Major production funding for game notes is provided by.

You have what it takes to begin your journey.

Curiosity.

Ingenuity.

Intellect.

Determination.

Through a vast portfolio of affordable and in-demand academic programs, hundreds of student focused activities, and wraparound services.

Southern University meets you where you are, giving you the tools and support that lead you to a successful career in the sciences or the arts.

Begin with your goals anywhere.

Finish stronger at Southern University at subpar.

Edu Hargrove, Engineers and Constructors, is proud to support LPB.

Since 1995, Hargrove has been employee owned and relationship driven with 2700 teammates around the world.

Hargrove works as one team to go beyond expectations.

With additional support from Lafayette Travel.

The LSU Alumni Association and the Cook Hotel and Conference Center at LSU.

Louisiana Tech University, Natchitoches Regional Medical Center, Northwestern State University, Red Sticks.

Sports the U.S. Army Baton Rouge Recruiting Battalion, the foundation for excellence in Louisiana public Broadcasting, and viewers like you.

Thank you.

For.

And we welcome you to post Game Note as we have officially put week one in the books for college football, along with my Super Bowl champ partner, Scott Shanley.

I'm Victor Holland.

It's great to have you with us here for game Notes on LPB.

It's got a lot of action around the state.

We knew one state team would lose because we had head to head competition overall for our state schools.

A very successful weekend and a lot of activity.

You could you could just kind of feel the excitement.

College football is back nationwide.

Yeah.

Everybody's been waiting all summer to get to this point.

Kick off a college football season really was a week ago.

But for the state of Louisiana, it was.

It was this weekend.

A lot of big games.

Like you said, one in-state matchup.

But there will be more coming up soon that we'll get we'll get to discuss.

But it was a great opening weekend of college football.

Yeah, it was a lot of fun.

And we have a lot to talk about here.

In the next hours.

We'll take you back to those two Thursday night games that kicked off this week for the state schools and then everybody else kicking off their season on Saturday.

We were recapping.

So here's what's coming up on this edition of Postgame Notes.

All right.

And move over Jimmie Johnson.

Johnson has got a little excitement because of what took place down at Yeoman Stadium on Saturday.

Tulane kicking it off at 11 a.m. and Fine Fashion, but recap what the Greenway did there is the in-state matchup, Scott referencing Southeastern Louisiana Tech.

They met in Ruston for the first time since 2021.

We will take you up to Ruston and show the action there.

And we will also talk about the matchup that we had with Southern and Mississippi Valley and in a beat out in the Swac, all of that and much more still to come right here on our postgame notes.

But we will start with the highlight game in the state and one of the highlight games throughout the country, prime time Saturday night over in Clemson, where the Clemson Tigers ranked number four in the country.

We're hosting the LSU Tigers preseason ranked number nine in the country.

You know, it wasn't all that long ago in Baton Rouge, people were complaining about the early schedule for LSU.

They wanted to see tougher competition, quit those pay games and go play the high quality opponents.

Well, since 2013 2019, LSU has not won a season opener.

They've played the quality opponents and haven't crack the win.

Column five straight, including the first three under Brian Kelly.

Trying to turn that around Saturday night in Clemson.

What a matchup this was.

Two teams heavily predicted to be into the playoff scenario and then some.

And here come the Clemson Tigers down the hill 80,000 strong Brian Kelly and his Tigers waiting to take the field Scott this was a defensive game throughout and early on.

Watch PJ woodland look at the speed up the middle as he gets to Klubnik for the sack during LSU Tiger fan, you got to be excited about what you saw both in the secondary, but up front.

The front seven of this LSU Tiger defense is much improved over last year.

Yeah, we're going to talk about the pressure and the changes on the defensive end in just a moment.

Carrying nuts Meyer and a quarterback for LSU.

The quick pass to the outside bar.

Sharp gets it.

But here comes the Clemson defense.

They forced the fumble balls out Ricardo Jones is going the other way 24 yards on the return the defense would hold.

So it sets up a 42 yard field goal by Nolan Houser.

Clemson has the early lead three nothing on LSU.

Then Nuss Meyer with LSU trying to drive inside the 35 yard line, takes a 12 yard sack.

Hurts the Tigers field position, but it does set up this from 52.

Damian Ramos.

And it is easily through the uprights.

And this game is tied at three.

It's ten three Clemson when Kane Durham powers his way into the end zone for LSU.

His first touchdown of the season capped a nine play, 63 yard drive.

We're tied at ten in the fourth.

The Tigers use their size to the advantage.

Six seven traités green.

Just throw it up.

Top to the big man 11 plays 73 yards and LSU takes a 1710 lead.

Clemson has to get to the end zone.

LSU has to make a play.

Remember Brian Kelly last year.

His frustration.

Somebody has to step up.

Well they don't on this one Clemson keeps the drive alive.

Under a minute and a half to go.

They've got to get to the end zone on fourth and four.

Remember one week ago Scott water Brian Kelly say you don't come back for another year if you don't expect to make an impact.

And guess who does it?

Number seven, Harold Perkins with the pressure.

Klubnik has no shot at this.

He's a special player.

And this is the type of impact he's going to have for this LSU defense.

They missed him sorely last year Brian Kelly celebrating with the pressure as LSU gets the win 1710 on the road against Clemson LSU look at time of possession over 37 minutes.

Clemson did not get a lot done at home, the defense holding Clemson to 31 rushing yards total.

We'll talk more about that in just a moment.

Next up for LSU, it is the home opener in Death Valley Baton Rouge next Saturday night when Louisiana Tech comes to town another in-state matchup that will kick off at 630.

But before we look forward, let's look back at comments from head coach Brian Kelly.

Dabo Swinney on the big showdown in Clemson.

Look, this is a hard place to play.

I mean, it's a top five team on the road.

And our guys were down at half and they don't lose when they're up at half.

And our guys persevered.

Great character.

Look, I can talk about a million things, but it's individuals.

And these players refused to do anything else but find a way to win.

And I'm so proud of them.

It was a heavyweight fight.

I mean, listen, that's, that's that's.

I was just simple as that.

Just a heavyweight.

Heavyweight, you know, fight as far as a football game and, you know, just a couple plays and they made a couple more plays, and we did, and we made a couple more critical errors than they did.

