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Wednesday Weekly…January 8, 2025.
Last year, Boise State lost just one starter to the transfer portal after Spencer Danielson was named head coach. That was quarterback Taylen Green, who went to Arkansas. It was one of the marvels of the winter that Danielson was able to keep his roster together the way he did. Well, it looks like he’s done it again, as Prince Strachan, who went into the portal Saturday, is the only starter the Broncos have lost. The portal reopens after spring football, but it’s hard to imagine any front-liners (Matt Lauter, Kage Casey, Maddux Madsen, Jayden Virgin-Morgan, Ty Benefield, for example) making the jump then. Meanwhile, with Malachi Nelson having landed at UTEP, we can only wish him well. It’s a place where Nelson can start and display his considerable skills—and at last prove that he can run, and lead, an offense.
WITH STRACHAN GONE…
Strachan is a big loss, no doubt, after 37 catches for 578 yards and three touchdowns the past two seasons. But it could have been so much more. The 6-5 Strachan is a big target who has yet to reach his ceiling and is coming off perhaps his best game as a Bronco—four receptions for 40 yards against Penn State in the Fiesta Bowl. Boise State will probably hit the portal itself for a wideout, but it still has Latrell Caples, and maybe Cam Camper if he elects to take advantage of the recent ruling on former junior college players.
At any rate, if Strachan is the only front-line loss for Boise State, that’s impressive. In his “exit letter” to Bronco Nation on Facebook, outgoing offensive coordinator Dirk Koetter heaped praise on fans but sounded this alarm: “Our best players are getting offered between 2 and 10 times what we can offer. We are losing recruits in the portal to schools that are just flat outbidding us.” That’s certainly true. But what I think he meant was players who are already in there from other schools.
NATE POTTER, POST-APPRENTICESHIP
Trust the process. That’s what we’ve always said with Koetter as Boise State O-coordinator, especially when it came to Madsen beating out Nelson as starting quarterback last August. The latest “trust the process” item is tight ends coach Nate Potter being promoted to O-coordinator last Friday. Koetter obviously had heavy input into coach Danielson’s decision. Potter’s calling card? The best season by the tight ends room since the Broncos joined the FBS in 1996—59 catches for 762 yards and seven touchdowns. It starts with Matt Lauter’s 47 grabs and 619 yards, but not to forget Matt Wagner, who contributed 10 catches for 108 yards. And Potter’s tight ends can forever claim a piece of Ashton Jeanty’s historic 2024 season.
KOETTER UNPLUGGED
If you didn’t hear Koetter’s interview Monday, give it a listen at KTIK.com. My takeaways: Jeanty’s workload may not have been quite so heavy had the running backs room been full. Boise State lost true freshman Sire Gaines in Game 3, and Koetter said, “Breezy (Dubar) was never really healthy all season.” So that meant Jeanty was naturally going to get more carries. As for the lack of a screen game, Kotter said, “With the exception of Kage Casey, the rest of our O-line were not good blockers in space.” He quickly added that they were really good at everything else. On Madsen: “Mad Dog doesn’t get you beat.” And, he added, “I thought Mad Dog played his best game right up until the end, when he had to take chances to get us back in the game.” And on Nate Potter as his successor: “Bronco fans are in for a treat.”
BRONCOS FOOTBALL POTPOURRI
Speaking of Potter, he’ll have help in his new offensive coordinator’s role. Boise State wide receivers coach Matt Miller has been named co-coordinator. Miller, the Broncos’ career receptions leader, just finished his fifth season on the staff—he was O-coordinator at Montana State for 1½ seasons before returning to Boise in 2020. Elsewhere, Boise State’s Jeanty and Ahmed Hassanein have officially declared for the NFL Draft, with Jeanty making his announcement on Tuesday, thanking teammates, coaches, the university and the community. And the Broncos have picked up another running back out of the portal: Keyjuan Brown of Louisville. He was third on the Cardinals in rushing this season with 243 yards and three touchdowns, averaging 5.2 yards per carry.
RYPIEN ON THE MARKET AGAIN
Former Boise State star Brett Rypien is in his sixth NFL season and has played in 10 games, none of them this season. And there won’t be any in the playoffs, as Rypien has been waived by the Minnesota Vikings. In a move that’s been in the works for several weeks, the Vikings have signed Daniel Jones, who was cut loose last month after six years with the New York Giants. Hopefully Rypien finds a sixth NFL team. His career passing stats: 950 yards, four touchdowns and nine interceptions.
