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Rice Football comes up short against FAU

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Rice Football threw the first punch, but was unable to go the distance, dropping their home conference opener to FAU on Saturday, 27-21.

In a game that shared many similarities to previous contests, Rice football waded through sluggish offensive waters, surrendered some key third downs on defense and came up just short of what could have been a big win for the program. Sitting at 3-3 with a road trip to UTSA looming, here are a few immediate reactions from the game:

Offense Strikes First, but Remains Work in Progress

Getting the offense going more quickly was the primary focus of Rice football practice all week long. They’d been slow out of the gate and forced to rally, an ill-advised strategy for a team committed to an option offense. Head coach Scott Abell backed up the talk by opting to receive the opening kickoff, a first this season after the Owls had deferred all four of the previous tosses they’d won.

Abell and the Owls were rewarded by a perfectly executed option play with quarterback Chase Jenkins correctly sticking the ball in the belly of Quinton Jackson, who did the rest, scampering 68 yards up the middle for the game’s first score.

Unfortunately, that one play would not absolve the Owls of their struggles. Jackson would rip off a 20-yard carry on the next possession, giving the Owls 92 yards of offense on their first four plays. The problem was what came next; Rice tallied 96 yards on their next 34 plays, failing to add any more points to their total in the first half.

Things did get better, including another resurgent second half performance. Rice converted 10-of-16 on third down and did not post a single three-and-out for the duration of the game.

“I hate it for our older guys, our seniors,” Abell said, reflecting on the disappointing result amidst an offense in media res. “Our younger guys, we talk about it all the time, we’re building something. A build doesn’t happen overnight, so you recognize that. But for older guys, their future is now. And we recognize that.”

Negative Plays Persist

Those growing pains have been exacerbated by the ease with which opposing defenses have been able to break plays in the trenches. Some of the Owls’ scheme allows for unblocked linemen, so a free rusher isn’t always the chief concern. What is problematic, however, is the frequency with which Rice football is being struck behind the line of scrimmage.

“It should be the opposite. When you run the football you should have few tackles for a loss,” Abell quipped. “It’s a stat we gotta improve on because we can’t play behind the sticks.”

FAU tallied eight tackles for a loss on Saturday night, a number that will only add to the Owls’ league-worst mark in that regard. No offense has allowed more TFLs per game than Rice, an indication that either the blocking or the keep-give decisions being made in the backfield are not operating as optimally as they should.

Much of this is supposed to get better over time. That’s good news for the future of Rice football, but the current 2025 team needs to find answers now. Rice showed a remarkable amount of resiliency to overcome so many of those negative plays, but it’s not a pattern that can continue if the team wants to turn the corner on offense.

To the Skies?

The passing offense has grown by leaps and bounds since the season opener against Louisiana. For most traditional offenses, 137 yards through the air won’t trigger any celebratory response, but for a Rice football offense devoted to the ground game, this represented a season-high in passing yardage.

Quarterback Chase Jenkins completed 71 percent of his passes and looked sharp on throws down the field. Outside of a trick play that resulted in a throw into triple coverage, the rest of the looks were clean.

Frankly, Rice was much more consistent in their passing attack than they were in their running game. And without the commitment to the running game, plays like Drayden Dickmann’s streaking score probably aren’t available to the same degree:

Still, it might be worth exploring the question. How can Rice incorporate a growing passing game as they work to establish an option attack that’s in its fledgling stages of development?

Abell credited a portion of that to looks that are more prevalent in those late game situations, but it’s something he and his staff will have to consider moving forward. An injury-plagued receiving corps won’t help those aspirations.

Make Your Own Breaks

Winning the turnover battle by two is usually a good sign, and while it was proof that not all the things broke the wrong way against the home team, it wasn’t enough good will for a team still learning as they go. This young program is going to need a few breaks. And while there is talent enough to overcome a few negative bounces, once again Rice seemingly came up short on the luck factor.

Where do we start? Jenkins being ruled an inch short of a first down on his second drive? And while it’s often not the officials fault for any particular result, that Florida Atlantic converting a massive third quarter third down on a pick play that left a wide receiver streaking wide open across the middle certainly did the home team no favors. Likewise, the same was true when the Owls’ opening third down conversion in the fourth quarter came back on a holding call.

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On mic, Abell said all the things he must and refused to gripe about some officiating decisions that did his team no favors. He did make this comment though, which rings true of the place this team is right now.

