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Rice Football rally comes up short against North Texas

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Rice Football dropped a heartbreaker in overtime to North Texas, falling at home in what was a very winnable game for the Owls.

Nothing has come easy for Rice football this season so it shouldn’t really be all that surprising when the Owls found themselves locked in a four-quarter struggle against a North Texas team that hadn’t composed all that many impressive performances to this point in the season. Credit the Rice with this: when faced with the tall task of traveling 89 yard to force overtime, they rose to the challenge. Unfortunately, they couldn’t finish the game off the same way, falling at home to North Texas. Here are a few immediate reactions from the game:

Bring out the cart… again

On the Owls’ first drive of the game, Wiley Green took the shotgun snap and dropped back to pass. He was quickly greeted by a swarm of green, which sacked the newly-appointed Rice starter who was injured on the play. That marks the second time Green has left a game with an injury this year and the third game in which Rice has lost a starter during the course of the contest.

Injuries happen in college football. No team is immune. But when it comes to the quarterback position at Rice, the injury luck (or lack thereof) has gotten out of hand. Green was also knocked out of the game against Texas earlier this year. Luke McCaffrey also left that game with an injury. Then Jake Constantine, who took over for both following the Texas game, was hurt midway through the Owls’ game against UTSA.

The Roost Podcast: Stay tuned for the game recap this week 

That’s FOUR quarterbacks injured to the point they had to leave the game over the course of eight games. The vast majority of teams across the country won’t lose one starting quarterback to an injury this season. Some will get unlucky and lose two. Rice has doubled that. And it’s not the first season this team has had to improvise at the most important position on the field.

Getting any sort of offensive rhythm established when you’re forced to swap out the key cog so repetitively can’t be easy. If nothing else, Rice football has had plenty of practice.

The ugliest 12-minute drive of all time?

If Rice were to submit some game film as proof of their upward ascent, it’s hard to imagine more than a snap or two from this game against North Texas would make the highlight reel. Somehow, Rice managed to run 12 consecutive plays inside the redzone and walk away with just three points. The Owls spent seven minutes within striking distance of the endzone after being handed multiple fresh starts via personal fouls called on the North Texas defense.

The offensive line was not having their best day and was flagged for holding twice in that redzone sequence. It seemed to become problematic enough that Rice nearly grounded the ball entirely, looking to take the points and tie the game rather than risk being knocked out of field goal range by sack or penalty.

North Texas responding to the 19-play, 12:07 Rice drive with a nine-play, 1:52 touchdown drive of their own further added to the frustrations of failing to capitalize on so many tries within a stone’s throw of the endzone. That entire sequence underscored a sloppy day for both sides of the ball.

Build the whole plane out of fourth down

There’s probably a more impactful name than the “it” factor, but that elusive clutch skill is something Rice has been looking to nurture for several years now. They caught lightning in a bottle by converting on five consecutive fourth down tries against UAB. Then they kept it going, converting on fourth down twice against North Texas. They’ve now converted six seven eight NINE consecutive fourth down attempts. And two of those came via long pass plays rather than the Owls’ typical jumbo package.

Putting the ball in the endzone without as many heart-stopping moments is the optimal solution, but if you aren’t perfect on that front, being able to get one yard when you need it most is a skill worth having in your toolbelt.

Waiting for the Rice offense to show up in any form or fashion has been a frustration for some time. If it takes fourth down to get things in gear, so beat it. Yes, Rice needs to get to the point where it does take a miraculous streak of do-or-die moments, but it’s better to find messy offensive success than no success at all.

Pinball season bounces on

It’s starting to get exhausting. The sheer erratic nature of the 2021 Rice football team doesn’t make any sense. A week removed from the most significant victory over a C-USA West opponent under head coach Mike Bloomgren’s watch, the Owls lost to a listless North Texas squad that hadn’t beaten an FBS opponent since a two-point win over UTEP to close out the 2020 regular season. The win previous to that? It was over Rice.

If Rice could congeal its good days and bad days, the middle-of-the-road option might very well have a similar record to the 3-5 line the Owls currently hold in the standings. Granted, that more mellow iteration probably doesn’t beat UAB, but probably ought to have beaten North Texas.

On the positive side, if you’re going to have the lows, complimenting them with massive road upsets over conference foes is quite possibly the “best-case scenario” given the circumstances. On the other hand, a team with enough talent to win those big games has enough talent to win the other ones too. They just haven’t been able to string together any sort of consistency.

A bowl game is well within reach. Knowing what this team is capable of makes it seem decidedly foolish to count them out at this juncture. But they need to find a way to smooth out this rocky road or weight the die they keep rolling. The upside they forgo with disappointing games like Saturday is far too great.

