Washington Huskies wear down Wildcats, win 31-13

Behind a school-record 40 carries for Bishop Sankey, the Washington Huskies continued the streak of home teams winning the matchup between the Huskies and Arizona Wildcats with a 31-13 victory at Husky Stadium.

UW was the team better able to weather to downpour of rain over Montlake. Maybe I enjoyed this tweet a little bit too much by John Boyle about the rain.

If this rain gets any harder, I fear Lake Washington is going to "Retake Montlake"

— John Boyle (@johnpboyle) September 28, 2013

It felt like Washington should have gone into halftime up by two touchdowns, but some well-timed stops by the Arizona D allowed their offense the opportunity to drive down the field behind the legs of B.J. Denker to score six to go into the half down only five.

Washington came out of the half and Keith Price was sharp, completing all five of his passes on the opening drive, culminating in a toss to a wide open Austin Sefarian-Jenkins for a TD. Arizona responded with a touchdown drive of their own to put the score at 18-13 in favor of the Huskies. Arizona would not score again, while Price would orchestrate two more touchdown drives.

A few short Instant Dots:

• Steve Sarkisian seems much more willing to pound the rock this year, with 40 carries to Sankey and 10 to Jesse Callier (Yahoo! says 39-11 but the broadcast said 40-10). Maybe he feels that running more plays allows them to use the running game to wear down the defense even more. Whatever the reasoning, it is working.
• Price is not hampered by injury, and it shows with his wheels. He scrambled for several gains on the ground in addition to moving around the pocket and breaking contain to find open receivers or throw the ball away. His first touchdown of the day was a perfect example of this. Kevin Smith sliced across the formation after the snap to the short right. Price broke contain, evaded several sacks, and eventually hit Smith for the touchdown.
• ASJ is really struggling to get into the flow of this offense. Quite a few of the throws are along the sidelines, and he is much more of a middle-of-the-field receiver. It seems the coaching staff is still trying to find ways to incorporate him into the offense; we don't know what is going on. His sanction from the team may have hurt his ability to impact the game more than people realize.
• As the season has progressed the passes have gone more and more downfield. There are fewer bubble screens, but still quite a few passes outside the numbers on the outside, just further down the field. Look for Kasen Williams to have a huge game soon, as these are what he is best at.
• Justin Wilcox used what is called a "psycho" defensive front. One down lineman with five linebackers all moving around before the snap in an effort to confuse the linemen into making incorrect line calls. It is something to monitor going forward, as it can be a very effective tool at creating pressure on the quarterback - it is susceptible to the run however. He also almost exclusively used four man fronts against passing situations.

Questions:

1.       How many carries is too many for Sankey?

2.       When will ASJ have his breakout game? Or, do you not think it will happen?

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