The Student Printz

Issue date: 9/28/06 Section: Sports

Media Credit: Matt Pollitt Number 21, defensive back Jasper Faulk, scrambles to retrieve a fumble as number 91, defensive end Robert Henderson, dives to help recover the ball.

Media Credit: Matt Pollitt Number 87, wide receiver Chris Johnson, scores on a 54-yard touchdown pass in the second quarter of Tuesday night's game.

In a game between the two teams that were predicted to compete for the Conference USA East Division title, the Southern Miss Golden Eagles defeated the Central Florida 19-14 Tuesday night in front of 23,540 fans in the Citrus Bowl and a national television audience.

In what seemed to be a struggle for most of the game, the Eagles found ways to score and make the big plays required to win ball games.

"We're average at best when we're not ready to play," head coach Jeff Bower said. "I don't want to take away anything from UCF, but we didn't play with intensity and emotion."

The Eagles (3-1, 1-0) looked different from their last game, a 31-17 walloping of North Carolina State at home. They also looked different than last year's UCF game, when the Eagles whipped the Knights 52-31 in front of a homecoming crowd.

Tuesday's game was much closer, and had the Knights made two crucial mistakes, the game could have easily gone the other way for the Eagles.

With five minutes to go in the second quarter, UCF's kicker banked a field goal attempt off of the right upright. It was his third miss in four attempts on the year.

Also, UCF sophomore Kevin Smith fumbled the ball at the Southern Miss 1-yard line, which the Eagles recovered in the end zone. The score would have given the Golden Knights the lead. Instead, the fumble gave the Golden Eagles the ball at their 20-yard line, which they used to take the ball downfield for a field goal.

"We needed that play," said redshirt junior safety LeVance Richmond, who stripped Smith with Tokumbo Abanikanda recovering in the end zone. "I was thinking strip the ball the whole time, and there he (Smith) was, coming right at me."

One thing that decided the game for the Eagles were turnovers, and Richmond's forced fumble was just the first of the Eagles' huge turnovers. After being forced to punt, USM punter Britt Barefoot placed the ball within the UCF 10-yard line where it rolled to be downed on the one by USM coverage men. On the very next play, UCF quarterback Stephen Moffett threw the ball right into the hands of middle linebacker and Printz Defensive Player of the Game Jerome Lyons, who took the interception back for the touchdown.

Lyons finished the day with seven tackles and one interception.

The final thing that brought the game to Southern Miss was the emergence of the Nasty Bunch in the final UCF drive of the fourth quarter.

Southern Miss had not sacked Moffett all game, but on the final drive, the Nasty Bunch showed up and sacked him on three of four downs, including the fourth down conversion attempt.

"We just decided to go after him," USM Defensive Coordinator Jay Hopson said. "On the drive before that, we hoped to keep them in front of us and run some clock, but with the game on the line, we went after them."

And with the clock winding down with two minutes left, Southern played the ultimate keep away by taking delay of game penalties and running back and kneeling to keep the ball out of UCF's hands.

And the game resulted in USM's first conference win of the year. They now sit atop C-USA's eastern division and will face off against the defending league champions next Tuesday.

The Printz Co-Offensive Players of the Game this week are freshmen Rodney Gray and Damion Fletcher.

Gray finished with a team leading five catches on the night for 75 yards. Fletcher ran for his third consecutive 100-yard game, and had his fourth consecutive 100 all purpose yards game.

The Printz Special Teams Player of the Game was punter Britt Barefoot. Barefoot was consistent with his punting, punting eight times for 327 yards, including two inside the 20, and one downed on the 1 yard line, setting up the Lyon's interception touchdown return.

Southern Miss begins preparations this week for next Tuesday night's game against the University of Tulsa.

Kickoff is set for 6:30 pm on ESPN2.

Page 1 of 1

Article Tools