 163 yards, but all of that came on just 13 completions and those went for three TDs. The lone sack of Clayton was credited to Josh Biezuns who tied with Marcell Gipson and Chris Prosinski for the team high in tackles with nine overall. As poor as the offense has been for the Cowboys, the defense has been equally as miserable with 436.6 ypg allowed, ranking the group eighth in the Mountain West Conference and 105th in the country entering the week. The run defense has been particularly woeful with 218.6 ypg allowed, although you can't blame a team for that when they face the likes of Air Force and TCU during a three-week stretch and those two programs are in the top-five in the nation running the ball.