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Football earns bowl eligibility following win

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Photo by Courtesy Erik Williams | The Rice Thresher

Junior quarterback Driphus Jackson runs for a nine-yard touchdwon during a 17-7 victory over the University of Texas, San Antonio on Nov. 1. Rice has now won six consecutive games and is bowl eligible for the third consecutive season for the first time in school history.

By Evan Neustater     11/12/14 2:23pm

The Rice University football team (6-3, 4-1 C-USA) defeated the University of Texas, San Antonio 17-7 on Saturday in front of a homecoming crowd of 19,464, giving the Owls their sixth-straight victory and granting them bowl eligibility.

Junior quarterback Driphus Jackson scored the first and only touchdown of the first quarter on the first offensive drive of the game, scoring on a nine-yard touchdown run — Jackson’s first rushing score of the season. The Owls added a field goal from senior James Farrimond early in the second half, giving Rice a 10-0 lead. With just seven seconds left in the first half, UTSA was on the two-yard line with one timeout remaining. The Rice defense stopped UTSA on the goal line as time expired, cementing Rice’s 10-0 lead entering halftime.

The second half continued the low-scoring output of the first half until Jackson found redshirt senior wide receiver Mario Hull in the back of the endzone, bringing the score to 17-0 with a few minutes remaining in the third quarter. Although UTSA scored a touchdown with 9:36 left in the game, Rice held on for the 17-7 victory.



Jackson led the team offensively, completing 18 of 28 passes for 213 yards, a touchdown and one interception. Jackson also recorded 48 yards rushing and one touchdown on the ground. Jackson has now completed 130 of 222 passes on the year, recording 1861 yards passing and 15 touchdowns with four interceptions.

The win marks Rice’s sixth-straight victory this season and its 10th consecutive homecoming victory. With the win, Rice is now bowl eligible for the third consecutive season, a school record. The Owls have now also won the most games in a three-year span in school history, winning 23 since the start of the 2012 campaign. 

Despite becoming bowl eligible with the win, Rice is not necessarily guaranteed a spot in a postseason game just yet. According to Head Coach David Bailiff, it’s important for the team to remain focused on winning out the remainder of the schedule.

“We’ve done a good job of keeping everything in perspective,” Bailiff said. “Just because you’re bowl eligible doesn’t guarantee you a bowl game. There’s only so many bowl tie-ins for bowl-eligible teams, so we need to continue winning to guarantee a bowl game.”

Sophomore running back Jowan Davis rushed for over 100 yards for the third time this season, rushing for 121 yards on 25 carries. Davis now has 748 yards rushing on the season, good for sixth in Conference USA. Senior wide receiver Jordan Taylor caught nine passes for 92 yards in the game, and now has 530 yards receiving on the year despite missing the first four games due to injury.

Rice found itself in penalty trouble during the game as the team racked up eight penalties, costing the Owls 89 yards. According to Bailiff, the team needs to clean up its penalties in order to defeat Marshall University next week.

“We’ve got to keep playing better,” Bailiff said. “We had some uncharacteristic penalties that cost us. That’s one of things going into Marshall: We have to make sure we’re playing our best football as we move forward. It’s great to win six, it’s great to win homecoming, but this week is extremely challenging.”

Junior running back Luke Turner said the offense needs to work on finishing drives.

“Offensively, we left a lot of points out there on the field,” Turner said. “We should have scored a couple times when we made it to the red zone, but we were offset by penalties and had stupid mistakes on our own part that took us out of the red zone. [Farrimond] is a really good kicker, but we want to score touchdowns every time.”

Rice will next face undefeated Marshall (9-0, 5-0 C-USA), who is currently the Associated Press No. 21 ranked team in the nation. Marshall owns sole possession of first place in the Conference USA East Division and will look to earn their 10th victory of the season against the Owls. Marshall’s offense, ranked second in the nation, is led by junior running back Devon Johnson, who has recorded 1,203 yards on 137 attempts, giving him the nation’s fourth-best 8.8 yards per carry average. 

Marshall’s offense is also headed by senior quarterback Rakeem Cato, who has 2,316 yards passing and 22 touchdowns on the year. Marshall has the seventh-ranked rushing offense in the country at 295 yards per game, the second-ranked scoring offense at 47.8 points per game and the sixth-ranked scoring defense, surrendering just 16.6 points per game to opponents.

According to Bailiff, stopping Cato will be a challenge due to the quarterback’s athleticism.

“There’s really no weakness in [Cato’s] game,” Bailiff said. “He’s great when you keep in the pocket. When he breaks contain, though; that’s when he’s at his absolute best. There’s times where it looks like he’s surrounded and still somehow comes out. He just has a command of what he’s doing with that offense.”

Redshirt sophomore linebacker Alex Lyons said stopping Cato will be the focus of the defense due to his ability to extend plays.

“As Coach Bailiff said, there really is no weakness in his game,” Lyons said. “We’re going to execute what the coaches give us and do what we do.”

Despite defeating Marshall 41-24 in last year’s Conference USA title game, the team says it is focusing on the present. According to Bailiff, this season features two completely different teams.

“We’re such a different team than we were a year ago,” Bailiff said. “This will be a different game for us. This is going to be a great Conference USA game.”

Rice’s game against Marshall will kick off at 1:30 p.m. in Huntington, West Virginia and will be broadcasted nationally on Fox Sports Network.



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