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Rice Football: A season in flux hits encounters third postponement

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Rice Football did not play their scheduled game against UTEP on Saturday, another snag in a season full of challenges off the field.

At 1:30 p.m. Mike Bloomgren sat in his office with a Zoom screen pulled up. The virtual press conference wasn’t a new development — he’d done that too many times to count since the 2020 season began — the time of the call was the unfortunate wrinkle.

When Bloomgren woke up on Saturday morning, he was expecting to be playing a football game at that time. UTEP had arrived from El Paso. Rice ate their normal pre-game meal. Preparations were in place for Rice football to play. Then poof. No game.

Around 12:20 p.m., supposedly 20 minutes after its initial start time, positive tests and contact tracing at UTEP forced the cancelation of the game. An hour later Bloomgren was back in front of the mic rather than making halftime adjustments with his team.

“There’s a lot of flux going on,” Bloomgren said. “The uncertainty has been tough for everybody in 2020.” An understatement if there ever was one.

30 of 84 Conference USA games have been postponed this season. The Rice game was the 100th FBS game postponed this year.

More: Conference USA COVID-19 Postponement Tracker

Prior to 2020, Bloomgren can remember just one in-season cancelation in his entire coaching career. That came in 2001 in the wake of 9/11, a game against Southern Miss when he was on staff at Alabama was canceled. Since then, he’s played the game on his schedule. Until this year, when he’s had to have that uncomfortable conversation with his team three times in the last four weeks.

“We had our normal morning,” Bloomgren said, before then running through the play by play of another postponement.

What comes next, not even Bloomgren knows. Right now Rice football is scheduled to fly to West Virginia to play Marshall. Bloomgren mentioned continued dialogue in the conference office about replacing that game with a West opponent.

Rather than fly East, rescheduling a previously postponed contest with UTSA is on the table. Bloomgren also mentioned moving up the Dec. 12 contest with UAB, which hasn’t played a game in more than a month. Further clarification is expected from the league office this weekend.

Amidst the chaos, Bloomgren remains resolute on one thing: “Whoever we get the opportunity to line up for next Saturday, we will be thankful for that opportunity,” he said. At this rate, a football game against anyone would be a welcome development.

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BREAKING: Rice Football vs UTEP game canceled

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Rice football’s upcoming Thanksgiving weekend game against UTEP has been canceled due to COVID-19 complications at UTEP.

For the third time in four weeks, Rice has had their game postponed. Due to COVID-19 complications at UTEP, the Owls and Miners will not play today as previously scheduled.

Rice was able to play both of their scheduled October games without a hiccup. The Owls opened at home against Middle Tennessee on Oct. 24 and went on the road to play Southern Miss on Oct. 31. Since then, they’ve lost the opportunities to play UTSA on Nov. 7, Louisiana Tech on Nov. 14 and now UTEP on Nov. 28. The UTSA game was postponed on Friday. The Louisiana Tech game was postponed on Thursday.

Conference USA added games against Marshall (Dec. 5) and UAB (Dec. 12) prior to the Owls’ first postponement. Given the three missed games against opponents from C-USA West, there’s still a decent chance the Marshall game is canceled in favor of a divisional contest, but nothing can be certain in 2020 at this point. Marshall most recently lost a game against East division foe Charlotte that has yet to be made up.

More: Rice Basketball Season Preview

Western Kentucky remains the only C-USA school to avoid a postponed game because of COVID-19. A full list of C-USA games impacted by postponements since the season kicked off in late August is available on our Conference USA COVID-19 Postponement Tracker.

The next game on the schedule for Rice football is the Marshall game on Dec. 5. Rice hasn’t played at home since Oct. 24, more than a month ago. At this rate, playing any football, anywhere, would be welcomed. With the calendar creeping into December, there’s not much time left to play this season.

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Rice Football vs UTEP: Testing delay continues, update

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There’s a lot in the air when it comes to the status of today’s Rice football game against UTEP. Here’s what we know, and what we don’t.

Rice football released this statement earlier this morning:

The start of today’s football game between Rice and UTEP, originally scheduled for noon at Rice Stadium, has been delayed pending a second round of testing on participants.  Further information will be released when available.

