Mike Leach fired special teams coach Eric Russell Monday, two days after Washington State lost a 60-59 decision to California.
The Washington State Cougars lost to the California Golden Bears Saturday night in a wild 60-59 affair that included Wazzu allowing two touchdowns on kickoff returns and a missed 19-yard field goal that could have won the game.
Coach Mike Leach’s response to that was to fire assistant head coach/special teams coach Eric Russell before practice on Monday.
"“We made a change at special teams and while I think a great deal of coach Russell but we wanted to split the special teams up among the assistants and the way he’s most effective is with him running the whole thing,” Leach told The Spokesman-Review. He’s a great coach. Yeah, I decided to make a change at special teams.”"
The Cougars are 2-4 and 1-2 in the Pac-12 and special teams have been a problem all season. Washington State gave up a special-teams score on a punt return at Utah the previous week and field-goal kickers Erik Powell and Quentin Breshears have combined to make 6-of-11 attempts this season.
Washington State gave up touchdowns twice in the third quarter Saturday after scoring themselves.
After Gerard Wicks scored on a 1-yard run to put Wazzu up 38-27, Trevor Davis ran the ensuing kickoff back for a 100-yard score.
Washington State scored on its next possession on a 9-yard pass from Connor Halliday to Isiah Myers before Davis ran another kick back 98 yards to make it a 45-41 game.
Those were Davis’ only two returns of the game—and, wow, does that 99.0 yard per return average look gaudy.
Halliday—who threw for an FBS single-game record 734 yards—drove the Cougars down to the Cal 2-yard line, but Breshears shanked a 19-yard field goal—an attempt shorter than an extra point—with 15 seconds left and Cal escaped with the victory.
It’s not unheard of for a team to fire an assistant in midseason and losing a game in which you’ve gained 812 yards of total offense might be considered just cause for such a move.