No doubt the rushing game was better under cliff, he made it more dynamic and helped the rb rush. The game plan against Idaho was to pass the ball, now I won’t use it as an excuse as to why we lost but it definitely didn’t help us nor that stat. Here are the rushing numbers between the two teams, one is ranked 2 and the other is 24.
The gris: 15 games for 637 attempts (most of any) for 2652 yards for 4.16 average. They had 32 touchdowns and averaged 176.8 per game. Solid stats but when MSU, NDSU, and SDSU are all top 5 it is undeniably an area where the other top 4 teams are stronger in.
The cats: 12 games and 480 attempts for 3492 yards for a
7.28 average (almost a yard above any other school). For 41 touchdowns and 291.0 (2nd highest) average per game. Now yes the cats had some bad teams on the schedule but the 2nd string players played a lot of the game. Funny how you say “always run blocking” when your team rushes the ball more than
any team in the top 50

. I can’t find sack per drop back stats but I would agree the cats and gris have fairly similar pass protection and would argue the cats have better o-linemen while gris have size advantage.
Please tell me how a 7.28 average per rush isn’t incredible, not only do we run it frequently we do it at the highest performance. Now obviously the explosive runs do stem from scheme, no doubt but then why do gris fans hate on the scheme so much if it does so well.