And in games like that, that's that's usually the difference.

But you know plenty of opportunities.

And we just we missed our opportunities.

I thought we got away from the run too early.

We didn't we didn't run the ball, effectively at all.

You got to give LSU credit, because they made a couple of those critical plays.

And again, that's the difference in a game like this in the fourth quarter.

So, you know, congratulations to them.

Scott, it seemed like a big theme around the country in week one.

Defense ahead of the offenses there.

We certainly saw I saw it last night between these two teams.

There's no question.

I think in a lot of the big time matchups LSU, Clemson look at Texas, Ohio State, a lot of the the premier matchups in college football.

The defenses were way ahead of the offense.

I think part of that is there's a lot of transfer portal.

It takes time for offensive players to catch up with their timing and their rhythm compared to defensive players.

But I think this LSU defense, you have to be encouraged by what you saw.

Obviously with number seven back on the field, it changes like it tilts the field a little bit for you, but I kind of disagree with that.

What he said was a heavyweight fight.

Yes, but I almost felt that time heavyweight versus middleweight because I think LSU has by far the better players offensively and defensively compared to Clemson.

If this team played five times, I think else you would just get better every single time they played.

All right.

Since you talked about the defense, let's talk about what they did.

And specifically in the second half you heard Dabo Swinney say we had trouble.

He said we got away from the run too soon.

Well, you might have gotten away from the run because you couldn't do it on the run.

I mean, what LSU defense was doing, especially in the second half against Clemson, you have to recognize the talent.

To Scott's point about what they were able to do.

Scott in the second half, Clemson ran for less than 30 yards.

They ran or less than 30 yards in the game less than 12 yards in the second half.

Are you ready for this?

Zero rushing yards in the fourth quarter.

They played 15 minutes.

They didn't have a run.

Yeah that's amazing I think if you're a head coach you're Dabo.

Every coach goes into a game and wants to run the football because it says you're controlling the line of scrimmage.

You're able to move another man against his will.

Well, you weren't able to do that against you when you LSU 32 total yards rushing in a game and winning the time of possession 37 minutes of 23, you're going to win a lot of football games.

This amazing.

This game was as close as it was with those type of stats.

I think the LSU run defense being much improved gives us a team a chance to talk about the SEC Championship and College Football Playoff, especially when you look at what Alabama looked like yesterday and Texas looked like yesterday.

This LSU defense is going to get people problems and look at the number of white jerseys.

This is the play on fourth and four at the end of the game.

I want you to watch the replay.

Look at the real estate that Harold Perkins covers from the left side of the screen to the right.

And then look at how many white jerseys are on the back.

Right here corner.

Here he comes Scott across the middle.

Who's he throwing to.

There's seven white jerseys there on one orange jersey.

Yeah there's no doubt that LSU has the better quarterback in his quarterback matchup.

Clay Klubnik did not look very good.

But thus Meyer also did have guys like Perkins rushing and say that guy's a special player.

You pair him up with wet weeks, much like, you know this week that the talk of the NFL is Micah Parsons going to pair up with Rashawn Garrett in the green Bay Packers?

Those two edge rushers I feel like LSU has that with weeks at linebacker and Harold Perkins.

These guys cover a lot of real estate in a hurry.

Yeah.

When you heard Dabo Swinney saying they got away from the run, you saw the pressure that they were putting on Klubnik.

But then again, when you try to run, there was nowhere to go.

I take you back to the preview show we did one week ago when we heard from Brian Kelly.

What did he say?

I think my defense coordinator's really, really good.

We had to give him more tools in the toolbox.

Right then they went out, got the number one recruiting class in the portal, and a lot of those guys were on the defensive side.

But boy, Clemson had a couple of big splash plays here and there, but they were so few and far between.

It was a grind for them.

For what?

That LSU defense to your point, much different looking defense than what we saw a year.

Yeah I think you saw the talent of LSU.

Like I said comparing heavyweight to middleweight.

That's not taking a shot at Clemson.

I think Clemson is a really good football team.

I don't think they have the type of players that LSU does.

What I think happened in this game was they went LSU, went into a hostile environment, a hard place to play in college football, and you have to give this LSU team a lot of credit.

Going on the road against a good opponent haven't won in number of years, five years, like we said, being down at halftime and not letting that affect you, overcoming adversity early on in the season can really propel you throughout the year.

Before we go to some final stats here, let me ask you something about that point, because I wanted to ask you, what are your thoughts on these matchups?

I love that it's a home and home.

Remember, for years Alabama was always going to Atlanta for a big game.

LSU went to Vegas, went to New Orleans, went to Orlando.

I love the home at home with the big matchups early, Clemson is going to get theirs.

They're coming to Baton Rouge, right.

They'll be back to Baton Rouge next year.

So you'll see that home at home.

Well for the fans and the nil and the ticket price just now these days and trying to get everything you can, I love that you're going to campuses for big matchups.

Texas went to Ohio State.

They'll be okay.

They lost.

LSU went to Clemson.

Clemson will probably be okay in the SEC.

Want to get your thoughts on what do you think about these early season matchups and a true road game?

Yeah, I understand what college football and even the NFL, they want to do some of these neutral site games and show off these new stadiums in Vegas and other places, but there is nothing like going and seeing the opponents places that you would have no other reason to go to, to Clemson to see a football game.

If you're an LSU fan now, I give you every reason to go there.

Just like Clemson, they would much rather play a neutral site game next or go to Atlanta and play LSU.

But deep down they're excited.

They get to come to Baton Rouge and see Death Valley.

Yeah, well, you heard Brian Kelly say he's proud of his team being on the road.

Hostile environment.

Get the win here.

The final numbers to show you just what LSU was able to do in this matchup here with Clemson 354 total yards again for Clemson 31 rushing yards.

Not in a quarter.

Not and a half.

That's for the game.

And they had zero in the fourth quarter.

That's for me.

That's all I need to know Scott when I see that.

And then you go bottom left 37 minutes.

It tells you Clemson had trouble controlling the ball LSU did not.

Yeah.

And then one of the couple of things we didn't talk about LSU's defense three of 13.

Clemson's three of 13 on third down.

You're not going to win many football games.

You can't stay on the field.

