While that picture is from Friday at the “new” (not that new) stadium where they host the Men’s College World Series, we actually drove out to Lincoln on Thursday we got here on Thursday just to check it out and do a little shopping — and I can’t wait to go back today and enjoy the gameday experience. (Side note: If any of you have some tips for the best ways to enjoy a gameday in Lincoln, I’m all ears! Send me an email.)

It does mean, however, that for the third consecutive week, I won’t be able to watch the Cougs live — although I’ll (again) be following along on my phone and watching what I can during the plethora of Big Ten Network timeouts today. Will this be a day where I end up extremely happy, with both a Cougs win and Washington loss??

Maybe! It sure seems like this is one WSU can win. I also think the potential for some prime “Pac-12 After Dark” is high, even if it won’t really be dark until the fourth quarter. SDSU’s defense has given up some stunningly crooked numbers, and Owen Eshelman is hopefully ready to take advantage in start three. Meanwhile, the Aztecs are also rolling out a redshirt freshman of their own at QB, for his second start. The first start for Stone Saunders gave SDSU fans a lot to be excited about (363 yards and a TD), even if he did throw a couple of picks and the Aztecs ultimately came up short against Colorado State.

This strikes me as a game where the volatility could be really high. Maybe it will be a rock fight, as the stats suggest … or maybe it will be wild. Neither would surprise me.

Consensus via TeamRankings.com.

Predictive model probabilities: 45% chance for WSU to win, 51% chance to beat the spread

A confounding thing about the defense this year is that, while Trent Bray’s unit has been pretty effective overall (55th in adjusted EPA/play), it’s been really ineffective at coming up with the sorts of plays that can change games. One way to measure that is a stat called “havoc rate,” which is basically how often a team comes up with tackles for loss, pass breakups, and turnovers. There, the Cougars rank 124th, fueled largely by being 125th in sacks (8) and 128th in takeaways (3).

Folks who study this stuff closely will tell you that a lot of that is driven by randomness/luck, a concept that was driven home last week. The Cougars repeatedly pressured apparent Ball Security King Maddux Madsen on his dropbacks forcing him to scramble often and resulting in WSU defenders getting two hands on a throw no fewer than three times. How different is the game if WSU hangs on to even just one of those errant throws? Or if they’re able to bring Madsen down in the backfield even once for a sack to prevent those backbreaking scrambles? Instead, the Cougs could only come up with a few pass breakups and a couple of tackles for loss that resulted in just three negative yards for the Broncos.

It sure feels like, at some point, luck has to swing toward the Cougs. It feels like Matyus McLain and Linus Zunk are going to get home. It feels like the other team is going to put the ball on the ground and it’s going to end up in our hands, or we’re going to hang onto one of those bad passes.

With SDSU trotting out a redshirt freshman QB for just his second start, today would be a really good day for the Cougs to make up for lost time by regressing (progessing?) to the mean. Saunders threw two picks and took a sack last week.