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3 takeaways: Defense, late TD lead CSU football to comeback win over Hawaii

kevin lytle, fort collins coloradoan
·3 min read

It wasn't the prettiest game, but what a relief of a win for the Colorado State football program.

A clutch 80-yard drive and touchdown inside the final two minutes powered the Rams to a 17-13 win over Hawaii on Saturday at Canvas Stadium.

CSU's defense was phenomenal, the offense was better but had issues and the Rams won it late. CSU rallied from a 13-3 halftime deficit.

"Just really proud of our football team and the way they continue to fight," CSU coach Jay Norvell said. "We really challenged our team at halftime that we needed to come out with some real spark in the third quarter."

Here are three takeaways from the game.

Offense finds some footing

There were still some issues (see: red zone. More on that later), but the Clay Millen-led offense finally found some rhythm and the Rams moved the ball.

It was CSU’s highest yardage output of the season and a decent mix of plays.

Avery Morrow continues to run like a man possessed and became the first CSU back since 2017 (Dalyn Dawkins) to go over 100 rush yards three games in a row. He finished with 147 yards on 26 carries.

His 10-yard TD run with less than two minutes to go gave CSU the winning score, and it was a fittingly strong run from Morrow.

Morrow has been awesome the last three weeks.

Millen wasn’t anything incredible in his return from injury, but he was solid. He was 17-of-24 for 177 yards with several big completions on the 80-yard drive to win the game.

CSU had a season-high 380 yards of total offense.

Lytle:It’s not pretty yet, but Jay Norvell and CSU football are in attack mode

Red zone

CSU’s first offensive drive started with a bang when Avery Morrow busted a 67-yard run down to the Hawaii 2.

Then it fell apart. CSU ran twice to negative effect, then threw two incompletions to turn it over on downs.

That’s a theme in the red zone. On the first drive of the second half, CSU again drove inside the 3 and needed five plays (a Hawaii penalty gave CSU a second fourth down) before Morrow could run it in from a yard out.

The Rams turned it over on downs from the Hawaii 10 in the third quarter while trailing 13-10 when a Morrow run on fourth and 1 was stuffed.

The Rams were inside the Hawaii 35 three times in the first half and scored only three points from those.

But CSU did score on the final red zone trip, and that was the one that mattered.

Stuff to clean up, but success in the end. The Rams will hope the second-half red zone TDs can be a catalyst for improvement.

As it happened:Live updates: Colorado State football team hosts Hawaii

Defense shines

The CSU defense was sensational again, and it's fitting that an Ayden Hector interception with 39 seconds to go ended the game to seal the win.

"I don’t think there was any doubt in anyone’s mind that they weren’t going to score on that last drive," CSU linebacker Dequan Jackson said. "We went out there and showed that."

CSU allowed a stunningly low 38 total yards of offense to Hawaii in the second half. Read that again. That's a stunning number.

CSU has allowed only 44 points (just under 15 points per game) in three Mountain West games.

This is one of the top defenses in the league. It will have to prove itself against better offenses moving forward, but they give CSU a chance to win games.

CSU is now 2-5 overall but 2-1 in Mountain West play.

Follow sports reporter Kevin Lytle on Twitter and Instagram @Kevin_Lytle.

This article originally appeared on Fort Collins Coloradoan: Colorado State football beats Hawaii with late TD. Here are takeaways