You're getting into long down yardage situations.

And we can talk all day long about how good the LSU defense was.

We also have talked about Caden Durham, Caden Durham, that running back for LSU.

I think he's going to be one of the best running backs in the SEC.

He's a special player here with no smear, gives him a chance and that defense to win a lot of games.

We had a state school close out the action last night in Clemson prime time.

But how about the state school that kicked things off at 11 yesterday morning a beautiful day down in New Orleans at Yeoman Stadium where Tulane for the last few years has played Kansas State.

Speaking of home at home, they were at Kansas State.

Kansas State came to New Orleans this year.

They went to the Big Ten.

It was northwestern making the trip down in New Orleans.

Would they be able to handle the pressure, the heat, the humidity?

They're going to try to wear them out.

Well, let's go down to Yeoman, the beautiful campus off of Claiborne Avenue.

And here come the wave.

And it didn't take very long early first quarter two minutes in Preston Stone back to pass.

And he's picked off by James Johnson.

He's going to take it 17 yards.

Dances his way along the right side to give the Green wave good position inside the 41st Tulane possession Jake Retzlaff who does get the start at quarterback.

Great fake hits Justin Reed back of the end zone for the touchdown seven plays 52 yards on the waiver up seven.

Nothing.

Second quarter now 13 three more trouble for Stone under heavy pressure.

Just heaves it up.

And look at Javion White with the interception again it's the pressure Scott.

Just barely just a prayer yeah making the quarterback throw the ball before he wants to get him off his timing.

That's how you get to get get those interceptions defense a great play right there.

How about this two plays later the drop back for Retzlaff.

Did you know he had these kind of wheels I no I do now.

Oh look at him go 69 yards as he steps back and takes it to the house.

And Tulane is in control early in this thing it is 20 to 3.

They would add a field goal in the second half northwestern would get nothing.

And like it 23 to 3 is your final score as Tulane racks up 420 yards of total offense, with 268 of those yards coming on the ground.

Speaking of defense, let's talk about this in a moment.

Five force turnovers, three sacks for the way.

Next game they will be at South Alabama for a 6:00 start.

By the way northwestern two Lions coach head coach John Summerall.

You need to put a little respect on his name.

Our guys really handled situational football well today for game one.

I talked a lot this week Tim, about most game wins aren't won.

They're actually lost by some team.

Maybe kind of giving it away.

And what we didn't do is be ourselves today.

We played clean football.

You know, we wore the green helmets today, for the 20th anniversary of Katrina.

And I'm going to say one thing.

I'm not trying to take a shot, but we were requested to wear white jerseys because that's what that team wore.

It got denied by, the other team.

That's their prerogative.

But when you show disrespect to the city of New Orleans, that's what's going to happen to you.

You're going to get you're going to run into a team like this.

It's they had a chip on their shoulder because I wanted them to wear the same exact uniform of that team for 20 years ago.

Request got denied.

We might have used that for a little bit of motivation to represent the city.

So, don't disrespect New Orleans ever.

Yeah.

Oh, he's got to play for that.

That Patrick, there's a reason transfer portals are ended up in New Orleans.

Play at Tulane.

It's guys the real deal.

I love seeing that passion.

Yesterday people were wondering why the helmet looked different.

And then you heard the full story there.

You have to request for the other team.

LSU does it all the time when when Steve Spurs er sometimes he would say, no, you're not going to wear white.

It is a thing for the visiting team.

Northwestern said no.

And yeah you can imagine Tulane use it for inspiration.

But besides put that aside and we know that work for Tulane.

They just looked so much more dominant than northwestern from the get go.

And they put that pressure on when northwestern never could figure it out.

Yeah.

And it was kind of shocking.

We talked about previously northwestern is one of those teams that if you watch Big Ten football, they give the Ohio State's and the Michigan and Nebraska.

They give them fits because they play good at the line of scrimmage.

They're a well coached team.

They're a smart football team.

And I thought this would be a little bit closer game.

I think what this game says to me and should tell a lot of people nationally, is Tulane is not a Cinderella story.

There's no longer there's the team that beat USC a couple years.

This this is a true competitor, a true opponent that you have to be ready for at the line of scrimmage.

And when you can control the line of scrimmage, like Tulane's doing, playing good defense, running the football that should open a lot of people's eyes at Tulane is in this national discussion for the college football playoffs started with Willie Fritz when he was there with the turn around beating USC in the Cotton Bowl.

He leaves, John Summerall comes in and he's kept it rolling.

And remember in the preview show, we heard from him at the media conference days for the American conference when he said, remember?

Jokingly, I said I loved his approach because he was so funny.

Well, we've got two returners on starters on defense.

We're in much better position.

We've got three.

You know, it was kind of tongue in cheek, but boy, when you saw the pressure five turnovers against northwestern.

Even if they try to get something going they either got pressured they got sacked.

He was throwing it away.

They did have four interceptions one fumble.

But in the end it was the defense that really set that thing up for Tulane.

And you can see I strongly believe that our team takes on the image of their head coach and just hear coach real talk, right.

You can see why this team plays blue collar football.

They play at the line of scrimmage defensively taking the football away.

When you take the football away five times I don't care who you're playing, you're going to have a chance to win a lot of football games.

So if you continue to to disrupt the football like that, take it away, give the ball back to your offense.

And then offensively, I think what Tulane did yesterday and we didn't expect Retzlaff to run that much.

But what they're doing is they're taking what the defense gives them.

If you're going to sit back and cover two and keep defensive backs back, we're going to run the football.

And so I think Tulane is one of the best coached teams in the country, and they have the talent to go with it.

That's dangerous.

You mentioned rest.

Let's take a look.

Because that's one of the things we should focus on.

Remember we told you one week ago was really a four headed monster down in New Orleans trying to figure out who was going to play the starting role at quarterback.

Well, look at his debut.

18.

The 31 for passing.

He had the 69 yard touchdown.

You see the poise here rolling out to the right.

Remember he got to the Tulane campus late stop because of the transfer portal and him leaving his previous school.

Get it to New Orleans.

Here he throws one on a rope down to the left side.

Great yardage for Tulane that would help them get down the field the need to score.

And then there's this one again the drop back survey the field.