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Rice Football: Owls stun UAB in first-ever trip to Protective Stadium

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Rice Football bounced back with a vengeance, knocking off UAB on the road in the Owls’ most complete performance of the season.

Empowered by a productive week of practice and the excitement of a move to the AAC, Rice football came out ready to play against UAB on Saturday. Despite entering the game as heavy underdogs, the Owls traded blows with the Blazers, never once looking overwhelmed or outmatched.

For all the productive plays created by the UAB offense and defense, something in this game was abundantly clear. Rice wanted this one. Not only did they play with intensity, their quality of play matched their level of desire. For the second year in a row, Rice has upset one of Conference USA’s best. And they’ve pulled off both wins away from home. Here are a few immediate reactions from the game:

As fast as fast can be

The X-factor for Rice football in this week’s game preview was extremely straightforward: start fast. From the moment the ball was kicked into the waiting arms of Juma Otoviano, Rice did exactly that.

Special teams started fast. Otoviano burst through the coverage team and took the ball out to the 50-yard line.

The offense started fast. Rice converted two fourth downs, marching the remaining 50 yards down the field to score the opening touchdown and put Rice up 7-0. They’d follow that up with a second touchdown drive on the ensuing possession to take a 13-0 lead.

The defense started fast. Gabe Taylor forced a fumble on UAB’s first offensive play. Antonio Montero recovered, setting the offense up for another scoring drive.

Rice goes Green

It’s been quite a career for Rice quarterback Wiley Green. Given the bench following a rough showing against Arkansas then injured in the loss to Texas, Green surprisingly resurfaced this week when Jake Constantine was unable to play. Dropped down the depth chart multiple times in his Rice career, Green’s shortcomings have always been decision-based rather than ability-based. He can make the plays, and he showcased that ability on Saturday.

Green wasn’t perfect. He was credited with a fumble on a bang-bang play where it appeared he attempted to hold back a throw he had already committed to, leading to the fumble ruling rather than an incomplete pass. Nevertheless, he bounced back and marched Rice up and down the field, again and again.

This quarterback job still belongs to Constantine when he’s ready. But Green’s big day gave proof to the coaching staff’s longstanding belief that the offense didn’t need herculean playmakers to work. It just needed execution. Now, to Green’s credit, he made some big plays like this one:

Green finished the game 17-for-22, throwing for 205 yards and three touchdowns. He completed 77 percent of his passes, the best mark of his career in any game in which he attempted at least seven passes. Green proved this offense can work, and he did it against one of the best defenses in Conference USA.

Defensive absences noticed, but overcome

Rice managed to get by with a largely depleted secondary during the 2020 season, in part because they had remarkable healthy among the front seven. This year, more or less every level of the defense has suffered an important injury. De’Braylon Carroll was lost for the season during the summer. Rice was without him, Kenneth Orji and Trey Schuman against UAB.

Treshawn Chamberlain, who was one of the healthy cogs in that 2020 defense, missed this game. So too did George Nyakwol. Whether it was those specific absent pieces that were the ones Rice couldn’t afford to lose or the entire defense has taken a step back from where it was last season, this unit isn’t nearly as effective as it once was.

The Roost Podcast: Stay tuned for the game recap this week 

Big plays and turnovers are important, but right now Rice needs to improve on things like tackling and gap integrity. It’s not as if those missing men are the only ones capable of wrapping up. Rice has capable players. They just need to start executing. The Owls are allowing their opponents way too many “easy” yards and setting themselves up for failure.

Fortunately for Rice, the tackling improved as the game progressed. That played a huge role in the Owls’ retaking the lead early and controlling the game into the second half. For the most part, they kept the play in front of them. Well-timed blitzes and solid coverage made UAB work for every yard the rest of the way.

Not consistent, but resilient

The perils of last week’s trip to San Antonio seemed lightyears away to the Rice football players and staff on Saturday afternoon at Protective Stadium. In the wake of what was certainly one of the most frustrating and disappointing losses of Mike Bloomgren’s tenure, the Owls once more found a way to write their own history.

After an 0-3 start, Rice bounced back with three consecutive victories. The UTSA loss was crushing, but this is still a team that’s won 6 of their last 10 conference games — 7 out of 11 now. That included the upset of No. 15 Marshall and now a win over C-USA conference favorite UAB, both of which took place outside the confines of Rice Stadium.

The concern after the rough start and shutout losses to Texas and UTSA was legitimate. But the discovery of quarterback Jake Constantine and the proof the team can still win without him when they play together proved even more meaningful. Rice hasn’t ironed out all the kinks, but they’ve proven they can win, and win big games. And after all the low points over the last few years, winning is all that really matters.

