Pease hopes to keep No. 5 Broncos offense rolling

BOISE, Idaho (AP) In hindsight, Brent Pease realizes he should have listened to the clues from Chris Petersen a little bit closer.

It was in the days after Boise State closed out its 2010 season with a victory over Utah in the MAACO Bowl. Pease, then Boise State's wide receivers coach, was being courted by new Indiana coach Kevin Wilson to take the offensive coordinator job with the Hoosiers. Meanwhile, without Pease's full understanding, then-Boise State offensive coordinator Bryan Harsin was being lured out of Boise for a job at Texas.

"When I communicated with Bryan at that time I thought he was staying here. If I knew he had a chance to leave I wouldn't have even looked at that opportunity," Pease said. "And I probably should have listened to my head coach a little bit more. He probably had an idea and he tried to lead me that way."

Pease eventually took the job at Indiana, then just a handful of days later darted back to Boise for a chance to be the offensive coordinator with the Broncos after Harsin left for Texas. It created a messy New Year for all involved, but is now just a brief bit of history.

And instead of being with the Hoosiers as they prep for their opener against Ball State, Pease is trying to dissect No. 19 Georgia's defense as the fifth-ranked Broncos prepare for their opener in Atlanta against the Bulldogs.

His task is simple: make sure an offense that's been ranked in the top five nationally four of the past five seasons doesn't have any hiccups and perhaps be part of the Boise State team that breaks through the BCS ceiling.

No pressure.

"There is nothing like continuity. There's no question about it. But if you feel good about what you're doing ... and if it's not right then you have to do what you need to do to make it right," Petersen said. "With us, continuity has been a big part of helping us stay on track."

Pease's move from receivers coach to offensive coordinator helps preserve the continuity the Broncos have enjoyed on that side of the ball for nearly a decade.

Petersen arrived in 2001 along with head coach Dan Hawkins and served as offensive coordinator until his promotion to head coach when Hawkins left for Colorado.

When Petersen moved up, Harsin, then the tight ends coach, took over running the Broncos offense. Now it's Pease stepping in to Harsin's spot and trying to continue the Broncos' relatively seamless transitions.

"They're different people, different personalities, but we're still doing the same stuff," Boise State's Heisman-finalist QB Kellen Moore said.

It'll be the way in which Moore directs the Broncos offense that'll be the truest tell of how the offensive transition is going. For the past four years, Pease was giving Moore suggestions and ideas from the perspective of Boise State's receiving corps.

Now Pease is learning a little bit different language - that of the quarterbacks - in trying to help Moore improve on his already gaudy numbers.

"I don't' think my relationship changes with him. I can say the same things," Pease said.

"I might have to talk in quarterback fashion obviously. But we're probably more dialed in on what we're focused on."

For Moore, the separation from Harsin was difficult. Harsin was the coach that went to bat with Petersen and believed Moore could play in the Football Bowl Subdivision when most of the interest in him was coming from schools a division lower.

But it's not as though Moore is developing a completely new relationship. It's just slightly tweaked from the past.

"I think it's also great through your experience you hear a different voice. It was certainly not easy because you work with Harsin for four years, you build that foundation and we always worked for four years constantly, but I couldn't ask for a better situation," Moore said. "Go into your last year and you have to have a coaching change, that was basically my No. 2 guy already."