And once he gets to about the 40 well he's got he's got defensive backs.

And apparently he's out running down.

This play right here is really impressive I think if you're 20 and you're watching this knowing that your quarterback has wheels like that, who can keep a defense on us.

Now defensively you have to play 11 on 11.

That's that's tough.

And then you go to the other side like we've been talking about three sacks, four interceptions a forced fumble for Tulane's defense on the day.

And you can see look jumping the passing route.

The interception we saw earlier the pressure on the quarterback.

It's almost like he had his eyes closed and just tried to throw it up there for a prayer.

This one look, he's throwing it in the line because of the pressure.

Loose ball.

They knock it out Tulane gets it.

It was just a sea of green if you're willing.

Wait if you will.

Yes.

He won't love it.

But look at Stewart again.

I mean look at the one on one coverage.

Just everybody being challenged and nobody flinched.

Whatever challenge they faced in the passing game or up front, they never flinched all day long.

Yeah.

You're playing a Big Ten opponent, like I said.

And I think when you watch this, Tulane has the better talent.

You can see the front seven.

They're they're swarming the quarterback.

But in the back end these plays made by the defensive backs individual plays on the football affecting the football taking it away in the air.

That's impressive.

Here are the final numbers as Tulane impressively on the offense, puts up 420 yards of offense, just 237 for northwestern and again 76 yards of rushing.

You would think you'd want to lean on that Russia game.

Tulane absolutely took it away.

It's one thing, Scott, when you say two turnovers, three turnovers, like you mentioned, when you have five turnovers, you're pretty much done no matter what happens.

I mean, you need a miracle and then some to pull that out.

As soon as I see that, I think it's Sean Payton.

Talk to us all the time with the Saints.

He would show this stat up all the time.

When you win the turnover take away battle, if you're plus two you're going to win 80% of your games.

You're plus are you going with 85%.

You get plus five.

You're probably 99.9.

You need a lot to go wrong in a football game, plus five turnovers and lose a game.

So that's outstanding job.

And Tulane did it the right way with a very impressive win over northwestern at home to start the season off with a win.

Well from New Orleans will make our way over to the newly named Navarre Stadium on the campus of McNeese over in Lake Charles.

Matt Theater back at the helm for the Cowboys, a second stint at McNeese is head coach tied for all time wins at the school.

As we pick up the action first quarter Louisiana Christian has already scored the first points of the game with a field goal, but that's what Bryce Strong takes it in.

Seven yards out.

McNeese is up by the score of 7 to 3 in the second quarter.

Louisiana Christian again finding the end zone seven yards.

Beautiful fake Bryce Perkins the quarterback keeps it.

There they go for two.

They miss it 17 nine McNeese later in the second look at the misdirection by the Cowboys.

Travon de citizen 21 yards.

It gets it into the end zone 20 for nine.

The Cowboys are on top.

Just under five minutes to go in the second.

And still in the second Jake Strong pass it to the left side to Jonathan Harris 15 yards 31 nine at this point for McNeese.

As you would expect, once they got things going, the Cowboys were able to get the job done 64 to 9.

The Cowboys get the win.

What a start for Jake Strong 22 of 28 for 329 passing yards and three touchdowns.

The Cowboys rushed for over 300 yards.

Congratulations to Matt Viator.

With that win becomes the all time winningest coach for the Cowboys.

Next week, they will travel an hour west or east, rather down I-10 to Lafayette to face the raging Cajuns of Louisiana.

After this game, they'll hear from the head coach and the win number one on the season.

He's got a really good understanding of the offense.

They get coachable.

They have a great relationship, and I'll watch him in practice and watch how they speak with each other.

And, and I've really been pleased with that whole thing.

And it's, it's a tough thing, for, for me personally, because quarterbacks are my baby.

I mean, that's what I've done.

And, you know, for the last not the last three, but three years there and two of the years for sure.

I mean, that's all I did.

Are you all it's me all day, every day.

And I you know, I like the position.

But, you know, I think it's better in my opinion, when quarterbacks have their own position coach and it's not the head coach.

Here's a look at the numbers.

And just how impressive was a lot of records.

That total yards over 600 rushing yards over 300.

All setting records for Magnuson.

Very balanced Scott coming out of the gates 305 rushing 359 passing.

So they found it through the air.

Great start by Jake Strong, but also what they were able to do on the ground.

Yeah great great quarterback play.

But I think when you look at those stats you look at the balance offensively when you can go over 300 yards and both running and passing the football, you're gotta win a lot of football games.

But I think what it does that's complementary football because that helps your defense.

It gives the defense a break.

You're not just hearing it out every play.

So good complement good complementary game plan by the McNeese Cowboys.

So the numbers on the screen will say one thing.

The numbers on the final score also say something about this.

But then again, when you look at the matchup and this is by no means disrespect to Louisiana Christian, just a much bigger school for in this deeper, bigger.

They were supposed to get that win and they got the win.

But I think if you look at the other side of it on the focus for McNeese, remember Matt Victor's back took them to the playoffs in 2015.

You heard him say he's been spending time.

He's down the road.

He's been at Louisiana.

That's we're going to go play next week.

He's been consulting.

He was there when Napier was there before Napier went to Florida.

And then Desormeaux came in.

Then he decided to take a year off.

So to get back there, start a new system one week ago or even on our show yesterday on Game Knows.

What did you say?

Don't ask about quarterback.

No idea.

When asked about running back.

No idea.

Well Jake Strong comes out, has a tremendous game and they scored a ton of touchdowns on the ground as well for the Cowboys though, isn't it more about let's see how we're doing with this new coach.

There's an old coach but a new system as we get ready to move forward.

Yeah, certainly.

Because he's back.

He understands the identity that he wants his team to have.

Any time you go into a game, especially game one, a lot of people say these coaches know who they're playing.

They I really don't think they do.

You never know how guys are going to respond until they turn the lights on and they kick the football off.

Some guys can practice better, some guys can play better in games.

But as you saw rolling, a lot of teams throughout the country thought they going to play multiple quarterbacks and then they kind of settled in on one as the game went along.

Same thing with the running back position.

Means they have a lot of a stable running backs, and it's good to have a stable of running backs because especially if you want to be that control the line of scrimmage, run the football down your throat type of team, which coach feature does I think you need those those stable running back Jake Strong, as we told you, throws for 320 miles.

