After an underwhelming performance in week 1, the Spartans’ offense came to life and delivered the boom in the home opener on Saturday.
The 66 points scored by the Spartans were the most by an SJSU team since October 6, 2004 when they scored 70 in a win over Rice University.
In just his second regular-season game in a Spartan uniform, running back Deontae Cooper rushed for over 100 yards, the first time since Nov. 23. 2013 when he ran for 166 yards playing for the University of Washington.
“He is a work-hard young man,” said Spartans head coach Ron Caragher. “He had some tough breaks his first couple of years health wise with multiple knee injuries (...) I thought he ran hard and made some people miss and he finished forward on his runs.”
Zamore Zigler and Malik Roberson joined in the Spartans’ heavy rushing attack with 111 and 92 yards respectively.
“We did a really good job running the football,” Caragher said. “I think that our guys up front responded to last week when we went three and out too many times.”
Saturday was an early wake up call for the Spartans. Their rushing attack, which mustered just 53 yards against Tulsa, man-handled the Portland State defense for 409 yards.
“We shot ourselves in the foot a lot last week.” Cooper said. “Everyone in that locker room said we can improve, so it was good to come out here and make some improvements.”
Despite the discrepancy of yards passing (233 pass yards) and rushing (409 rush yards) on the stat sheet, it was the Spartans’ ability to establish the run that opened the door to the passing attack.
“We want to establish the run,” said Spartans quarterback Kenny Potter. “It is huge, it opens up the passing game and when the passing game
is good it opens up the running game, so we want to work together.”
Potter, who finished last season as the most accurate quarterback in the Mountain West conference, only attempted 20 passes but made the most of his opportunities, completing 14 for 233 yards and three touchdowns.
“We came out here and proved what we can do when we are all working together,” Potter said. “It is awesome the way we bounced back, it shows how much confidence we have in our team and how we are going to stick together.”
It was important for the Spartans to win the battle up front. Their offensive line provided clear running lanes for the backs, unlike last week when Tulsa sealed those holes and left no room to run.
Throughout the first half, the Spartans ran short-yardage plays directly down the Vikings’ throat. This wore out PSU’s defense and SJSU capitalized in the second half.
Those runs helped turn the momentum in the game, which bounced back and forth in the first half with each team exchanging touchdowns before the Spartans took a two-touchdown lead at the end of the half.
The third quarter was when the Spartans imposed their will on their opponent, putting any thoughts of an upset to rest and showing an ability to break tackles and create big passing plays to set up easy touchdowns.
In the fourth, it was easy pickings for the SJSU.
They were able to give some of their backups some playing time because their lead was to much for their opposition to make up.
Welcome to the show
It was a coming-out party for sophomore receiver Tre Hartley, who finished with a game high of 93 receiving yards and a touchdown.
“Tre Hartley had a really nice catch down before half,” Caragher said. “We got the touchdown with a spectacular catch and that was a big momentum swing which started 28 unanswered points.”
Hartley had two huge catches that resulted in a touchdown and helped the Spartans gain distance from the Vikings for the first time in the game This allowed SJSU to go into the locker room on a high note.
“He is a very special talent,” Potter said. “It is awesome for me to have a guy like that and weapon outside that can go up and make plays, it makes my job really easy.”
Potter said the team was excited about Hartley going into the season and thinks he can be a special player for them going forward.
Defense running wild
The Spartans defense came away with six turnovers, three interceptions (two from junior cornerback Andre Chachere) and three forced fumbles.
The +6 in the turnover game was a significant improvement from the -3 one week ago.
SJSU also made strides in stopping the run, allowing 100 fewer rush yards against Portland State than they did against Tulsa.
-For more on the Spartans defense and the big day for Chachere, check out The Mistry Spot in Thursday’s paper.
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