DEGGIE AND O’MAR…AND PEANUT?
Tyson Degenhart had a clunker last Saturday, when San Diego State held him to nine points and one field goal. The Boise State star’s allowed a mulligan after 3½ stellar seasons. But Degenhart was back last night with a 21-point, 11-rebound double-double as the Broncos thumped UNLV 81-59 in ExtraMile Arena. Two guys also have to be mentioned—O’Mar Stanley looked like last season’s O’Mar with 12 points as he moved bodies around inside, and coach Leon Rice burned the redshirt year of Peanut Carmichael, the true freshman from Bend, OR, in the first half. Carmichael scored his first points on a three-pointer about 3½ minutes after coming in and put up eight points on the night. The other good sign going into a monster test at No. 25 Utah State Saturday: an amazing 13 offensive rebounds.
A STRANGE ATMOSPHERIC DEBATE
Tuesday night’s environment in ExtraMile Arena may not have provided a fair test with that 8:40 start. But the atmosphere there took some major heat after last Saturday’s loss to San Diego State, with many calling it flat. Honestly, I didn’t notice it being way out of the ordinary. It surely wasn’t like last year’s electric win over SDSU, but I thought it was fine. Others beg to differ, though. The biggest zinger came from San Diego Union-Tribune beat writer Mark Ziegler, who called the Broncos’ home facility “ExtraQuiet” Arena. Ouch. Even athletic director Jeramiah Dickey got into the fray, saying he took grief from some fans in the past for his kids being too loud. “Basketball is not tennis,” tweeted Dickey. “The best basketball atmospheres in the country are the loudest. Days of sitting and golf clapping are over.”
THE YOTES RE-FOCUS
College of Idaho men’s hoops have a steely resolve right now, proving it in last Saturday’s 91-72 rout of Bushnell in the J.A. Albertson Activities Center. The Coyotes were coming off a shocking 59-56 loss to Corban last Friday, breaking a 52-gameconference regular-season home winning streak dating back almost six years. The Yotes were not happy. C of I, now 11-2 overall and 6-1 in the Cascade Conference, is on the road this week—at Northwest University on Friday and Evergreen State on Saturday.
STEELIES SHUFFLE THE DECK
Idaho Steelheads coach Everett Sheen has been making wholesale changes on his roster the past couple of weeks. The hope is that the Steelheads find the right combination moving forward, as they’re languishing in the middle of the ECHL Mountain Division standings with a 17-12-3 record. Sheen has added new faces in each of the last three days—forwards Andrei Bakanov from the Fort Wayne Komets, Mason McCarty from the Cincinnati Cyclones and MacGregor Sinclair from the SPHL’s Birmingham Bulls. here’ll be new combos on the ice tonight when the Steelies open a three-game series against the defending Kelly Cup champion Florida Everblades in Idaho Central Arena.
HAWKS UNVEIL NEW SKIPPER
The Boise Hawks have their new manager, Kash Beauchamp, who has had managerial stints at a number of minor league franchises. The most recent was a two-season assignment in the Pioneer League, where he led the Ogden Raptors to the championship in 2023. Beauchamp was a first round pick by the Toronto Blue Jays in the 1982 MLB Draft. He spent six seasons at the Triple-A level with the Blue Jays, L.A. Dodgers, San Francisco Giants, and the Atlanta Braves before transitioning to coaching and managing when his playing days ended in 1995.
This Day In Sports…brought to you by BACON BOISE…fresh breakfast and brunch every day!
January 8, 1963: Don Shula, the defensive coach of the Detroit Lions (before they were known as “defensive coordinators”), replaces Weeb Ewbank as coach of the Baltimore Colts. That began a lengthy head coaching career that would include two Super Bowl titles and the only perfect season in NFL history, all with the Miami Dolphins. Shula is also pro football’s all-time winningest coach with 347 victories. Ewbank would go on to coach the AFL’s New York Jets—and in January of 1969 he would beat Shula’s Colts in Super Bowl III, the biggest upset in pro football history.
(Tom Scott hosts the Scott Slant segment during the football season on KTVB’s Sunday Sports Extra and anchors four sports segments each weekday on 95.3 FM KTIK. He also served as color commentator on KTVB’s telecasts of Boise State football for 14 seasons.)
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