But let's take a look at the running backs and focus on it because he does have a stable.

Remember what Scott told you not only in our previous show but even Saturday morning on game those.

Hey, what do you see that cowboy on the helmet?

You think of hard nosed, grinding out toughness, 305 yards, four different running backs had a rushing touchdown in this game.

So everybody had their chance to prove something.

And Scott to their credit they did.

They had a chance to show coach hey you might want to put me in at another time because I'm ready to go here.

Has a lot of depth at that position for them.

You can never have too much depth at certain positions on the football team.

Running back is certainly one of them, and these guys should be thankful.

They're lucky they play for a coach who understands how to put them in pieces position to succeed based on their talents and abilities.

I think that's what's fun about coaching football is you get to find out what a guy's individual abilities are, and try to try to put those guys in a position to make plays and mechanics.

They're going to do that.

When you have that many good running backs, you got to find a way to get them on the field.

Yeah, it'll be an interesting matchup next week when they go down the road to Louisiana.

Considering Vitter had been there for a few years.

They know his coaching style, but he knows a little about them too.

It'll be a neat matchup to see the Cowboys in the cages.

We'll talk about the Cajuns in a little while, but first, let's take you up to Ruston for what happened on Saturday night.

Open Louisiana Tech on the campus.

You know, they're on the nine week system.

We didn't know what the crowd would be like there because the students, well, they're getting ready to start school.

But you can see behind the shot there on the bench, they were ready to go as Frank Sarfo brought his lines up the roster for the first time since 2021.

That game saw over 1000 yards of total offense.

This game did not.

The Lions, under pressure making Mason got sacked on Kyle Lowe.

It's a loss of seven.

But then for Louisiana Tech, Joshua Randall got the pressure on the sack.

Take another look at this one how fast he gets through the line Scott he just got left wide open.

Yeah I think that was a busted busted play right there a free shot on the quarterback.

And Sonny come be taking notes.

Let's not run that play again later for tech Trey Cook it's under pressure.

Kind of heaves one up here.

But he gets bailed out Eli Finley with the grab and almost after making a move almost takes it into the end zone.

However the Lions defense would hold tight and so it leads to a field goal.

We played a house football and it's just three nothing Louisiana Tech.

Let's go to the third quarter a Murray Wiggins kicks the reception here a little slingshot out to the right side.

One little move there but that was enough.

Frees him up to get to the end zone.

It's 22 yards on the touchdown ten.

Nothing Louisiana Tech play Devon.

And then on the left side walks this one.

It is Louisiana Tech.

It's great field position on a seven play 50 yard drive.

And now the Bulldogs are starting to pull away.

Well hey the Lions are battling inside the 20 when Jayden Henry takes a shot.

Ball is loose and Cam Franklin sees nothing but running room.

80 yards later, he's escorted into the end zone by his teammates.

Rushing hit set off to a celebration.

A good effort by the Lions.

A little too much.

Bulldogs in the second half as tech wins it 24 to nothing.

Louisiana Tech won the second half 21.

Nothing.

As I mentioned, just three points between these two teams after they had 1000 yards four years ago when they met in Ruston.

Next up for the Lions, they stay on the road.

They'll go to Murray State next weekend.

That's a 4:00 kick.

And as we mentioned earlier, the next game for Louisiana Tech, they'll make the four hour drive down from Ruston, the Baton Rouge.

They will be the opponent for LSU's home opener in Tiger Stadium.

And that will be a 630 kick.

Postgame reactions from Ruston after the Bulldogs get the win.

I think we're really close on a lot of plays.

I think there's just some, stuff where we kind of shot ourselves in the foot and luckily we, we got a defense and guys like Jamal on the defensive side, it.

I mean, it's hard to lose games when you shut the opponent out.

So we played really complementary football today.

I'm super proud of the way the defense played.

They really built us out in that first half and allowed us to kind of pick up momentum in that second half, and then we were able to put them away just, I mean, we wore them down in the second half.

So it's all thanks to the defense man.

They played their heart out.

Coach Celso and I were speaking before the game.

And you know first games are now even more than ever man.

There's just so much unknown.

And and you you know you think you know what guys are going to do but you don't know some of them.

You played with some of them you haven't played in a game before.

There's a lot of moving parts from a coaching staff standpoint.

And so you don't know what you've got sometimes and you feel pretty good about it.

But until you get out under the lights and start playing and seeing live bullets, I think that's when you can really start seeing growth and maturation from us, one game to the next.

And we'll see that during the course of this week, which we've got to clean up.

Here are the final numbers from that ball game pretty even in terms of total yards from what you saw between the Lions and the Bulldogs.

And in fact, it's the Lions that had more yardage there with 273 yards and 50% of the third down conversion.

But did you want to rewind this program?

About four minutes.

Remember what Scott just said about that percentage of turnovers and a percentage of winning.

But what he learned under Sean Payton, three turnovers for the Lions, none for the Bulldogs.

Boom.

You're making the other team make mistakes and you're just playing football.

You can play the best football.

You want to play better football, but you just take care of the football and don't give cheap points to your opponent.

You'll find a way to win a lot of football games.

That was ten yards for per reception in southeastern.

They just had the ball five minutes left because they gave it up too many times.

And you heard Sonny Cumbie talking about that.

Scott, do you feel like this is the trend and take out the Clemson's and the and the Texas and the LSU is because there's quarterbacks experience.

But the Sonny comes point for a lot of these schools.

Game one maybe game two.

Is this the new normal you're coming in saying I got three quarterbacks don't know who I'm playing.

So I got four running backs.

I don't know who.

I don't know who's going because you don't even know who they are.

No, I think a lot of times people look at coach and say, well, you're just trying to hide who the starter is.

I truly believe you.

Go, like I said, some guys are just practice guys.

Some guys are gamers.

You don't know until the lights turn on.

And I think with this, the way college football is now with the with the portal, some of these guys are showing up to campus late.

There's not enough time to get timing and rhythm.

You're going to see some of these quarterbacks.

And yesterday just on the national spotlight, people talk about Klubnik and thus Meyer and and and already making fun of the 2026 draft class.

It's game one guys.