“Sometimes you want to get a break or you need to get a break but you also have to go make your own breaks. Especially when you find yourself where it’s hard,” he said. “Right now, it’s hard. No games are going to be easy. We shouldn’t expect it, and I don’t think our guys do. You hope to get a break or two, but more importantly you’ve got to figure out how to make your own breaks.”

Staring down the barrel of their first sub-.500 record if they drop their game to UTSA next weekend, Rice football desperately needs to find a way to generate that luck.

What’s more, the trajectory of this season feels like it’s hanging in the balance as Rice football faces one of the toughest remaining schedules in the conference after their bye week. A win this week would have given the Owls six tries to win two games and secure a postseason berth in Abell’s first season on campus.

As of now, it’s easy to readjust those pesky expectations and treat a bowl bid as an upside play for a season that began with very muted hopes. Yet it would be disingenuous to discard that zeal generated by a 3-1 start which faded to distant memory on Caden Veltkamp’s quarterback keeper to ice this game.

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Rice Football comes up short against Navy

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A slow start proved too much for Rice Football to overcome as the Owls suffered their first conference of the season, falling to Navy 21-13 on the road.

First place in the American Conference standings was on the line when Rice football visited Navy on Saturday afternoon. The Midshipmen got off to a fast start and seized the momentum early, sinking the Owls’ upset hopes and handing Rice it’s first conference loss of head coach Scott Abell’s tenure. Here are a few immediate reactions from the game:

Dominated up front

By far the most concerning development of the afternoon was the Owls’ inability to get push in either the offensive or defensive trenches. The Rice offensive line, down their starting center and a rotational tackle could not handle the strength of Navy’s Landon Robinson on the interior. He routinely won at the point of attack and created negative plays, starting with a five yard loss on the Owls’ first snap from scrimmage.

The Owls’ base offense accounted for 19 total yards on 15 plays through four drives. The running game had been effectively silenced with the penetration on the interior and the Midshipmen’s ability to get to the edge on the handful of times Rice tried to win there. Chase Jenkins was sacked two times and Navy tallied seven tackles for a loss.

Head coach Scott Abell didn’t shy away from that harsh reality. “I thought Navy won the battle in the trenches,” he said. “Offensively, we let their movement kind of dictate early what we were going to try to do… we overthought that.”

He went on to emphasize Navy’s offensive experience and execution as the biggest differentiator on the other side of the ball. Navy was routinely able to exploit the spacing of the Rice football defense, averaging a staggering 7.9 yards per play in the first half, finishing the game with a still robust 7.5 yards per play.

Ultimately, in a game pitting two option offenses against each other, getting pushed around on both sides of the line of scrimmage put this team in a place that proved too difficult to overcome.

Dealing with the First Negative Game Script

The trench woes contributed to a two-touchdown deficit for the Owls on the road. That their opponent scored first is nothing new — Rice entered the game 3-0 when falling behind after the first score — but the lack of a counter punch from the offense was quite different.

After scoring in nine consecutive quarters, Rice was shut out at halftime. At the break, Navy was outgaining Rice 308-51 and Rice had picked up just three first downs and was 1-of-6 on third down tries. Remarkably, because both sides had only exchanged a handful of possession each, Rice hadn’t really been forced to abandon their primary offensive philosophy to that point.

That’s largely been true of this team through five games. The Houston game was the only one-sided result, but even that contest was competitive in the fourth quarter.

“My [game] script changed, but it changed more because of schematics. I didn’t feel like we had to change our approach and start slinging the football around, but I knew we needed to find some ways to stay on the field offensively and give our defense some breaks,” Abell shared.

“We didn’t really change the approach until midway though the fourth quarter.”

That Rice was able to cling to their core offensive philosophy was a credit to the resiliency of the defense and just enough progression from the offense from start to finish. It’s also a positive sign of things to come for the future.

Passing Problems More Pronounced with Low Volume

A scattershot passing game was responsible, at least in part, for the Rice football offense being stuck in neutral for so long in this game. The Owls had the right approach with how the dialed up their shots, but their ineffectiveness — for multiple reasons — really hamstrung the Owls’ offense, particularly in the first half.

A wide open Braylen Walker dropped what should have been at least a 25 yard gain. That the pass came in a constant rain in Walker’s first game back after an extended absence didn’t help, but the results were the same. A little while after, Jenkins couldn’t connect on a deep throw that landed just beyond the reach of a streaking Aaron Turner.

