Rams defense grows up, shows bright future together

FORT COLLINS» Being better across the board is good.

It’s just not enough for a Colorado State defense that was forced to grow up together last season.

A unit that gave up 214 yards per game on the ground in 2016 now yields just 134.8, twice holding teams to fewer than 100 yards, including last week at Utah State. The flip side is allowing 256 yards per outing in the air (up from 205.2), but teams have been forced to throw to play catch-up against the Rams recently.

Find a mistake, make corrections, stick together.

“It’s a good thing when you start young together and you just grow,” defensive end Arjay Jean said. “It just shows how bright of a future we’re going to have down the line.”

For the players and coaches, that means seeing gains every week in some aspect. The idea is to be stout across the board.

Coach Mike Bobo noted they were burned by wheel routes earlier in the year, but not so much the past few weeks. He criticized the unit for having no pass rush heading into Utah State, and they came out the back end with seven sacks.

“I feel like our defense all year has gotten better week to week,” Bobo said. “Really, playing defense, I say it all the time, is alignment and assignment and hitting your gaps, but then understanding where you’re weak, what has hurt you. Every week it’s really important defensively that you correct things, because offenses are going to look at tape and look at what’s been successful against the opponent they’re playing, and if it’s close to something they do schematically, they’re going to implement that.

“Defenses usually see things that have hurt them over and over. I think our coaches have done a nice job, and our kids, of correcting some mistakes.”