It's this.

It takes time.

It takes chemistry to develop.

And these guys will be much better players in weeks two and three.

And in this day and age of of transfer portals and nil and everything else, much like say for Tulane, a four had a quarterback monster.

You had a guy on the roster that had some experience, but then you got a guy in from another major college with a lot more experience.

He winds up getting the start and he was a shining star down there.

So you might have experience, but you know, it might not fit in this system or you might have a little less experience with my system might be a perfect fit for you.

We just don't know.

You don't know and you don't know until you see that guy, like I said, under lights and playing and what he can do well in games, what he gives defenses fits with.

And you may be on campus for two or 3 or 4 months, but you haven't been put in those situations.

Now you're getting put in those actual situations, and now the coach can truly judge what your talents and abilities are.

And I should remind you that the Lions will also make a trip to Baton Rouge.

That will be in a couple of weeks.

They'll be down there towards the end of September to face LSU in Tiger Stadium as well.

Louisiana Tech will be down in Baton Rouge next week.

This weekend of football kicked off on Thursday night in Louisiana, we had two ball games.

The first team to kick off was actually slated to be the second team, but because of bad weather, well, you know, Monroe wound up kicking off a little later, two hours later than they were supposed to because of lightning delays up in Monroe.

Year two for Brian Vinson as head coach for the Warhawks opening drive of the game.

Second and 22 from their own 25.

Here comes Braylen McReynolds.

We heard from him on our previous show.

The transfer from South Alabama wanted to make an impact, and he did on this one misdirection and takes it almost to the end zone.

Look how close 74 yards we go 74.5.

He's in.

But it comes just short of the end zone.

After all of that work he takes a breather.

Hunter Herring comes in.

He goes over the top six plays 6181 yards.

Excuse me seven nothing.

Warhawks second quarter same score eight North meant to end at quarterback by some time.

Finds Tyler Griffin.

Great throw.

Griffin between three defenders and he's going accept.

Oh there's that yellow icon.

The flag holding brings it back.

Take the points off of the board.

But later in the second are meant to find Jake Godfrey.

Beautiful pass right sideline 24 yards for the first down.

And the Warhawks are moving three plays later on fourth and two.

Let's go for our mental rolls.

Right.

Rico Powers 18 yards and it leads to a field goal.

The Warhawks lead ten.

Nothing at the break.

Opening drive of the second half on second and 13.

Armenta the misdirection.

He throws back to McReynolds.

He makes his way into the end zone.

Ten plays 75 yards in just over five minutes.

And the Warhawks would add to it.

And they get the win over Saint Francis.

Saint Francis about to move down now a neat little fact here.

They made their first plane ride for an A road game in ten years.

Good for them for coming down putting up a fight.

But it's the Warhawks that get the win.

Bradley McReynolds.

What a debut in a Warhawk uniform, 133 a 33 scrimmage yards and a touchdown.

You see, of Saint Francis only 81 rushing yards while Ulm dominated with 311 stepping up a notch a little bit you all M is going to title Town in Tuscaloosa next weekend to take on Alabama, who will be dropping from number eight after that loss to Florida State.

Coach, we are pleased after the season opening win.

I just don't think we executed well offensively at all early.

You know, we've had lightning delays here.

We had for the first three days of camp.

So we can sit here and we're not going to make excuses.

And that's what I told them in the locker room.

There are no excuses.

The days of excuses are gone.

And we've just got to put our head down and we've got to go to work.

You know, we've got to go to work and we've got to get better.

We get two extra points blocked.

That's embarrassing.

It's embarrassed and it should not happen.

And we've got to get better at that.

So we'll work hard to clean up a lot of our things.

I think this team has a chance to be a really good football team, and that's why we're so hard on ourselves.

Because, you know, we don't accept anything but but the best and, that's our expectation.

And we're going to continue to go down that path.

Love how his eyes got big at the end.

He was trying to smile, say we're going to be okay.

But he wanted to get the point across.

Guy.

Just the things we need to clean up.

Yeah, we may have won.

We may have shut out our first opponent, but there are a lot of things they'll get us beat.

Don't you forget about the things we need to correct this week in practice.

And you see, statistically, as you would expect, the Warhawks dominated in that ballgame.

They started five and one last year.

This year, one and zero.

They'll have take on Alabama next week on the road in Tuscaloosa.

The other game played Thursday night was just a little bit south of Monroe.

So the Natchitoches where Northwestern State and the demons riding a losing streak since mid 2022, taking on the Braves from Alcorn State.

Abraham Johnson had time more early in this ballgame to make it six.

Nothing for the demons.

Later in the first on fourth and four.

Alcorn around midfield lining up for the punt.

We and the ball's way over his head and going the wrong direction for all corn.

Guess who's there.

Ty Moore he just scored a touchdown.

Now he picks up on the scoop and score and ties it again.

It's 13 nothing.

Northwestern state they would then have a lightning delay mid game by about an hour.

Because of that weather from Monroe came down to Natchitoches.

But when they were back playing like a Christian Williams on the concentration on this interception.

Watch again.

It goes off the defender.

All his teammates belly pops up right into his hands.

Great interception by Christian Williams to keep Alcorn out of the end zone.

Later in the third quarter Orlando's MacLaren well he jumps around us too.

One mistake that northwestern had the one big mistake because he has clear sailing 72 yards for the interception.

And the score.

And the Braves are now down just by 613 to 7.

It's now 1310.

It's getting a little interesting but you want to talk about determination Scott.

Watch Kobe Burrell into the line of scrimmage on third and five.

And he's got nothing.

Or or he's got 32 yards of determination.

You love to see that from a program that's trying to find some confidence.

That's where the running back coach says, now you see why we do all those drills every day in practice, keep the legs moving and good things happen.

Fullback Ryan Tyler punches it into the end zone early in the fourth quarter to give Northwestern State a cushion.

Scott, your favorite formation there it is victory formation victory formation.

They haven't done it in a while.

And the students were ready to celebrate.

Those who didn't go home because of the lightning and rain had reason to celebrate.

Coaches jumping 80s are hugging and crying, and rightfully so.

Northwestern state gets the win and snaps that losing skid 20 to 10.

Abraham Johnston, the quarterback, 85 yards passing, 69 rushing yards.

