Damien Anderson is averaging 125.7 rushing yards per game, second best in the Big Ten Conference. But coach Randy Walker is not happy. The Wildcats’ spread offense, noted for its explosiveness, is averaging 227 rushing yards per game, best in the Big Ten. But Walker is not happy.
“We have to be more consistent in our running game. We have to get Damien going,” the Northwestern coach declares.
Anderson, in fact, has gone off only sporadically in this fall that he entered with both Heisman hype and high expectations. In the season opener against Nevada-Las Vegas, he gained 113 tough yards in 28 carries, but only 14 of them came in the first half. In a rout of Duke, he did frolic for 189 yards, but in the Wildcats’ 27-26 victory Saturday over Michigan State, he struggled to get 75 yards in 28 carries.
“They’re working on stopping Damien Anderson. I would!” Walker says, and as he speaks, it is easy to tell he is not happy.
His voice is up an octave and his words flow forth in a torrent. Those are the signs that indicate a subject has touched one of his exposed nerves.
“But I think they tried to stop Jimmy Brown, Gale Sayers, O.J. Simpson,” he says. “Every great back has had defenses geared to stop him. That’s the way this game has been played.
“I’ll just say this. This is probably not the smartest–I said this [Sunday] night to our coaching staff. I’m getting tired of people [the coaches] saying they’re loading the box to stop Damien. Yeah. OK. Go on. Give me something new in football. Let’s find a way to rush the football. Let’s make sure we come off the ball and stay on blocks. Let’s make sure we run the ball in there hard. Yeah, [our opponents are] going to have their moments. But we need to start having ours.”
His offense has had moments in the three victories the Wildcats will carry with them to Ohio State for their Saturday night meeting with the 2-1 Buckeyes. But Anderson has produced few of them. The catalysts instead have been quarterback Zak Kustok, who’s averaging a conference-best 328.3 yards of total offense, and his receivers.
“Our offensive schemes were being successful in the passing game because Michigan State was trying to stop the run,” claims Kustok, and even Walker recognizes this.
“We want to be smart and take what the defense gives us,” Walker says. “But at some point you have to block a little bit better, you have to make a guy miss here and there.”
That running game surely made no big plays against the Spartans. Anderson’s long run was 9 yards. On eight of his 28 carries, Anderson lost yards; six others netted 7 yards. Fully half of his rushes gained 3 yards or less.
“But I know coach Walker, his philosophy is that he always wants to be able to run the football, and be tough and physical,” Kustok says. “He’s an old-school coach; he likes running. But [opposing defenses] are leaving some things open in the passing game and we’re trying to exploit that.”
Walker’s take on that is a bit different.
“I struggle with things being said that it’s almost going to happen that way,” he says. “Well, no, it isn’t going to happen that way. [Michigan State] scored and there’re only 18 seconds left [in last Saturday’s game]. So? Find a way to score. Find a way to do it. Yeah, they have 11 guys on defense, they’re trying to tackle our running back. Yeah. Let’s go. Block ’em. Break some tackles. Make some plays. Rush the football.”
He is in full flow now, his verbal faucet wide open.
“It’s an attitude,” he says. “It’s like we’re wringing our hands. `Golly. They’re loading up to stop the run.’ Yeah. I got it. Quit telling me about it. Quit making excuses, and let’s find a way.”
