Originally posted by THEsocalledfan
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Saying CJ Smith shut down Wieneke makes it sound like he was out there on an island and limited his numbers by himself, but that couldn't be further from the truth. The Bison were killing Lujan all game with a 4 man rush (so much so that he didn't even play the next two games due to injury), therefore much of the time CJ had help over the top. NDSU's pass rush was so effective that, even when they didn't sack Lujan, they forced him to throw early, which led to numerous throws that were delivered before Jake even started his break. Smith also had 3 pass interference penalties (one was pick up due to multiple fouls on the play) while trying to cover Wieneke, so to say that CJ "shut him down" is just inaccurate.
I don't want it to seem like I'm implying that CJ Smith had nothing to do with Jake having down numbers in last year's Dakota Marker game, because he is a good corner and was a part of it, but it was the Bison D as a whole that defended Wieneke well, not an individual. If we were going to anoint any one player for "shutting down" Wieneke, it would be Greg Menard, not CJ Smith.
My hope is that our pass blocking is better this year and we get Goedert rolling so we can at least make the Bison pay for focusing too much effort on Jake.
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