COUGARS LOSE TOP 2 DEFENSIVE TARGETS
Despite finishing the regular season with 9 wins and a Top-25 ranking for the first time in 11 years , Coach Kirby Moore was unable to sway 5* DE All-American Scott Joy to Pullman.. Rated #20 Overall Day the Washington State Gatorade POY (#1 WA) from has signed with Ohio State as the Cougars fall short in landing their first 5* talent.
Moore
Well losing Joy stung, the real loss and a what feels like a kick to the gut was 4* MLB Jaron Banfield (#303 Overall/#3 WA/#39 LB) announcing he was signing with Stanford.. The Graham WA native visited Pullman back in Week 7 and had the Cougars #1 almost the entire season but a Week 13 to Stanford somehow swayed him to sign as WSU falls short of signing what could've also been their first 4* talent on Defense."To be honest I was surprised we stayed in the hunt as long as we did.. We were able to convince Scott to come to Pullman for a Week 12 visit after the loss to Stanford and had a long talk about what he wanted.. He told us despite growing up in Tacoma ever since he was a little kid he wanted to be a Buckeye.. No hard feelings I hope he has a great career there"
Moore
With Joy and Banfield off the Big Board, WSU now 20 players left led by 4* Center Jimmie Gentry and 4* CB Channing Zunega."We new landing Joy was going to be a longshot but we felt like we had Jaron from Day 1 and with our current LB room we felt like he was a instant starter a leader on our Defense for the next 4 years.. This was a big blow.. Coach Bray is going to get busy scouting some LB's who have maybe been overlooked (no scholarships) but odds are we are going to have to hit the Portal hard to recover from this one"
