Toothless, clawless and almost scoreless.
That may describe BYU's offense in a 24-10 loss to Air Force on Saturday — the first such winning Falcon stop in Provo in 21 years.
AFA landed in Provo and whacked BYU, scoring an in-your-face quarterback dive as the final seconds ticked off — just for fun. Geez, has Cougar football really come to this?
Oh, there was improvement since the Cougars lost to Stanford eight days ago. And for a second straight weekend, the Cougar defense delivered a solid effort. But some of the same bonehead mistakes hit coach Gary Crowton's offense at the most inopportune times. Stuff like a Marcus Whalen fumble on a late drive; a deep handoff and missed block that turned a Cougar third and one into a fourth and 11 with the game on the line.
These were things that turned a 10-10 defensive battle into a basic butt kicking by the Falcons as time expired.
The Cougars have gone from averaging 50 points a game in 2001 to 30 in 2003 and are now half of that this season. The Cougs are averaging 15 a game. At this school, that's something on your lawn you'd poke with a stick.
It's official, Crowton's offense has dug itself into a deep hole and his new impressive defense doesn't have a crane big enough for a rescue. If BYU's doesn't find answers quick, the Cougars could be headed for a second straight losing season.
"I am really upset right now," veteran Cougar receiver Toby Christensen said.
"I don't know what to say right now. I'm supposed to be one of the smarter players on the team but I'm frustrated. I don't understand what's happening. We move the ball and we just make one mistake. Whether it be me, I dropped a second-down ball today, or whether it is somebody jumping offsides, somebody missing a block or the quarterback making the wrong reads.
"It just seems so funny to me that we can have ten guys do it right and if one guy messes up everybody's talking about how bad the offense looks. But as I've said before, as I look at it on film, I feel good about things.
You could simplify the problem for Crowton by saying his offense is plagued by the Drive Killer disease. Just when everything is chugging along, somebody blows it.
"That's exactly what happens. You can't blame any one person because we're all taking turns at being their fault," Christensen said.
"I don't know what to tell you. I think we just need to focus harder in practice. We need to work harder. It's really frustrating. You can't point fingers because it's nobody's fault. Everybody took a turn screwing up. It's not like we've got five really bad players on offense and we can't make things happen. We have good players, it's just really hard."
A week after Crowton said he wouldn't use the youth excuse, he told reporters Saturday that's absolutely the problem. This came one week after he pushed his players in practice and opened up his play book.
Some of the problem may be the playbook — it's been tough to find a rhythm within the pages as laid out come game days. There tends to be more margin for error on big play tries.
On Saturday, it appeared the Cougars were going too vertical too quick against the Falcons — just like in the Stanford game. Unlike the chip and knick away strategy deployed in the first three games against Georgia Tech, USC and New Mexico, Crowton designed an attack that goes deep early in possessions — often resulting in long second down plays .
When Matt Berry was healthy, Crowton's offense spread the field and used a controlled short passing attack and mixed in the run to keep drives alive. In the past two games, it's been just the opposite until the second half against the Falcons.
Perhaps Crowton likes Beck's arm strength too much.
With the score tied 3-3 at the half, Crowton adjusted and started to peck away on first down plays. It gave freshman quarterback John Beck easier second and third-down plays. In the second half, the Cougars gained 236 of their 306 yards and 70 percent of thir points on the board. But it came too late against the ball-hogging Falcons.
Defensively, Bronco Mendenhall delivered. BYU's defense limited the NCAA's top rushing attack to 209 yards — more than a third the AFA average. But key third down break downs including a fourth-quarter 30-yard touchdown pass from Chance Harridge to J.P Weller proved the difference.
The Falcons became the first opponent this season to drive 80 yards for a score on BYU.
Mendenhall deployed Manaia Brown as a defensive end, moving Brady Poppinga as a fourth down lineman. He wasn't happy with AFA's third down conversions, but his defensive ploys were good enough for a win — if there was help from his brethren once again.
"I'm starting to now know our personnel and with our schemes and maximize what we have," Mendenhall said. "I think our guys are playing hard, running hard, trying hard, competing hard and we need to make a few more plays at critical times and I don't care what the score is, we can win."
At the end of the game, after AFA called timeout for that scoring dive play from the one, Mendenhall immediately called his defensive players on the field for a huddle as Falcon players celebrated. Few of these Cadets were alive last time AFA won in Provo.
"He told us we should never have given up a score — no matter where the opponent gets the ball on us," corner Chad Barney said.
For the offense, it used to be that you'd expect a score no matter where the Cougars got the ball on an opponent.
Um, not lately.
E-mail: dharmon@desnews.com