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Rice Football: Mike Bloomgren reacts to UTSA loss

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Rice football head coach Mike Bloomgren met with the media following his teams’ discouraging loss to UTSA. Here are his words as he discusses the game.

We’re going to do this a little bit differently this week. Oftentimes, this is the space for a postgame featurette recapping the most recent game and delving into an aspect or two that proved important or consequential in some form. This week, this column will be reserved for the words of Rice football head coach Mike Bloomgren himself in his postgame comments with the media following the Owls’ 45-0 loss to UTSA. No need to dress it up. Here’s the head man himself:

Opening Statement

“Obviously not how we wanted this game to go, not how we planned for this game to go. We got taken to the woodshed. They beat us pretty good tonight. And we got outcoached and got outplayed — out-executed — it’s hard to say outplayed because I think our guys always play hard, but we had too much error in our game and made a lot of mistakes. And we paid dearly for them against a very, very good football team. We’ve got a lot of work to do if we want to continue to talk about ascending as a program. I think our fans deserve better. And we’re going to work our butts off to give it to them.”

On the loss coming directly following a bye week

“I think [the bye week] allowed us to feel really good about the gameplan; that allowed us to feel like we were in a really good place. And coming off two wins, you felt like we were taking positive steps, and tonight certainly was not a positive step. I think the only thing that I would point to tonight is that I thought our guys were really into the game for each other, they were playing for each other, and they were encouraging each other throughout the whole game. I think that’s where magic starts but nothing’s fun when you get beat like that, right?

There’s encouragement. There’s fight to the end. But we have to play better. We are in this to win. Coming out of the bye, thought we’d play a lot better than we did tonight, and we didn’t really execute on defense star standard and obviously offense was really bad.”

On what needs to change regarding the slow starts

“It’s probably confidence as much as anything. We are still fragile. We are still learning how to consistently win. And we’ve got to get to the point where when something bad happens, we set our jaw and when we say like, let’s go to the next play, let’s worry about what we can actually control, which is the next play, not the ones that have already happened. I think that’s something that we got to continue to work on. We are talking about it a good bit. And until we can get our confidence, I think that’s what we got to do. We got to find a way to make our own confidence, to earn our own confidence, and that’s why you practice, that’s why you do things in practice, that’s why you try to make those things really hard. But right now, we’re not able to shift the tide.

Momentum is such a big deal in this world. And I feel like when we get momentum rolling our way, we’re pretty fun. We have a lot of fun on the field and we’re scoring points and stopping people. We got to find a way to make that momentum go our way early in games.”

On what adjustments needs to be made moving forward

“I think that we’re gonna have to let this thing hurt, and we’re gonna have to learn from these corrections that these coaches will make on Monday and we better put a great game plan together for UAB. Because it’s not like they’re not the defendant conference champs…

We’ve got to make sure we have a complete understanding of what we’re doing, give our kids the best chance, and then we have to go execute. So we got to find out what we can execute at a high enough level to beat a team in Conference USA. And that’s what we need to do on offense and defense right now, whatever we’re good enough at. If we need to simplify, we need to simplify. If we need to do more, then we need to do more, we need to get more scheme. But again, it’s really heartbreaking to me for our players because I do think they’re playing really hard, they’re just not always playing well.”

On what needs to improve on offense

“I mean, look at those numbers. Gosh, we threw for 36 yards. We’ve got to make sure that we’re catching the ball when we throw it. We’ve got to throw it to the right place. We’ve got to throw it to the open guy. There’s not going to be a lot of magic here, but we also got to protect better. That’s where it’s always going to start for us. If we can protect the passer, we believe in our guys to take a drop and find the guy that’s open. But as I said we had a couple big drops that are disappointing, but we’ve got a long way to go in the throw game that we’ve got to improve on.”

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Rice Football outclassed by UTSA in blowout loss

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Despite having two weeks to prepare, Rice football was bludgeoned off their bye week by a scoring hot UTSA squad that never let up.

UTSA threw the first punch against Rice football at the Alamodome on Saturday night. Then they threw the second. And the third. In a highly anticipated Lonestar showdown, Rice football was outclassed in every aspect of the game, dropping their first conference road game of the season in a ghastly fashion.

Rice had two weeks to get ready for their return to San Antonio, the site of what was one of their most heartbreaking losses of the 2019 season. Both teams had changed dramatically since then. But UTSA looked like their new-and-improved selves this time around. Rice did not. Here are a few immediate reactions from the game:

It’s how you start

There’s no golden rule that insists your first fifteen minutes of a football game has to be your best fifteen minutes, but that’s certainly been a prerequisite for Rice football so far this season. The opening quarter of the UTSA game made that abundantly clear.

