Washington State Football's 2025 Offseason To-Do List

Jared Miller | Dec 30, 2024

Oct 1, 2022; Pullman, Washington, USA; Washington State Cougars helmets against the California Golden Bears in the first half at Gesa Field at Martin Stadium. Mandatory Credit: James Snook-Imagn Images / James Snook-Imagn Images

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Washington State Cougars

The offseason is now officially underway for the Cougars and the team is already off and running in terms of making moves for next fall. The next eight months will be busy as Washington State is trying to reload in almost every department and will be doing so with a whole crop of new folks in charge.

Here's what the team will need to accomplish over the rest of winter, spring and summer in order to be ready in 2025.

Finalize New Coaching Staff

The first thing needs to be done is rounding out the new coaching staff and that will surely be done in short order as former South Dakota State head coach Jimmy Rogers has been hired to lead the Cougs. Rogers will need to hire an offensive coordinator to replace Ben Arbuckle who is now at Oklahoma. He will surely look to pick up a new DC as well following the firing of Jeff Schmedding back in early December.

Once Rogers lines out his assistants, the real work can get underway in terms of rebuilding a depleted roster and that in and of itself is going to be a big task this offseason.

Find a Quarterback

The most pressing issue in terms of a roster rebuild will undoubdetly be at quarterback. After losing John Mateer to Oklahoma, Washington State's top priority needs to be finding a new signal caller. Fortunately for them they may already have one in-house. Zevi Eckhaus... if he chooses to stick around... did some good work his Holiday Bowl job interview for the starting position. Eckhaus, who served as Mateer's backup for most of the season, came in and threw for 363 yards and three touchdowns while rushing for another in WSU's 52-35 loss to Syracuse.

If Eckhaus doesn't stay, however, the team will need to bring someone in and do so quickly as the QB market is only getting diluted from here. Some big names are still out there but Rogers and company will need to start bringing them in. As they did last year, another quarterback competition seems as though its on the horizon for this summer.

Give Said Quarterback Weapons

The Cougs will need to help out whoever the new signal caller is and, fortunately, already have some positive momentum in this department. Senior receiver Tre Shackelford recently withdrew his name from the portal and will remain in Pullman. He had a limited role in 2024 but with guys like Kyle Williams and Kris Hutson now gone on the outside, he'll have the opportunity to step up. Again, the team may want to look to the portal here to bolster the positions around the quarterback. One name to keep an eye on is former Jackrabbit receiver Griffin Wilde who played for Rogers at SDSU and recently entered the portal. Wilde posted a 1,000 yard season with 12 TDs this year.

The other big area of concern right now is at running back. Wayshawn Parker left after a productive season that saw him rush for over 700 yards. Now someone else will need to step into that role as well. Whether that means bring someone new in or turn the attention to guys that are already there like Leo Pulalasi and Dylan Paine, the Cougars will need to establish a solid backfield moving forward.

Reload on Defense

It wasn't just the offense that got hit hard in terms of losing stars. The defense suffered its fair share of losses as well including guys like linebacker Kyle Thornton along with DBs Kapena Gushiken and "Buddah" Al-Uqdah. Finding new playmakers on that side of the ball will be of equal importance. Looking to the portal along with building up the younger players who are still around is probably the healthy mix WSU needs to shoot for.

Upperclassmen such as Andrew Edson on the line and Parker McKenna over the middle will be expected to step into leadership roles now. If the Cougs can keep these guys together as a core then subsequently build around them, the roster turnover on defense may not hit quite as hard come the start of next year.

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