Raider, you posted "And again, please explain why the Griz continue to dominate the Cats despite losing the in state recruiting battle and their “swagger”. You make zero sense with this."
Let me dumb it down for ya. Jeeeez, stop hanging around these hacks, it is rubbing off on your logic.
There is no correlation about whether we dominate the Cats on the field, and whether they have been signing the better Montana kids than us the past few years. As you know, Montana kids have always made up a minority of the total starting units for both teams, but it takes great out-of-state players to make a great tram. Obviously we have many more than do the Cats. At the pinnacle of our success, we had about 8-9 starters out of 22 from Montana. Last season, we had 3. During the glory years, Montana teams had a swagger that other teams feared. Most opposing teams knew they were beat during warm-ups. They feared coming into Washington/Griz. And that swagger came directly from the great Montana kids who lived-and-died by the great tradition of playing for the Griz. The out-of-state kids bought into the tradition, but it was the Colt Andersons, the Reynolds, the Shillingers, the Haucks, the Biermans, the Hilliards, the Harris, et. al. that set the aura of invincibility surrounding our program.
How many games were nip-n-tuck late into the 4th quarter..... yet we ALWAYS found a way to win them. It was a will-to-never-lose that prevailed in those days, and it it not there today. You can deny it all you want, but it has been lost in recent years. And, I maintain that the REASON it has been lost is because we no longer have a corp of Montana kids to drive the Mercedes, like we used to do. Let's face facts, Montana kids grew up with Grizzly football dominance, they lived it, and dreamed of someday being a part of it to carry on the tradition. Out-of-state players do not share that commitment. Most sign with the program that will give them the best chance to be an NFL player. It is more about them, than the program.
I hope that this explanation will provide my reasons for feeling the way I do. By the way, I play golf with a couple of Griz insiders, and we have discussed this very topic at length. They agree with me, for the record.