COMMENTARY: Where does Wazzu go from here?

If Wyoming’s last-minute, go-ahead touchdown on Saturday severed any ounce of hope that Washington State could escape a nightmarish November with a win, quarterback John Mateer’s interception on a fleeting attempt to save the game with two seconds left was a cruel but fitting conclusion to yet another November gone wrong for coach Jake Dickert and company.

WSU lost to Wyoming 15-14 on Saturday, its third straight loss following 38-35 and 41-38 road losses to New Mexico and Oregon State, respectively.

Dickert dismissed defensive coordinator Jeff Schemedding on Monday morning and lost Ben Arbuckle, his 29-year-old rising star offensive coordinator, to the Southeastern Conference’s Oklahoma Sooners on Monday afternoon.

The Cougars allowed 28 points per game in 2024 (90th out of 134 Football Bowl Subdivision schools) and missed the seventh-most tackles (157) in college football.

Over the past two seasons combined, Arbuckle’s WSU offense ranked 10th nationally in passing yards per game (302.7) and 20th in scoring offense (34.2 ppg). The Cougars were the No. 12 scoring offense in 2024 at 36.8 points per game.

With both coordinators gone, where does that leave WSU?

Last year’s last-minute late November loss to the undefeated Washington Huskies on a walk-off field goal was arguably more painful for the Cougs than Saturday’s result to the Cowboys, but given the 2023 Huskies’ sky-high success and the Cougars’ collapse, a three-point loss to a then-undefeated team that would go on to play in the national championship was a point of pride.

It’s reasonable to say fans left 2023, the final year of the traditional Pac-12, lamenting a lost season in a lost conference with a simmer of hope and a sense of pride in the Cougars’ future.

Dickert kept the majority of his roster and coaching staff intact as the Cougs entered a 2024 season with a mostly Mountain West schedule and the Pac-12 whittled down to two schools with an uncertain future.

Fast forward one year and the Cougars’ conference fate was determined months ago — a reformed Pac-12 with the best of the Mountain West set to start play in 2026 — but the on-field questions appear more pressing.

Dickert’s greatest strength in weathering the storm of conference realignment was continuity. Keeping his staff together helped him keep his team together. WSU lost a fair share of players to graduation and several to the NFL last year but only two significant 2023 starters chose to transfer as quarterback Cam Ward left for Miami and wide receiver Josh Kelly joined Texas Tech.

With both coordinators gone and WSU facing a 2025 schedule that is far more unique and arguably tougher than 2024’s majority-Mountain West slate, Dickert’s single objective over the following days, weeks and months is to keep his team together.

There is only so much that Dickert and the Cougar Collective can do. The Cougar Collective is an association of WSU alumni that connects student-athletes with various name, image and likeness opportunities and coordinates mass fundraising and outreach to support these deals.

This year, the collective has reported a mass increase in monthly donors and introduced products and merchandise, including the sale of coffee and beer. Even with the collective’s best efforts, larger schools that want the services of WSU’s best players can outbid the Cougs by a mile.

Mateer, the Cougars’ quarterback who led the nation in total touchdowns in his first year as a starter, has reportedly received at least one million-dollar NIL offer. It’s hard to tell a 20-year-old to turn down a million dollars, but that is what WSU will essentially need to do if it wants to keep Mateer.

“We’ve built a really strong culture here that people want to be a part of,” Dickert said Saturday after his team’s regular-season finale loss. “There’s a lot of challenges in today’s football. We’ll now have to navigate everything that comes our way.”

Mateer appears ready to play in WSU’s bowl game. The Cougars will learn when, where and who they are playing when individual bowl games announce their participants on Sunday.

Whether or not the sophomore signal-caller from Little Elm, Texas, is back in the Crimson and Gray come September is a tough question. As is the future of other returners such as freshman running back Wayshawn Parker, who ran for over 700 yards, and sophomore linebacker Buddah Al-Uqdah, who led WSU with 76 tackles and added three interceptions.

Defensive tackle David Gusta said in an interview with radio host Jason Puckett that he plans to return to WSU in 2025.

“It’s important when one of your best players puts the stake in the ground, ‘I’m coming back. I love being here. I love being coached by (defensive line) coach Kal (Pete Kaligis),’ those are impactful statements,” Dickert said. “He knows what he wants to do, he knows the people he wants to partner with to get them there, and I think that’s very important.

“And you know, the more that I think that the locker room understands you’re in this together. You’re not on a bunch of individual journeys, right? You’re on a team. And I think that’s what somehow has gotten lost somewhat.”

Dickert is 2-6 in November the last two years. In the last three seasons combined, he has started 4-1 each time only to go 8-15 combined in the final eight games.

Dickert is still building a program and with that comes failures, growing pains and losses. It also comes with wins and triumphs and Apple Cup trophies.

The way 2024 ended was certainly disappointing and to many fans, unacceptable. But the path forward will be blazed by Dickert.

One, because WSU is in no financial position to fire a coach and start from scratch with the conference rebuild going on.

And two, because Dickert has accounted for spectacular results relative to the cards he has been dealt. Two wins over Wisconsin, two Apple Cups and a team culture that, at the very least, kept the core of the team together.

His challenges will be to build a 2025 team full of coaches and student-athletes that, similar to the height of this season, want to be there and to hire offensive and defensive coordinators who put their players in a position to succeed.

If he can steer the Cougs through choppy realignment waters in 2025, then a clearer path to the College Football Playoff, new regional rivalries and a shot at a brighter future will await him and the Cougar faithful in back in the Pac-12 in 2026.

Taylor can be reached at 208-848-2268, staylor@lmtribune.com or on X (formerly Twitter) @Sam_C_Taylor.