Early Fade

TCU Rolls Past Mustangs, 48-7; Tulane Awaits

DALLAS – For the Mustangs to compete with a team like TCU they must: A) get out of the gate fast, (B) make a couple of plays, (C) catch a break, then (D) ride the emotion of a good home crowd.

Save for a good home crowd - 30,923 - none of the above happened Saturday at Ford Stadium. The Horned Frogs hopped on the Mustangs early and never let up.

Roughly five minutes in SMU had: (A) lost a fumble, (B) dropped a sure interception, (C) allowed a pick-six to a defensive end and (D) trailed the Frogs, 14-0.

Though the Mustangs’ defense held it to 20-0 at the break, TCU cruised for 28 second-half points. Marcus Jackson polished things off with a 79-yard TD jaunt with four minutes left.

Cornerback Derrius Bell defends the end zone in the first half. The Frogs settled for three on this drive.

On Monday SMU head coach June Jones looked for positives.

“I see the foundation starting to get built, but were not making the plays,” he said. “We left a lot of plays out there that, you know, we’ve got to make. We’ll start making them when the kids can carry from practice to the game what they’re supposed to do.”

Bo Levi Mitchell passed for 218 yards, completing 20 of 36 with two interceptions, both to defensive linemen on shovel passes. For the second week in a row, the Mustangs’ Run and Shoot managed a single touchdown.

“I saw him do a lot of good things and then some not so good things,” Jones said of the quarterback he’s bet the season on. “Again, I think, he’ll just keep looking at the tapes and getting better. You wish that he was better every play but that’s life when you’re going with a young qb.”

True freshman Cole Loftin caught his first career touchdown pass - as it turns out - with a broken right collarbone. “He’s obviously a football player,” Jones said. Loftin is out indefinitely.

“They’re a really good football team,” Jones said of the Horned Frogs, “but when you look at the tapes I’ll bet you that TCU is looking at them too and going, ‘Whoa.’”

“I thought we blocked them good enough that we should have made lot more plays.”

“While the game’s going on, it’s just total frustration,” Jones said. “Then, when you look at the tape you realize that, hey, you can see some things that [are] getting a little better even though it doesn’t look better to the naked eye.”

Is this team progressing more slowly than Jones anticipated? “It’s different with different places,” he said. “If we had played three [Division] I-AA teams, you wouldn’t be asking that question. That’s the difference. The competition’s very good and you’re trying to learn at the same time. You’d like to already know what you’re doing by the time you go play those type teams.”

“I hope that we’ll be a little further along this week, even though it’s a short week.”

Defensively, SMU allowed TCU to convert 13 of 18 third-down opportunities. (For the season, Mustang opponents have a 66-percent conversion rate, the worst mark in C-USA.)

There were also two dropped interceptions. “One of them might have gone 90 yards,” Jones said. “You just make those couple of plays and all of a sudden that’s a little different feel for the game.”

“Right now, we’re still not obviously where we need to be. But there were some good things in there. The defensive line played well, for example. I thought they got off the ball and raised their game to the challenge.”

Are the defensive problems from a lack of talent or a lack of confidence? “That’s a difficult question for a coach to answer,” Jones said. “I think it’s, right now, assignments [and] alignments. I’m not going to throw anybody under the bus, that’s for sure.”

SMU's Pete Fleps, left, and Anthony Sowe converge on TCU's Joseph Turner (24). Turner finished with 67 yards and two touchdowns in the Horned Frogs' 48-7 win in Dallas.

“But we’re getting better. That was two different types of teams [we played], two weeks in a row. If we had played another four-wide-receiver team like Texas Tech we would have been probably that much better running that scheme against them.”

How do you keep players “up” after another decisive loss? “I think you probably should ask them that,” Jones said. “I do what I do and we do that very well. I thought we had our best meeting this morning of all the meetings I’ve had in probably 35 years of coaching and playing.”

Might a return to conference play this week give the team a boost? “We’re at a point where it doesn’t matter who we’re playing, you better be enthused or you’re going to get your rear end kicked,” Jones said.

The Green Wave is coming off a 24-10 win over Louisiana-Monroe, its first win of the season and its first game against an unranked opponent. In a 20-6 loss at then #13 Alabama, Tulane out-gained the Crimson Tide, 318-172. ‘Bama prevailed on an 87-yard punt return for a touchdown and a blocked punt for a touchdown.

The Green Wave’s other loss came at home to then #14 East Carolina, 28-24.

Against that tough slate, Tulane leads C-USA in most every defensive category, including total (223.3 ypg), rushing (73 ypg), passing (150.3 ypg), scoring (19.3 ppg) and sacks (13).

Offensively, Matt Forte has moved on to the NFL but Tulane still has a formidable running back in Andre Anderson (6-0, 211), the league’s fourth-leading rusher. Averaging 90 yards per game, Anderson posted career highs for yards (152) and carries (38) against ULM.

Sophomore quarterback Kevin Moore also had a career day with 272 yards passing, completing 19 of 32. Junior safety Corey Sonnier had a career-high 10 tackles.

Head coach Bob Toledo’s record is 5-10 in his second year at Tulane. Overall, he’s 83-78 in 14-plus seasons.

Quotable Jones:

On an early missed opportunity against TCU: “We had a guy come completely clean in the A-gap on a punt. I’ve never seen a guy come that clean and we didn’t block the punt. Sooner or later we’re going to make one of those plays and then we may start to make more.”

SMU Football Notes:

• With Loftin out, Jones expects Josh Bryant and Cole Beasley to get the reps - perhaps Justin Willis too. Jones said Willis, a two-year starter at quarterback, is “coming along” at receiver but is not yet ready. “He’s catching the ball really well,” Jones said. “I think he’s a smart kid. He’ll get his chance when he’s ready to go.”

• SMU’s Thomas Morstead leads C-USA in punting with a 45.6-yard average on 18 attempts with a long of 59.

• Jessie Henderson is now SMU’s all-time leader in career kickoff return yardage (2,293).

On Deck: SMU (1-3, 0-1) @ Tulane (1-2, 0-1), Thursday, September 25, 2008, 7 p.m. CT, Louisiana Superdome (69,703), New Orleans, Louisiana; TV: CBS College Sports; Radio: KTCK 1310 AM.

Prediction: The Green Wave catches SMU at a bad time – for SMU: Tulane 29 SMU 13

Did You Know? SMU’s 14 total points the last two weeks are the fewest points a June Jones-coached college team has ever produced in consecutive games. In nine years at Hawaii, Jones’ fewest was 21 points in losses to UTEP (7) and Tulsa (14) in 2000, his second year there.

Article by Rick Atkinson -
CUSA Fans SMU Correspondent