The Rice defense kept UTSA in front of them on their first possession, but two third down conversions and a fumble forced that landed in the hands of a UTSA receiver saw the Owls fall behind 7-0. The offense went three-and-0ut, then the defense sagged before holding UTSA to a field goal.

Rice needed a spark on their second drive and got into a favorable position — third and short — before Jake Constantine was sacked. Another three-and-out. Following a booming punt by Charlie Mendes, the Rice defense then allowed an 81-yard run to stud Roadrunner tailback Sincere McCormick and a touchdown two plays later.

This start proved eerily similar to the Houston game. Two three-and-outs on offense and a defense unable to get off the field on third down, leading to a three-score deficit in the first quarter. Altogether, this was about as disastrous of a starting sequence as Rice has seen in recent memory.

Overwhelmed in the trenches

Part of what led to the awful beginning for the offense was severe protection issues up front. On the Owls second third down, Constantine dropped back to pass and was almost immediately met in the backfield by not one, but two UTSA rushers.

As if that wasn’t problematic enough, it happened again on the very next possession. Facing a fourth down near midfield, Constantine again dropped back to pass and again saw two defenders in his face immediately. He did his best to throw over the free rushers, but the ball was tipped, caught and returned for a pick-six.

Whether it was the running back, the quarterback or the line, someone didn’t make the right lead. Bad protection leads to bad plays, plain and simple. This play looked doomed from the start, and it might have put any hopes of making this game competitive to bed immediately.

Oftentimes, sacks are as much a quarterback stat as a protection stat. It takes both positions operating together to avoid those negative plays. Constantine wasn’t perfect either, but he was set up to fail from the start and the ramifications were disastrous.

Insult and injury

Rice did themselves no favors in any of the three phases on Saturday. But once again, injuries at a key position proceeded to stack the deck further against the Owls. Following an incomplete pass on third down on the second drive of the second quarter, starting quarterback hobbled to the sideline. Luke McCaffrey, who was “1B” on the quarterback depth chart, was suddenly the last man standing at the position for Rice football.

For Rice, the injury luck at this essential position has been unfathomably awful. Rice has started three quarterbacks in six games this year. Three different passers appeared in games in 2020, and Rice churned through signal callers in each of the 2018 and 2019 seasons as well.

The Roost Podcast: Stay tuned for the game recap this week 

Saturday’s performance was incriminating enough on its own aside from Constantine’s injury. But the sheer fact that we have to have this conversation — discussing yet another Rice quarterback knocked out of a game with an injury — is downright maddening.

Sometimes it’s better to be lucky than good. Rice has been the unluckiest program in the country when it comes to quarterback health. And it’s not even close.

From winning streak to gut punch, yet again

A back-and-forth season pivoted back away from the Owls on Saturday night at the Alamodome. Rice has won six of their last 10 conference games, beaten previously undefeated No. 15 Marshall yet never seemed to be in the same zip code of a UTSA team that looked as good as advertised and remains the lone remaining unbeaten team in Conference USA.

A perfect conference record was improbable at best. That’s out the window. Reaching bowl eligibility and perhaps even getting a shot to contend for a conference title? Both of those objectives are in mathematically in play. But this time Rice won’t have the luxury of two weeks to prepare. And they’ll be playing an opponent (UAB) that is at least as good, if not better, than the UTSA squad that blew them out on Saturday.

It would be nice to see this team get another signature win to prove their trajectory remains as high as it felt entering the year. They’ve proven they can. It gets lost in the shuffle, but the Marshall upset came on the heels of a disastrous showing against North Texas (on the road) where the Owls’ starting quarterback was injured and unable to go against the Herd. That’s not to say the situations are synonymous, but there’s something about this team that doesn’t follow a linear pattern whatsoever.

If the two-game winning streak lessened the pressure, it’s back on, with interest. Rice needs to put a completely different team on the field next week. Another no-show performance would cannot take place.

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Rice Football: Owls outlast Southern Miss for first conference win

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Rice football got four interceptions from its defense, weathering a late Southern Miss rally to clinch the Owls’ first conference victory of the season.

For the second time in as many weeks, Rice football threw the first punch. Jake Constantine hit Jake Bailey on a third down slant and he did the rest, torching the Southern Miss defense for the 39-yard score. The Golden Eagles would level the game at seven, but were never able to take the lead as Rice opened conference play 1-0. Here are a few immediate reactions from the game:

Not so special teams

Rice allowed a 95-yard kickoff return for a touchdown and watched Southern Miss recover an onside kick in the same game. Charlie Mendes put one out of bounds in the fourth quarter, netting just 29 yards on a potential field-flipping opportunity. They did convert on a field goal, Christian VanSickle’s first as a Rice Owl, but were largely a liability on the day.