Seven different demon receivers had at least one catch.

Very well balanced for them as they now go on the road at Minnesota.

But the focus is all about deter I said the people the last week or so, I don't think I've ever seen a team and a campus and a city as in need of a win.

As this football team, this university in Natchitoches did.

They just allows everybody to kind of take a sigh of relief and, lets people know that this football program that the city in this campus love so much, is still alive and well, and we're going to be A-okay.

And a new is coming.

Yeah.

It's awesome knowing that so many people are behind us for how long this program has been down, this many people still support us and still have our backs and will still come out and support us.

Was unbelievable.

And I think it's only going to grow now that we got that, that, when the streak off our back all offseason like this is all you can think about.

But I think this is going to open us up to play so much freely and, and better.

Like we're going to just play better now that we don't have that like winless streak weighing on our back 1022 days now it's zero.

So I told the guys in the locker room after the game that when we woke up this morning, we had the longest losing streak in the country.

Saturday night when all the games are over with, we'll have a longer winning streak than half the teams in the country.

That's pretty cool to think about, so let's see if we can hold on to it.

Well, they should be excited to have that winning streak here on this Sunday after all of the action 270 total yards C a couple of turnovers.

Both teams having their share of turnovers.

But in the end Scott it's more about the numbers that you see on the screen.

For me 1022 days, you and I and everybody watching, we've done a lot of things and 1022 days.

You know what they've never done win once after all of the practices, all the workouts, fall camp the entire season, spring drills then once.

So to see them put it together and get the win, you can see why he was so emotional and what it means to that community there.

Certainly, I think it's a testament to the kids who have been there through all this.

I think it's a testament to the coaches who have been there, and I think it's a testament to the coaches and the players who have come since then that knowing what their what they've gone through.

So, you know, when you see those players, you see the running back driving his legs, running down the sideline, you saw the interception in the end zone.

And those things don't happen unless you believe you don't play like that and hustle and finish every play.

Unless you believe.

So when you see when you see that type of effort, you want good things that happen.

I remember what coach said.

He's proud of the kids.

They didn't bring in kids who were running from something.

They were running to something.

And that was northwestern because they believed they could help turn it around.

82% of his rosters Louisiana kids, great job on the win.

Congratulations to the demons.

See if they can keep it going.

Like coach said, let's focus on a game now that took place in Lafayette, the brand new $65 million Our Lady of Lourdes Stadium on the campus of the Ragin Cajuns there at Louisiana.

Beautiful new stadium, totally renovated press box.

They play in front of a stadium.

Last year because of the renovations, ready to debut it against rice.

It's three nothing Cajuns in the second quarter.

Quinton Jackson scores from one yard out.

Look at the hole on the left side.

Yeah that's concerning.

You don't want to be able to drive through a car through the through the line on the on the one yard line.

Walker Howard making his debut remember full circle Saint Thomas More to LSU to Ole Miss.

Back to Lafayette.

And he's playing for the Cajuns.

He'd like this one back.

He tried to heave one up and take a chance but it came up well short.

Jack Cain got the interception here.

And then some rice misdirection Scott this is what we're talking about with their offense and the triple option.

There's people running all over the place.

You got two to the right to the left.

Somebody coming on the end.

And you know what it leads to is a touchdown.

These type of offenses are all over in college football because they put they put defenders disciplined and their eyes to the test.

Every single play you have to be disciplined.

You have to if that's your guy you have to go with him.

Let your teammate do his job.

You do yours.

That was one of the things they were talking about with rice, his new head coach, and his history of running so many multiple formations.

The cages get on the board right before the half with a 51 yard field goal from Tony Sterner, and it's 14 six now.

And near the end of the third quarter, watch what Walker Hauer can do with his legs.

One turn and he's in 25 yards on the touchdown.

It's 1412 and the Cajun Light Show is on.

And they're going to go for two.

But Howard rolling to the right.

Quick pass overthrown.

And he can't converts but stays 1412.

And unfortunate for the Cajuns it would stay 1412.

They couldn't get any closer.

Howard in his debut ten of 22 for 88 yards.

And the pick did have nine rushes and a touchdown.

The time of possession of Scott.

And it has to speak to the ground game and Rice's scheme.

36 minutes for the owls.

Yeah, we saw that motion and an eye candy we call it.

But they are running football team and they try to keep keep their offense on the field.

Stay ahead.

The chains get into third and manageable.

And that's where you have to get negative plays.

You have to get those offenses off rhythm.

You have to get them into third and long.

And they just they just didn't do that enough yesterday.

Here's what head coach Michael Decimal had to say after the Cajuns opening loss to rice.

It was kind of the nightmare offensive that you were hoping to avoid a little bit, turn it over.

You know, self-inflicted penalties, you know, second half couldn't get good field position to start, started, backed up.

You know, really felt like we kind of killed ourselves on a lot of these drives.

And, you know, it was just one of those deals.

Everything was just a little off.

You know, everything was a little out of reach, you know, a little off the mark, a little too far.

I knew our team was going to be tested at some point.

I knew at some point we were going to have to find out what kind of team we have, and the resolve that we've got the grit on this team.

But, you know, I didn't think it's going to be week one, but here we are.

So.

No.

Told the team today.

Like this.

This is going to define our season one way or the other.

We're either going to come together.

We're going to, you know look at this type of approach it head on, and find a way to get better, or we're going to let it break us a little bit.

Look, it's not just speak.

You hear what you just said there?

Everything was just a little bit off.

It goes back to reiterate that we're not just repeating because it's easy to say it's true.

Everything's a little bit off.

Brand new quarterback, a brand new wide receiver.

Used to be at LSU.

New players in there trying things out, but they're trying it under fire.

Right.

You're under the lights now.

Everybody's watching to try to see how the pieces fit together.

I think it's just the dynamic college football and we don't want to bang the drum too much.

But when you have a lot of transfer portals and that's the way college football is, these are how teams are building their teams.

It takes a while.

It takes a while to learn what a coach wants and technique, what he wants, how he wants me to to make this play, whether it's in the run game, how you're going to, blitz off the edge.

So you have to learn what the coaches want.

I do technique wise, so these players are going to get better.

A lot of a lot of people are overreacting.