Again, that any singular passing play failed isn’t the point. But when you only run 22 total plays in the first half and attempt seven passes — even fewer thrown down the field — you end up at the mercy of variance, perhaps more often than you’d like.

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Rice started to move the ball in earnest in the second half, but still saw the passing game thwart their momentum in key moments. Drayden Dickmann had the ball fall just out of reach in the front corner of the endzone. Rice settled for a field goal and kept the deficit at the time at two scores rather than pulling within a touchdown.

Jenkins did hit Dickman in the fourth quarter to set up the Owls’ touchdown on fourth-and-goal, but the effort would prove to be too little, too late.

If Rice hits a few more of those passing plays, the game might very well have gone differently. However, that they fell incomplete made it abundantly clear this offense desperately needed the boost they would have provided.

Wrestling with Elevated Expectations

The frame of reference for how we evaluate Abell’s program has shifted wildly in the span of a few short weeks. Fair or not, this team was projected to be a bottom dweller in the American Conference. That they started 3-1 and won their conference opener on the road made it clear they wouldn’t be keeping company with the worst teams in the league, but where was their ceiling?

A loss to a now 4-0 Houston team provided a glimpse of that upper bound. Saturday’s road tilt against Navy gave further clarity. Through five games, this 3-2 team has shown itself to be flawed, yet resilient.

“We’re still in the fight. As we get back to Houston, we’ve got to turn the page. We’ve got to see the film from right here and turn the page and get ready for FAU at home. One of the things I’m proud about this team is our fight and our grit. You can see it out on the field, every play, regardless of outcome, we fought. That’s something I’m proud of,” quarterback Chase Jenkins said after the game.

“We didn’t get the result we wanted, obviously, but going forward you’re going to see a team full of heart.”

Effort has never been in question with this group, they’ve mastered the want-to. Saturday’s result made it clear there is still work to be done on the how-to, on both sides of the ball.

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Third Down Woes

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Rice Football: First Third of the Season Grades

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Here’s our Rice football report card for every position group through four games, doing our best to provide an honest assessment of the Owls so far.

A Thursday night tilt against Charlotte gives Rice football a chance to catch it’s collective breath on Saturday and rest up before a suddenly pivotal game against Navy this coming weekend. It’s also marks the completion of the first third of the season’s game, providing a natural check-in point on the program as head coach Scott Abell works to rebuild it in his image.

From the starting quarterback to the secondary, here’s our evaluation of where things stand through four games and one standout at each position who deserves some extra recognition.

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Rice Football Races Past Charlotte in Prime Time

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Rice Football improved to 3-1 for the first time since 2001, dispatching the Charlotte 49ers in a prime time win on national television.

With the nation watching, Rice football put their gun-choice option offense on display on Thursday night, grinding out a road win over Charlotte in head coach Scott Abell’s American Conference debut. The Owls improved to 3-1 on the season.

“It’s exciting. It shows the world, it shows everyone that it’s different this year for Rice,” said senior linebacker Andrew Awe. “A lot of times [in the past] when we were down, we were down and out. But this year it’s different. We’re a contender for conference this year. We play hard every snap.”

Awe’s 11 tackles led the team and paced a defense that racked up six sacks and nine tackles for a loss. Turning in another solid performance in which many were, understandably, fixated on the new offense. Here are a few immediate reactions from the game:

Hello, America

Rice football was the standalone game on Thursday night on ESPN, giving anyone slightly curious about the Owls’ new offensive scheme the chance to flip on the game — on their TV, not via a streaming service — and take in the option attack. Rice did not waste the opportunity to showcase it.

After allowing a field goal on defense, the Rice offense took the field and calmly marched 75 yards down the field in nine plays, churning through 4:26 on the clock and ending in the endzone. Rice attempted just two passes, the second of which was a pop pass over the top of the run-hunting defense for a score.

Charlotte entered the game allowing more than 4.5 yards per carry against FBS opponents, so there was expectation that Rice would be able to find success on the ground. On the opening drive, it was Quinton Jackson who ripped through the defense and drove the offense down the field. Quarterback Chase Jenkins would enter the fray a few drives later, cutting back for a massive 34-yard scamper just before halftime.

