Western Michigan football: Can experienced Broncos return to New Year’s Six?

Broncos must be better defensively

If the Broncos are going to compete next season they have to better defensively. If the defense was steady, but not spectacular, before Jon Wassink’s injury, they completely fell apart after the quarterback went down.

The Broncos don’t need a spectacular defense with the offense they have — they only need steady. Although they return almost everyone from last year’s defense, they have to improve in several areas.

First, they have to create more turnovers. They were plus-one in turnover margin with nine interceptions and 11 fumble recoveries. They didn’t give the ball away often, but they didn’t take the ball away, either.

The Broncos have to improve against the pass as well. They were ninth in the conference in interceptions, last in pass defense efficiency and eighth in total pass defense.

Western Michigan was pretty good at getting to the quarterback even without a dominant pass-rusher. They were fourth in the MAC with 32 sacks although they didn’t have a defensive player with more than five sacks.

If the Broncos can keep that production and improve the back-end of their defense, they should be steady enough this season to compliment what should be an outstanding offense.