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--> --> Raiders to stick with strengths By Joe Zavala Ashland Daily Tidings The Southern Oregon University football team went to the well to come up with its latest phrase of the week - the always reliable "smash mouth football." That's what the Raiders are planning on playing Saturday in their NAIA Playoff Series first-round contest against Montana-Western - kickoff is scheduled for 3:30 p.m. at Raider Stadium - and that's what they talked about following Thursday night's practice. "Yeah, they're a finesse style from Montana," Raider junior quarterback Dan Woodward said of the Bulldogs. "They like to throw the ball and I don't think they're ready for the kind of smash mouth football we play here. We got both the running and passing attack here and we got a defense that can stop both. "We're just going to hit them in the mouth, that's been our style all year and hopefully we come out fast from the get-go and I think we will. It's the playoffs and everybody's kind of jacked up and ready to go and it's not like just another season game. It's the real deal and you win you're in, you lose you're out. It's simple as that so I think everybody's focused, ready to go." For the ninth-ranked Raiders (7-2), smash mouth football involves, among other things, handing the ball off to all-star junior tailback Dusty McGrorty, blocking like crazy then setting up to do it again. McGrorty, a 6-0, 215-pound wrecking ball, has averaged nearly 29 carries per game in eight games this season (he missed the Oct. 12 game against MSU-Northern with a knee injury), racking up 1,235 rushing yards in the process. His season total of 229 carries is just 37 off Craig Henderson's all-time Raider record, set in 1987, and his 2002 rushing output is SOU's fifth-best all-time single-season total. Those numbers seem to grow relative to the significance of the game. In the last two Raider contests, both must-wins for SOU, McGroty has carried the ball 73 times for 404 yards and five TDs. Predictably, the Raiders don't plan on changing their season-long game plan heading into the third playoff contest in program history. "Our offense, we're going to smack them in the mouth," Raider all-star offensive lineman Jeremy Chapman said. "That league likes to pass the ball probably 80 percent of the time it seems like, so we're just going to go in, smack them in the mouth, play our style of football, control the clock, run up some yards." The 15th-ranked Bulldogs (9-2) do hail from the pass-happy Frontier Conference - a league SOU is already 2-0 against this year, with a 37-13 win over Rocky Mountain and a 42-0 win over MSU-Northern - and will field a team that bears little resemblance to the grind-it-out Raiders. While SOU balances the run and the pass equally (the Raiders average 200 rushing yards per game and 188 passing yards), Montana-Western gains over three-quarters of its yardage through the air. Playing the role of McGrorty for the Bulldogs is junior quarterback Travis Kirby, who earned conference Player of the Week honors after completing 26 of 36 passes for 325 yards and five touchdowns last Saturday against then fifth-ranked Carroll College (Mont.). Kirby is currently the third most prolific passer in the nation (3,362 passing yards) and has thrown 24 touchdown passes to boot. SOU senior safety Brad Kudlac, who picked off three passes over the past two weeks, says Kirby is impressive, at least on film. "He's a great quarterback," Kudlac said. "He hangs in the pocket as long as he can, he'll try and get the ball away before a sack, but he'll wait until the last second and he'll find the open man, from what I've noticed on tape. And he's got an arm that can go to any corner, in any seam in the field. He can put it in anywhere. He'll force the ball here and there and I think that's when he makes mistakes, but his mistakes are pretty rare." As a team, UMW is ranked fourth nationally for passing and has four players with 40 or more catches. Leading that receiving corps is sophomore wideout Dallas Mock (50 catches, 530 yards) and senior Brandon deLeon (49 for 597). The Raider defense that allowed just 300 yards per game won't make any major changes, Kudlac said, but they'll have to keep an eye out for the dinks and dunks. "We're just going to keep playing the way we have all year," Kudlac said. "We'll come out and run our normal coverages. We haven't really put any new wrinkles in. "They play a smart game. They take the yardage that's given, they throw a lot of short patterns to set up the big play and it's just wide open, pass, pass, pass, and they just do the run to keep you honest. We've just got to control it, basically. We've just got to rally to the short ones because we play a lot of deep zone converges, and if we rally to the short ones and cut them off enough, then hopefully we can contain the deep routes. And I think with the defensive scheme that we have, we should be able to do that." Notes: Montana-Western opted to make the 1,002-mile trip by bus, probably against its will. According to SOU coach Jeff Olson, the Bulldogs wanted to fly, but the NAIA wouldn't pay for it. UMW coach Tommy Lee was unavailable for comment. The Bulldogs are expected to arrive in Ashland sometime today. ... SOU and UMW share three common opponents this season: Eastern Oregon, MSU-Northern and Rocky Mountain. The Bulldogs posted a 5-0 record against the trio (Frontier teams play a double round-robin) and outscored them 158-96, while the Raiders were 3-0 by a 123-32 clip. ... If the Raiders win, the details of their second-round game will be posted at www.sou.edu/athletics Sunday morning. Email your... Technical questions & comments to: WebMaster Daily Tidings editorial comments & questions to: Editor Visit our other Oregon Newspapers... | Albany Democrat-Herald | Ashland Daily Tidings | Corvallis Gazette-Times | | Lebanon Express | Newport News-Times | Springfield News | Cottage Grove Sentinel | Ashland Daily Tidings 1661 Siskiyou Blvd. Ashland, OR 97520 Telephone 541-482-3456 © Copyright 2001 Lee Northwest Publishing