EWU coach on upset of WSU: Players took game ‘really personal’
Sep 5, 2016, 3:08 PM
The Eastern Washington Eagles are no strangers to giving Pac-12 teams a run for their money.
EWU, which plays in the NCAA Division I FCS Big Sky Conference, nearly beat the Washington Huskies in 2014 and even knocked off a ranked Oregon State team the year before that. The high-flying Eagles proved how dangerous they can be again on Saturday, as they rolled in Martin Stadium in Pullman and beat a talented Washington State squad 45-42 in the season opener for both teams.
So, just who are these Eagles?
As it turns out, they’re mostly made up of Washington-bred players – including star wide receiver and Yakima native Cooper Kupp – and because of that there was plenty of motivation for them to pull off the upset of the Cougars, as Eastern head coach Beau Baldwin told “Brock and Salk” on Monday.
“This was really personal,” he said. “We have about 65 to 70 percent of our guys who are in-state guys, so this one is, it’s personal. And there’s that chip on your shoulder. I mean, let’s be honest, we all grow up and we all have dreams when we’re football players in high school of trying to play at the highest level, and the highest level in our state is UW and WSU. So when you’re not recruited by one of those two schools and not looked at that way … (when) you’re on that stage you want to prove that you belong with those guys.”
Eastern Washington is a perennial postseason powerhouse in the FCS, of course, and even won the 2010 national championship. So for Baldwin and his team, winning at WSU was never looked at as something out of reach.
“In the game itself there was never really a time where I didn’t feel like (we were going to win). And we have total respect for WSU, but I always felt like this was a game we were going to win,” Baldwin said. “We felt like that going in, our guys were never wide-eyed so there was never really a time in the game that I felt like this was a game that I didn’t feel like it was a game we were going to win.”
