Washington State

Cougars · Pac-12

Head coach Jimmy Rogers Year 1 with Washington State

Year-1 HCs (2015-2024) averaged -0.19 W vs SP+ expected · n=83

Season Projection · 2026 W0

10,000 sims

5.8

Expected wins

6-5

Proj record

3 to 9

Win range (90%)

#59 (34–85)

Final rank (90%)

Make playoff

14%

Win conference

Path to Glory

Tap a win or a loss on each pivotal game to see how the playoff probability shifts. Leave any game unset to average across both outcomes.

Make the playoff

Baseline projection.

at Kansas State

Away · Sep 12
at Texas State

Away · Nov 21
vs Arizona

Home · Sep 26
at Utah State

Away · Oct 10
vs Boise State

Home · Oct 24

Pivotal games are the 5 with the largest playoff-probability swing, ranked by the model. Math: chained Bayesian log-odds update from the conditional simulation set; gets the directionally right answer but won't perfectly capture cross-game correlations until the full Monte Carlo pipeline lands.

Returning production · 2025

41 PCI

Quarterback 50% (3/6 players)
Offensive line 45% (9/20 players)
Skill (RB/WR/TE) 34% (12/35 players)
Front 7 (DL/LB) 45% (14/31 players)
Secondary 13% (3/23 players)
Special teams 43% (3/7 players)

PCI weights returning production by position group (QB/OL heaviest). 70%+ is healthy continuity; 45-70% is a normal rebuild; below 45% is a meaningful turnover.

If QB1 is out (Zevi Eckhaus)

GIE projects a 4.0 rating drop and a 15.8pp shift in playoff probability if Washington State loses its QB1 for an extended stretch. (n=2 historical samples; pooled across recent seasons.)

Situational efficiency · 2025

FBS percentile rank

3rd-down conversion 36.0% 43th — below avg
Red-zone TD rate 14.8% 50th — average
4th-down aggression 35.0% 44th — below avg
Late & close 4.2 yds/play 25th — below avg

Percentile is across all FBS teams with play-by-play data for the season. "Late & close" is yards per play in Q4+ with a one-score margin — a proxy for clutch offensive performance.

Schedule

Full 2026 slate. Tap a row for the matchup breakdown.

Latest Stories

Stories about Washington State will appear here as they're published. Check back during the season for analysis, hot takes, and game write-ups.

More coming

Per-team pages get the full treatment in Phase 3: current rating, season projection histogram, schedule with win probabilities, and live overlays on Pylon stream days. For now, this page exists so stories and news have a permanent home as content rolls in.