For those onlookers who wanted to see what this Rice football offense could be, those two drives showcased it at its best. However…

With the Good, Comes the Bad

A run-first offense looks brilliant when it works, but what happened between the Owls’ first half touchdown drives showcased the dangers that come with building an offense that often eschews the passing game. Those two scoring drives accounted for 15 plays and 150 yards, but they were bookends to three consecutive three-and-outs — nine plays, 14 yards.

The difference between 10 yards per play and roughly 1.5 yards per play was palpable.

Abell didn’t seem overtly concerned. He mentioned they’d tried more triple option concepts on those drives that didn’t work before pivoting to different components of the offense. “It’s kind of just football, right?” Abell remarked. “At time they’re going to stop us. They’re going to force us to punt. And that’s okay. We’ve been good on special teams all year. We’ve been good on defense.”

And while it wouldn’t ever be used as an excuse, it’s hard not to connect Charlotte’s consecutive scoring drives to open the second quarter with a Rice defense given very little breathing room by it’s counterpart on the other side of the field. Charlotte ran 40 plays before halftime. Rice ran 24. That’s too many plays to ask a defense to defend without missing a step.

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The negative play is a very real threat to this offense. Rice had a second-half drive torpedoed with a holding penalty that put them in second and long. They settled for a 55-yard field goal, which Enoch Gota pushed just right. That’s not a special teams problem; that’s a flaw inherent to this offense.

Offense Clicks and Finds Redemption

Fortunately those woes would prove to not be fatal on Thursday. Rice opened the second half with a 75-yard touchdown drive to go up by two scores and was much more successful moving the sticks in the second half.

After closing the second quarter with a touchdown drive, they marched down the field to open the third quarter with another 75-yard scoring progression. They outscored Charlotte 14-3 in the middle eight, seizing control of the game.

“We did a good job responding before the first half ended and we came out in the third quarter rolling,” running back Daelen Alexander said. “I think we showed in the third quarter what we can do with the offense, fully.”

Once again, after a slower start, the final stat sheet looks rather impressive for the Rice offense. The Owls had three different players with at least 70 yards rushing and probably could have stretched those totals further if they hadn’t ratcheted things down in the final frame. Quinton Jackson rushed for 80 yards. Alexander and 73 yards and two touchdowns. Jenkins ran for 71 yards and a score. All three averaged north of 6.7 yards per carry.

He Just Wins

Scott Abell was hired because he’d won at places where it was historically hard to win. There was tremendous optimism (and expectation) that he’d be able to bring winning to South Main, but even the most ardent believers probably didn’t see this coming. With the win over Charlotte on Thursday, Rice improved to 3-1 the season. It’s the first 3-1 start for Rice football since 2001.

But that’s not all. Abell became the first coach to open their Rice tenure 3-1 since Bo Hagan did so in 1967. The win was the first win Rice football has ever had in their American Conference opener, falling in their first two tries since moving to the league. In fact, Rice hadn’t won a conference opener on the road since 2017.

The statistics like that are plentiful. They all painted slightly different variations of a reality that’s becoming more believable with each passing weekend. Rice football might just be in a different place than they’ve been in quite some time and Abell is the unquestioned catalyst.

“I’m not surprised, but I am very proud of this team and this group,” Abell said. “I’m proud of where we are. I’m not surprised, and for those who are seeing this for the first time, we’re just at the beginning of this. Stay tuned. There’s more to come. And I look forward to what’s next for us.”

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Rice Football soars past Prairie View A&M

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Rice Football improved to 2-1 on the season with a comfortable win over Prairie View A&M, reaching season highs in scoring and total offense.

Through their first two games, Rice football amassed 479 total yards. On Saturday night against Prairie View A&M, the Owls finished with 461 yards of total offense and 347 yards on the ground. It wasn’t a perfect night, but there was a lot of good to take from the Owls’ second win of the season before conference play arrives next week. Here are a few immediate reactions from the game:

Welcome to the Stat Sheet, Chase Jenkins

Prairie View got on the board first with Panthers’ quarterback Tevin Carter connecting on a couple of big pass plays, including a 12-yard score, that put Rice football in an early hole. The Owls looked to be headed for a second consecutive three-and-out when head coach Scott Abell rolled the dice and opted to chance a fourth-down run on his own side of the field.

Daelen Alexander moved the chains and gave the offense some life. Then Chase Jenkins seized the reins of the Rice offense. Jenkins called his own number on the next play, keeping the ball for 14 yards. He ran for nine on the next play, his next of five total carries on the drive for 36 yards, including a three-yard touchdown to level the score.

