so I might be the only guy there is, or at least one of only a very few, that has watched every single game both Hawaii and BYU have played this season. Plus I have been to multiple games each team has played in person so I think I have a better than average grasp on each team and what each does well and what the weaknesses of each team are. So here is what I think are the main issues in this game. I am not predicting a winner and a loser here I'm just reviewing the teams and how I think they match up.

For starters I think Hawaii's offense is better than BYU's on the whole, and I think BYU's defense is better than Hawaii's so each team is superior to the other on opposite sides of the ball so this game is a match up of strength against strength and weakness against weakness.

Understanding this is a BYU board I'll focus mostly on what BYU has to do, as I see it, to win this game.

First of all Hawaii's offense against BYU's defense which I believe are each teams strongest unit. Hawaii is explosive and makes big plays both passing and running. They have two good QB's who have similar strengths but are still a bit different from each other.

For the first half of the year Cole McDonald started every game and got the vast majority of the playing time. He is a big QB, 6'4" and 220#'s and very athletic for his size with good speed. His arm strength is good although not elite but he has a funky throwing motion where his delivery is from the side, it looks like he is throwing the shot put. He is inconsistent with his accuracy sometimes making very good, tough, and on the money throws, especially long throws where he is better than short throws. He does make some bad decisions at times and throws into coverage when he shouldn't which has resulted in quite a lot of picks this season. He also has fumbled several times and sometimes rather than throwing the ball he will hold it too long and take a sack. I'd say he is good but inconsistent and can hurt BYU both throwing and running.

The second QB is Chevan Cordiero and he is smaller than McDonald as 6'0" and about 185#'s. He only played a little the first half of the year but the second half he and McDonald have basically split time with Cordiero actually starting 3 of the games with mixed results. He was very good against San Jose St and got the win but he was not good at all throwing two picks in the first quarter the following week at UNLV and got yanked for McDonald who then got them the win. Cordiero also has a good arm, I'd say stronger than McDonald's and a much better throwing motion. But his accuracy is spotty. He is very athletic and very fast and can really hurt a defense running the ball. In fact in their game against ASDSU which I attended and was played the week previous to BYU playing SDSU he really hurt SDSU on a TD drive mainly running the ball. SDSU was actually rushing 3 and dropping 8, much like BYU does all of the time, on the first possession Cordiero was in the game and he burned them multiple times on third and longs running the ball. If BYU insists on dropping 8 both of these QB's can really make them pay. SDSU adjusted after that first drive and quit dropping 8 and were pretty effective in stopping him the rest of the game.

Hawaii's receivers are mostly in the mold of small and quick. They get open and get really good yards after the catch. Since it is a run and shoot offense there is no TE so you will see a lot of 4 wr sets with a single RB. Just about every play a WR goes long and is an option and especially when McDonald is in the game he will try to go over the top to the guy on the deep route.

They have two RB's that play alot, a smaller quick RB and a big bruiser type and use both about equally. Once again if BYU is going to drop 8 they will make them pay with these two RB's because both are good.

I think BYU is going to have to play some amount of man coverage and rush 4 to have a hope of stopping Hawaii, if they stay in that 3 man front Hawaii will run the ball with both the RB's and the QB's and they will get yards doing it.

On the other side of things Hawaii's defense was pretty bad for the first half of the year, really bad, but they have actually improved a lot over the second half of the year and I would say can match up with BYU's offense which IMO is pretty mediocre. Where they are most susceptible is against the run, their Dline is undersized and BYU's Oline is huge. This is where BYU should try to exploit the Hawaii defense by using that huge Oline to pound away at Hawaii's undersized defenders. The Hawaii LB's are good, they have good speed and move to the ball well and the DB's are athletic and fast although they tend to give up big plays at times. If BYU pounds and pounds the ball they should be able to then pop a long pass over the top after the Hawaii DB's move up. But the big question is will BYU actually do that. They don't run enough inside zone IMO but that should be their focus against Hawaii and that is Hawaii's weakness because of the undersized Dline. BYU's overall size advantage can be the difference if they actually use it.

I don't think BYU can keep Hawaii from scoring under 21 points, so they need to be able to score more than that to win, in fact they may need to be able to score over 30 as Hawaii routinely scores in the high 30's and 40's and can rack up points very quickly.