This comes not too far removed from a fumble on a kick return of their own and a series of misses in the kicking game. It’s just been a tough season for this unit, one that Rice has gotten used to being an asset.

Rice was extremely fortunate to have its defense step up in key moments and neutralize several of those mistakes.

Third downs crucial for Owls’ offensive success

Third down has been a boogeyman for Rice football in recent weeks. Coming into the game, Rice had converted just 32.7 percent of their third down tries, the 12th best mark in Conference USA. The defense was equally ineffective, allowing opponents to convert on 42.9 percent of their tries, ninth-best in the conference.

Things started off on the right foot for the Rice offense. They converted on both of their third down attempts on their first possession of the game, setting up a 39-yard touchdown grab by Jake Bailey (on third down).

Then things took a turn. Not only did Rice fail to convert their next three third down opportunities, they went three-and-out on their next three drives. It might have been four, had Cedric Patterson not made a soaring grab on third and long on the following possession.

Constantine guided the offense on a nine-play, 75-yard touchdown drive on the first drive of the second half. At that point, Rice had converted 4-of-4 third downs on their two touchdown drives and 1-of-5 third downs on all other drives to that point. Sometimes it’s that simple. When Rice converts on third down, this offense works, and works well.

Rice football finds its quarterback

The third down efficiency was sporadic, but for the second consecutive game, Jake Constantine looked composed and accurate in the pocket. He bookended the three listless first half drives with a pair of lengthy scoring drives, giving his team the lead going into halftime. The running game did him no favors early, but he was able to do enough through the air to get the offense moving down the field.

Constantine completed 18-of-23 (78.3 percent) of his passes against Texas Southern. He completed 16-of-22 (72.7 percent) against Southern Miss. In the two games he did not play this season, Rice quarterbacks posted a combined completion percentage 48.1 percent. It’s hard to view what amounts to a 30 percentage point increase in efficiency as anything other than a massive improvement.

The Roost Podcast: Stay tuned for the game recap this week 

It’s going to be interesting to see what the split looks like between him and Luke McCaffrey following the Owls’ bye week. McCaffrey saw limited action against Southern Miss, possibly because of the limited redzone opportunities Rice saw. When he was in the game, he proved a spark, rushing for 16 yards on two carries and completing his lone pass attempt. He picked up two first downs.

If the plan is to bring McCaffrey along at his own pace, there was no reason to rush that process after this week’s positive outing from both players.

Rice Stadium took a collective deep breath midway through the third quarter after Constantine was leveled on a scary blow. Targeting was called and Constatine was taking directly to the medical tent. He reentered the game shortly after.

Busted coverage

The Rice defense made colossal strides from downright abysmal in 2018 to the unit that shut out an undefeated Marshall squad on the road last fall. The talent profile increased, and that undoubtedly played a major role in the improvement, but their sound fundamental play was perhaps equally as important.

Last fall, balls didn’t fly over the heads of Rice defenders. The Owls made stops on third down. They tackled well. The defense’s performances weren’t always perfect, but they looked like a unit that knew where they were supposed to be and did what they were asked to do the vast majority of the time.

Then this happens:

The corner bites, but allows the receiver to pass right by, assuming he has help with the safety behind him. He doesn’t. That allows the receiver to waltz into the endzone for a 31-yard score. The quarterback, Jake Lange, was third on the depth chart for Southern Miss when the season began, forced into action by multiple injuries. Making third-string quarterbacks look good is a recipe for disaster.

Fortunately, the Rice defense bounced back down the stretch. Each of their four interceptions and five sacks was crucial when it came to pulling out the win.

Back on track

If the 0-3 start was the worst-case scenario for Rice football, the 2-0 rebound has to be weighted equally as the best-case follow-up. Through five games, Rice is exactly where most would have projected them to be — and perhaps slightly better — given the uncertainty surrounding the matchup with Southern Miss entering the season.

With their backs up against the wall, Rice responded well. It wasn’t perfect, but a winning streak is a winning streak. And its ramifications on this team’s own outlook on themselves and this schedule cannot be overstated.

Rice hasn’t found the answers to all of their most pressing questions just yet, but they’ll have some time to ponder entering the bye week. Sitting at two wins with the bulk of their conference schedule still ahead, the Owls are positioned reasonably well to make a run at their goals.

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Will this team be able to pound the rock?

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