“I was really just trying to make plays to move the chains,” Jenkins said. “I wasn’t really worried about the stats.”

The 36 yards rushing already represented a season high on the ground for Jenkins, who became more involved as the game progressed, topping the century mark before halftime. Jenkins would finish the game with 124 yards, marking the first time a Rice quarterback has rushed for 100 yards in a game since Taylor McHargue had 153 against Marshall in 2012.

“To see Chase grow up tonight, the way he operated the offense, that’s kind of how it’s built, to take what they give you. As always, you want to be cleaner, you want to take advantage of everything, but I thought our guys did a really nice job,” Abell said. “I’m not disappointed at all. I think it’s a great game for us to build momentum on going forward.”

On a night when so much of the offense felt difficult, Jenkins’ ability to create with the ball in his hands was the most consistent source of explosiveness and routinely allowed Rice to move the ball.

Sluggish Start

While Jenkins’ emergence in the running game was certainly helpful, the Owls’ performance was largely sluggish for too long. They were forced to attempt two fourth-down conversions in the first half to keep drives alive. They converted both, the second with an explosive 52-yard touchdown run from slot receiver Aaron Turner, but the level of effort required was concerning, especially considering the opponent.

Jenkins had the ball pop out of his hands at the goal line on his touchdown run. The officials ruled it a score before the ball came out. The same happened to punt returner Tyson Thompson shortly afterward, with a loose ball ruled down before disaster. Thompson would fumble for real in the second quarter. Rice, fortunately, fell on the ball to retain possession.

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Prairie View A&M gouged the defense with a handful of long pass plays through the air, one of which came back via penalty. A holding call was crucial in the Owls’ first three-and-out on defense for the game at the beginning of the second quarter. Rice forced back-to-back three-and-outs to begin the game against Houston the week prior.

“Really they weren’t doing anything that we hadn’t seen all week,” safety Peyton Stevenson said. “We just came out a little sloppy, didn’t have our eyes in the right place. We knew they were going to test our rules. We knew they were going to test our eyes.”

Given the talent differential, none of these miscues were backbreakers. American Conference play, which begins next week against Charlotte, will pose a much stiffer test that sheer talent won’t be enough to overcome on its own.

Defense Takes Over Late

That Prairie View A&M had a lead at any point in this game was somewhat concerning, but the way the Rice football defense responded to a slow start was rather encouraging. The Panthers had 87 yards of offense on their first two drives, including a six-play, 63-yard touchdown drive that put them in front.

Rice held the Prairie View A&M to 58 yards combined in the second and third quarters. They kept Prairie View A&M in check before a late touchdown drive against the reserves. All caveats aside, Prairie View A&M only totaled 251 offensive yards for the night.

Down-to-down consistency waxed and waned, but even with the occasional hiccup here and there, the Owls made it extremely hard for the Panthers to get the ball downfield. Had the early touchdown never happened, this might have been discussed as one of the more thorough defensive performances Rice football has put on display in some time, particularly when held up alongside the best offensive showing of the Abell era to this point.

This defense is being graded on a higher standard because of its past success and the growing pains the offense is still working through. That’s the only reason why a 10-point performance (before garbage time) won’t be viewed as a tremendous success. This unit is capable of so much more if they can clean a few things up.

Late Game Cameos

The hope going into this contest was that Rice could get some of its younger players into this game to expose them to live action in this system. That wasn’t looking like a certainty in the early portions of this game, but with a three-touchdown lead and the defense heating up, Abell handed the keys to the offense to Drew Devillier and a host of others players who’d yet to see the field for Rice to this point.

Tyvonn Byars reeled off some big runs. Semaj Pierre took a ball around the edge for 14 yards. Tyson Thompson hauled in a laser from Devillier to extend the Rice lead. Abell mentioned the plan going into the week was to get several players into the game late. Even freshman quarterback Patrick Crayton handled a series, something that might not matter much now, but could play huge dividends down the road.

Altogether, it was a win, and a win in which the staff felt they achieved so many of the goals they felt they needed to coming into Saturday.

“I’m really pleased. We’re 2-1, but the part I’m pleased most about is the ceiling is so much higher. I don’t think we’ve played our best football. I think we’ve shown flashes of playing really good football in every game,” Abell said. “I’m happy where we are. I know the best is ahead for us.”

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So You Want to Throw the Ball

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