By Christian Vieyra (@thecvieyra) – Co-Executive Editor | Spartans quarterbacks Emmett Brown and Walker Eget view film mid game with offensive coordinator Craig Stutzmann in a 33-10 loss on Oct. 26 at Fresno State. (photo by Nick Orozco – Co-Executive Editor of The Spear)
On Tuesday, San Jose State head football coach Ken Niumatalolo played a video of renowned sushi chef Jiro Ono to the team.
“The thing that I love about his deal was the attention to detail,” Niumatalolo said of Ono. “So a message I wanted to share is just the fine details, not making things too complicated, maybe simplifying things for our guys and letting them refine their skills.”
This approach comes after a 33-10 loss at Fresno State which Niumatalolo called the worst of the season.
The Spartans looked good on the first drive of the game, scoring in four plays, but they would not reach the end zone again.
With losing the Valley Trophy in the rearview mirror, SJSU has some plans moving forward.
The first order of business for the Spartans was to pick a solidified starter at quarterback.
After multiple weeks of shifting between Walker Eget and Emmett Brown, the bye week is where they finally decided on one… for now.
Expect Eget to start going forward.
“I think it’s status quo. What we did is start with Walker (Eget) the last two games and it’s not talking about making a switch or anything like that, we’ll go with Walker (Eget),” offensive coordinator Craig Stutzmann said. “For us to be able to win the games that’s the toughest part of our schedule, we need this person to play at this level and right now we feel that Walker (Eget) gives us that best chance.”
Stutzmann said he now has an ample amount of sample size on the quarterbacks.
“I know the numbers don’t reflect it. It really doesn’t, but it’s what we know we need the offense to look like, his strengths, what he’s going to be able to provide for us,” Stutzmann said. “With Walker (Eget), I think he’s able to see some of those concepts and get a good feel for it, to where the balls disperse to different parts of the field and take advantage of those things.”
Despite getting minimal playing time the past few weeks, Brown still ranks second in the Mountain West in touchdown receptions and sixth in passing yards.
“I think what it was early on in the year, Emmett (Brown) got the ball out quick, we had a lot of space inside there, and Emmett (Brown) did a great job and then defenses started changing a little bit,” Stutzmann said. “There’s certain things that maybe Walker’s strengths is going to help us out a little bit more.”
The next step in SJSU’s offense finding its rhythm again is focusing on the bread and butter plays.
One of the main reasons Niumatalolo played the sushi video was to show the simplicity of what Ono does, from the ingredients to the process.
This is also what Stutzmann wants to do, simplify the offense.
“What we’re really good at and the things that separate us from others, we probably overlooked a little bit in the practice time and we just got to be more consistent with it,” Stutzmann said. ”These guys in college have classes, they have a social life, they got a lot of other things and there’s only so much time that we have with those guys and so I think I probably added in maybe a little bit too much and it took away from what our secret sauce is.”
Stutzmann is very specific with the amount of reps for starters throughout the week leading up to a game. One hundred and seven full-speed reps is the number he has chosen for the starting unit.
“If we added certain things in, or we had too many wrinkles, we’re only probably practicing our bread and butters maybe 25 or 30% of the time. That’s not enough. Those bread and butters got to be practiced at least 50% of the time,” Stutzmann said. “I think that’s what it came down to. We probably added a little bit too much wrinkles.”
Stutzmann acknowledged this issue starts with him and he plans to address it going forward.
“You don’t want to be stale and do the same things over and over and over, but at the same time too, that there’s something to be said about being able to do the things that you do extremely well,” Stutzmann said. “Back in the day, when we played in this style of system, we didn’t have a lot of plays but we knew the players could teach other players, the players could even teach the coaches and you knew any of the kids were able to play free.”
Stutzmann chimed in with a food analogy of his own, the iconic West Coast fast food chain In-n-Out.
“They don’t have many things on the menu, but what they do, they do really well,” Stutzmann said.
Niumatalolo said the bye week was perfect timing, allowing them to focus on the fundamentals, and SJSU hopes to get back to where they were offensively against Washington State, where they dropped 52 points.
“I feel like the Washington State game we were rolling, really that’s the best team we’ve played so far and they couldn’t stop us. We were going up and down the field, we had some juice, we had some energy, we had a swagger to us,” Niumatalolo said. “It feels like we need some continuity. We’re a little discombobulated.”
