San Diego State\u2019s defense this week faces a situation similar to the second week of the year when the Aztecs suffered a lopsided loss at Washington State.<\/p>\n
Last time, SDSU responded with a shutout victory over Cal that included a pair of defensive touchdowns.<\/p>\n
It remains to be seen how the Aztecs (7-2, 4-1 MW) respond to last week\u2019s 38-6 loss at Hawaii in Saturday night\u2019s Mountain West game against Boise State (6-3, 4-1),\u00a0 which will be starting backup quarterback Max Cutforth for the first time.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat\u2019s big for us is to look at that tape and reset,\u201d SDSU defensive coordinator Rob Aurich said, \u201chumble ourselves and get back to some fundamentals that weren\u2019t executed as well as they had in previous weeks.<\/p>\n
\u201cOne thing that stood out to me was our pursuit angle and tackling was the worst game we\u2019ve had in a month. And so we\u2019ve been hard at work to re-establish some fundamentals that showed up in the game.\u201d<\/p>\n
SDSU started strong, getting a sack on Hawaii\u2019s first offensive play, then an interception to end the drive. The Aztecs were on the verge of a three-and-out on the Rainbow Warriors\u2019 next possession before a personal foul extended the drive.<\/p>\n
Hawaii scored six plays later, then scored two more quick touchdowns on the way to a 24-6 first-half lead.<\/p>\n
\u201cYou can get pressed by the speed of the game where, hey, all of a sudden they have a 10-yard play, a 20-yard play, and it\u2019s like, \u2018What\u2019s going on?\u2019 \u201d Aurich said. \u201cAnd I think sometimes as a player you can press, and I think it\u2019s important in those moments to keep your emotional composure, reset yourself into your assignment, your alignment and your technique and go execute.\u201d<\/p>\n
Hawaii finished with 300 yards of total offense in the first half. Aurich and the defense had some consolation that after halftime adjustments, the Rainbows were limited to 86 yards and no offensive scores over the final two quarters. Hawaii\u2019s two second-half TDs came on a kickoff return and an interception return.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe positives we\u2019re going take from it,\u201d Aurich said, \u201cwe\u2019re going to look at the corrections we made, how they executed in the second half \u2026 and use that as a platform to get ready for Boise State.\u201d<\/p>\n
Boise State coach Spencer Danielson announced Monday that backup quarterback Max Cutforth will start for injured Maddux Madsen, who threw for 307 yards and four touchdowns in the Broncos\u2019 56-24 win over SDSU last season.<\/p>\n
It marks the third time in six Mountain West games this season that the Aztecs face a quarterback change by their opponent. Nevada and Fresno State also had new starters the week they went against SDSU.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe really saw replacements,\u201d Aurich said. \u201cThis kid\u2019s the first backup we\u2019ve seen. Everybody else has been replaced because they felt like the other kid had a chance. This is the first time we\u2019re seeing someone go down because of an injury. It\u2019s a little bit different that way. Those are chosen situations by the staff.\u201d<\/p>\n
Boise State was off last week, so Broncos coaches had seven extra days to prepare Cutforth for SDSU.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s going to be ready to play, and we\u2019re going to have to be ready to play our best,\u201d Aurich said. \u201cThe kid has pretty good arm talent at second- and third-level throws. That\u2019s what I think they\u2019ll do with him a little bit. They\u2019ll get him on the move and run some layer concepts. And then I think they\u2019ll probably start the game trying to get some easy completions to get him in the rhythm. He\u2019s more than capable to execute that offense.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve had a good track record of establishing some things we\u2019re going to do early (against) new starters, so they don\u2019t always get what they see on tape.\u201d<\/p>\n
Cutforth, a redshirt sophomore who came to Boise State as a preferred walk-on, was thrust behind center two weeks after Madsen was helped off the field against the Bulldogs with a right foot injury. He completed 14 of 27 passes for 106 yards and one touchdown with two interceptions in a 30-7 loss. Before that, Cutforth was 6 of 10 for 67 yards across four games while mopping up for Madsen.<\/p>\n
\u201cI think we\u2019ll see a much more polished plan for him this week,\u201d Aurich said. \u201cThat staff will do a good job. I think they\u2019ll see what he does well throughout this week and build a plan around the things he does well. But then again, Boise\u2019s going to be Boise. They\u2019re going to try to run the ball on you, get their tight ends involved and take some timely shots. And we\u2019ve got to stop their run game before we really focus on the quarterback.\u201d<\/p>\n
Boise State\u2019s running backs room includes sophomore Dylan Riley (104 carries, 745 yards, 7 TD), redshirt freshman Sire Gaines (99-473, 5 TD) and graduate senior Malik Sherrod (64-317, 2 TD). They lead a Broncos run game averaging 184.9 yards a game (37th in the nation).<\/p>\n
Availability report<\/p>\n
The Availability Report for the game was scheduled to be released Thursday night on the Mountain West website. SDSU is expected to have half a dozen players listed as questionable. It includes cornerback Chris Johnson, who missed last week\u2019s game at Hawaii. Quarterback Jayden Denegal, left guard Kalan Ellis and safety Eric Butler also were listed as questionable last week, but they played against the Rainbows. SDSU also was missing linebacker Tano Letuli, who suffered a season-ending knee injury.<\/p>\n
Aurich was hopeful for Johnson\u2019s return against the Broncos.<\/p>\n
\u201cAnytime you lose a kid who\u2019s going to play on Sundays, I think it hurts,\u201d Aurich said of Johnson, who is regarded among the top cornerbacks in the nation. \u201cThe thing we have to do a great job of defensively is overcoming (the losses). \u2026 Tano and Chris are big voices in our program. Extremely good leaders. Extremely well respected. When they\u2019re not on the field, it puts the responsibility on other people to carry that workload.\u201d<\/p>\n
Boise State (6-3, 4-1) at San Diego State (7-1, 4-0)<\/p>\n
When:\u00a07:30 p.m. Saturday<\/p>\n
Where:\u00a0Snapdragon Stadium<\/p>\n
TV:\u00a0CBS Sports Network<\/p>\n
Radio:\u00a0760-AM<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"San Diego State\u2019s defense this week faces a situation similar to the second week of the year when…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":52214,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[1327,181,74,76,75,305,127],"class_list":{"0":"post-52213","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-san-diego","8":"tag-college-sports","9":"tag-latest-headlines","10":"tag-san-diego","11":"tag-san-diego-headlines","12":"tag-san-diego-news","13":"tag-sdsu-aztecs","14":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52213","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=52213"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/52213\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=52213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=52213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=52213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}