What we do know

As of now, there hasn’t been anyone from Rice football on the field yet today. Typically we would have seen the team busses arrive (they haven’t yet) and players on the field for individual and team warmups. Neither of those has happened either.

There has been no confirmation as to which program is waiting on the further testing results. We do have some movement on the turf, though. A few players and coaches from UTEP have arrived and are going through individual drills on the field amidst the rain. They’ve also popped up their injury tent.

What we don’t know

I don’t know what the likelihood of playing this game is. But, with some of the UTEP contingent present and the Rice side unaccounted for, it raises concerns for the Owls’ testing results.

Would UTEP bring players to the stadium if there were possible COVID-19 questions within their program? That would seemingly put the ball back in the Owls’ court, but again, that’s the best guess we have for the moment.

What’s next?

That could raise an interesting (and potentially unfortunate) decision point for Rice. Playing today against UTEP, even shorthanded, might give Rice their best chance at another C-USA win this season. Whether or not that’s a viable decision remains to be seen. The alternative, though, could be tough.

If Rice does not play today, their remaining schedule is as tough as it could be in Conference USA. They’re still slated to travel to Marshall next weekend and host UAB the weekend after that. They’ll be underdogs in both contests.

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Rice Football 2020 Practice Notes, Presser Quotes and UTEP prep

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Rice football is eager to get back on the field this weekend and face UTEP. Here are the latest practice notes and press conference quotes.

It was tough sledding for Rice football in Denton, falling to 1-2 on the season with the disappointing road loss. The team returns home to Rice Stadium this week to face UTEP, which enters the game 3-4 with a chance to return to .500 by the end of November. The Owls would like to prevent them from getting there a climb back to .500 themselves.

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The team had some thoughts to share on last week. We’ve selected a few quotes from the Owls’ midweek press conference. Then we’ve got a few more updates on what’s in store for the Owls in the coming days and weeks.

Press Conference Quotes

“They played a very, very physical brand of football. They imposed their will on us in all areas. We had a couple of turnovers that were really, really costly and absolutely affected the outcome of the game, and we’ve got to play better. I don’t think it’s that we got to play harder, we’ve got to play better. We’ve got to play more disciplined. And we got to be better with our techniques.” – Mike Bloomgren on the North Texas game

“Obviously we started really fast, just like we wanted to — we were firing on all cylinders. We had multiple turnovers, which obviously that’s never good, we’ll never win like that so that’s obviously the things we need to clean up the most. We got to keep the ball off the turf. And then we got to hit our shots when we take them. And we did a pretty good job at it but we have to keep working, keep finding that connection, keep getting that rhythm and we will get those will go our way.” – WR Jake Bailey on the offensive performance vs North Texas

“We’ve done a pretty good job stopping the run, especially getting off blocks and making plays, just creating negative plays because those are game-changers. I feel like we’re doing a pretty good job, and we can definitely improve on that. I feel like if we continue to practice hard and come to work every day we’ll continue to get better.” – DL De’Braylon Carroll on the defensive performance this season 

Depth Chart Notes

Here’s an updated depth chart from Rice football heading into the UTEP game.

Running back Juma Otoviano was expected to be back this weekend, but his name is absent from the depth chart this week. It wouldn’t surprise me to see him go through pre-game warmups and have his status evaluated again at that point. Ikenna Enechukwu and Trey Schuman have flip-flopped at the defensive end spot, but the OR designation remains. We’ll most likely see both of them.

Looking ahead

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Rice Football Film Room 2020: North Texas Review, UTEP Preview

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What went wrong for Rice football against North Texas and how do the Owls fix it before they play UTEP? Find out in this week’s film room.

Well, that was no fun. Matt and I talked about it on The Roost Podcast this week, but a loss like that is a lot harder to swallow when you have real expectations, as we have for this Rice team this season. Hopefully they can clean the issues up and get a decisive victory over a UTEP team they’re rightfully favored against this weekend.

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I thought for a while about which play to pick for the North Texas game. It seems the offense would be a natural pick, since that was the side that fared worse. But after watching that game, the recipe for improvement for the offense, to me, is just: block better and stop fumbling. So let’s go with a play from the defense, which generally played well, but gave up a couple key plays, including this one.

The Bean Run

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