SAN JOSE — The bye week came at a good time for San Jose State and quarterback Walker Eget.
The Spartans, who have lost two of their past three games, return to action Saturday at Oregon State (12:30 p.m., The CW) needing to win one of their final four regular-season games to become bowl eligible for the third season in a row. Eget, after sharing quarterback duties with Emmett Brown most of the season, is taking first-string reps in back-to-back weeks for the first time this season.
“It’s a confidence I think I really need,” Eget said. “Just knowing that they trust me, I think that’s really gonna help the next four games.”
San Jose State (5-3, 3-2 Mountain West) decided to turn to Eget full-time at the start of last week’s bye.
“We feel like this is the right decision for us to press our team forward to win,” head coach Ken Niumatalolo said. “Throwing the football, so much of it is timing and spacing and familiarity with your receivers and him being able to get all those reps has definitely helped him.”
San Jose State’s Nick Nash #3 catches a 17-yard touchdown pass from Walker Eget at the end of the first half against Wyoming, Saturday, Oct. 19, 2024, at CEFCU Stadium in San Jose, Calif. (Karl Mondon/Bay Area News Group
Oregon State will also be coming off of a bye, and like SJSU, is looking to bounce back from a demoralizing loss.
“It’s actually going to be a battle of who had the best off week,” Niumatalolo said.
Oregon State (4-4) was blown out 44-7 by Cal in its last game, its third straight loss. That same day SJSU lost its rivalry game at Fresno State 33-10.
“Obviously we didn’t do a very good job on either side of the ball last week,” Niumatalolo said. “It’s kind of a time to go back and critique what you did, self analysis, so that’s what we did.”
SJSU used the bye week to fix minuscule errors such as a receiver being a yard too deep or short on a route Niumatalolo said.
The Spartans also tried to get back to the basics, but that’s Niumatalolo’s dilemma.
“You have to come with some wrinkles, you can’t do the same thing every week, but you can’t have a new playbook every week,” he said.
A concern all season has been turnovers for the Spartans.
SJSU’s turnover margin is at zero despite 19 forced turnovers, which is good for third in the nation and 14 interceptions which is also good for third in the nation and first in the Mountain West.
“That’s been the challenge to our team, it was the rally cry that I had for our team last week and we had four (at Fresno State),” Niumatalolo said.
San Jose State’s defense sacks Wyoming quarterback Evan Svoboda in the second half, Saturday, Oct. 19, 2024, at CEFCU Stadium in San Jose, Calif. (Karl Mondon/Bay Area News Group
Wide receiver Nick Nash said practices felt more clean after the bye, especially with Eget being the main guy at quarterback.
“It feels a lot easier for the quarterbacks to see, for the receivers to see, so I’m excited about kind of getting back to the basics,” Nash said. “It wasn’t 100% before the bye week but now it’s like, ‘this is who we’re rolling with.’”
Eget said the bye week helped the offense focus on details.
“If you can’t do the little things, you can’t do the big things. So we really just got to focus and do the small parts of every detail from all of our jobs to make sure as a team we collectively come out with a win,” Eget said.
Eget also sees some similarities to previous opponents in Oregon State.
“Personnel wise they are more like Fresno and the type of scheme they play is sort of like Colorado State,” he said.
Both of those teams handed the Spartans their two conference losses.
On the Spartans’ defensive side, defensive lineman Soane Toia said the emphasis in planning for the Beaver’s offense is stopping the run.
Oregon State is 12th in the nation in rushing offense and first in average time of possession.
The Beavers are in the middle of a quarterback dilemma, with Gevani McCoy being pulled for Ben Gulbranson in their loss to the Golden Bears.
Oregon State Beavers wide receiver Zachary Card (12) fumbles the ball during the third quarter of their game at Memorial Stadium in Berkeley, Calif., on Saturday, Oct. 26, 2024. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Area News Group)
“You watch tape, see what both guys did,” Niumatalolo said of the Beavers’ two quarterbacks. “You prepare for what they do schematically. You see what different guys do, the nature of how (offensive coordinator Ryan Gunderson) is going to call things with different guys in there.”
Toia said he views McCoy as a scrambler and Gulbranson as a drop-back passer.
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“When it’s down and distance too, No. 4 likes to run up the middle,” Toia said. “We gotta stop the run.”
SJSU defensive back DJ Harvey acknowledges that OSU’s run game is its strength.
“The play action pass comes off of that,” Harvey said of the Beavers rushing attack. “They actually got three short, stocky, great running backs and a great o-line.”
Niumatalolo, who visited Oregon State last season as UCLA’s director of leadership, said Oregon State is a hostile environment.
“We’re not looking past this Saturday, our sole focus is on Oregon State,” Niumatalolo said.
But he also said November was a daunting gauntlet, with home games against Boise State, UNLV and Stanford looming after this week.
“These last four are really gonna show what type of team we have later in the run,” Harvey said. “It’s called Cinderella November for a reason.”