After one week, everybody's going to get better with time.

Time on task and through actual game repetitions.

The brightest spotlight in Lafayette on Saturday night was certainly on number four.

The quarterback.

And that's Walker Howard.

As we mentioned, he was a standout Cougar at Saint Thomas More.

Just about what, ten minutes from campus there in Louisiana.

Then he came to LSU.

Could sit because there are some big names and Heisman Trophy winners.

Tried to go over to Ole Miss.

Then he decided to come back home.

A lot of pressure there.

Nice early pass there.

Do you see him?

He hit Sampson on the left hand side.

But then he had those he'd like to get back.

Scott this is one of them.

Little bit of pressure trying to stay alive.

Just heaves this one up.

Comes up about two yards short with the interception.

So we saw some mistakes.

We saw some nice passes and we saw what he could do with his legs.

He's got that 25 yard run for the touchdown which actually brought them within two points of this ballgame.

But initially your thoughts on what you saw from Walker Howard?

Yeah, it was a little bit of a mixed bag I think for Walker.

He's in a tough situation.

It's always tough.

You go home.

There's a lot of hype.

Any time you're going from playing to LSU and Ole Miss and people have huge expectations for you.

So he's a great player.

He's been a really good player, highly recruited player.

Him and Shelton Sampson will get that dynamic duo going at some point.

They were both together at LSU.

Shelton had four catches for 59 yards.

So I think at some point they will get that timing and rhythm down.

But but I think again, just like we talked about Retzlaff with Tulane, the legs were part of his game that people didn't know that he had yesterday.

Absolutely.

You see the total yards and look at the rushing yards for rice 206 of the 251 total yards.

Again it goes to that scheme that rice likes to use.

And when it came time to the red zone well he just never got in there.

Rice was two for three.

And then we talked about it earlier the time of possession 36 minutes for rice as they dominated possession.

They don't dominate the game but they got the win by two.

And now Louisiana will look to get its first win of the season next weekend.

Well they'll stay at home and welcome Mat Theater and the Cowboys for McNeese.

We turn our attention now to the Swac and the Southern Jaguars, who lost in week one.

They played week zero and they lost in the Swac mIAC challenge to North Carolina Central.

Very disappointing second half where the Jaguars lost a lot of momentum and one of losing by 17 points this week.

They stayed on the road for their second game.

It's a Swac game that doesn't count as a conference game because of their alignment, but they were in a beat in Mississippi to take on the Devils from Mississippi Valley.

However, when we start the game, it was a scary moment for their starting quarterback for the Jaguars as this game was delayed near 15 minutes because of the play coming up right here, where Jalen Woods is going to take the snap, tucks it and keeps it goes left side.

But as he's going into his slide he takes a vicious shot to the head.

Terrance graves was furious.

No flag is thrown no ejection but the quarterback taken away in an ambulance.

He gave thumbs up as he was being taken off the field.

And we have a very good update for him in just a moment.

But as the game went on, Cameron McCoy came back in at quarterback.

He had the experience from one week ago, third and eight from the ten.

He keeps it and scores eight plays 57 yards and southern is up 10 to 3 under three to play in the first half Joshua Brown hits Caleb Brown low and he does the rest.

Look at him dancing side to side up the middle 53 yards for the touchdown.

And the Delta Devils are up 13 to 10.

But there's still time to play.

And under a minute to go McCoy hits Darren Morse.

Look at the touch on this pass right over the shoulder.

Couldn't place it any better.

Gets the pass 11 plays 80 yards and a minute 52.

And the Jags are up 1713 early third quarter is that turnover bug.

Again.

Scott's been telling you all.

The difference is their fumble goes 18 yards the other direction.

Southern jumps on a great field possession.

Trey Holley the former LSU Tiger gets in.

Southern's got some breathing room.

It's 24 to 13 but they couldn't put them away.

Mid third quarter Mike Franklin up the middle calls it up to Morris Stokes going the other direction.

He's all alone.

Touchdown.

It's 2422.

They're going to go for the tie right here 550 to go in the third quarter.

But they come up short.

So southern still has the lead.

Now fast forward to the fourth quarter 2722 Jason Gabriel up the middle.

And he finds end zone touchdown for the Jags 3422 A little more comfort or is it two minutes to go.

Valley's not done yet.

Josh Brown hits Christian White for the 21 yard touchdown.

But the Jags do hold on after that.

What a challenge.

What a battle.

Southern gets the win 34 to 29.

Look again dominating the rushing game 212 yards for the Jags.

As they had the ball for almost 33.5 minutes.

And they will host Alabama State next weekend at 6:00 on the block.

Congratulations to the Jags getting the first win of the season.

Now we talked about that vicious head.

And you hate to see that any time Scott he's going into slide.

Took a helmet right under the chin bounces off the ground.

But Southern University has released a statement.

And it's very good news for him.

You can see it in its entirety on your screen, but I can give you the CliffsNotes version of it for what it says.

As the athletics director Roman Banks put this out, he thanked everybody for their love, their support, their concern.

Jaylen woods did go to the hospital.

He is confirmed to have everything test negative.

He has range in motion.

Returning back to Baton Rouge.

You know we won't see him on the field anytime soon after that shot Scott.

Because I know as a player you've seen it before.

You hate to see it.

You're worried about him, but it was relieving.

We heard he gave a thumbs up going into the ambulance and that's the best news.

Besides southern getting the win.

So that might even be secondary.

The fact that he has complete motion and everything came out negative.

Yeah, absolutely.

Especially when you see that play.

Those are scary.

Plays are still in the game.

I think the game of football is made as safe as you can possibly make it.

And they continue to to make progress with that.

But as a defensive player, you're taught play to the whistle.

Your defensive coach is on you all the time.

And so when a quarterback is going to slide, they just got caught in that mid mid air range where nobody knew what to do.

Nobody knew when to stop.

And so it's just the great thing is this young man's okay.

The thumbs up is a great sign.

And, you don't like to see these plays in the game of football.

Terrance graves will have his press conference this week, but I'm sure Scott, the two things he will focus on for the team U.

Disappointing loss against North Carolina Central one week ago.

He said they were humbled to second half.

The fact that they rebounded from that stayed on the road.

Then in game you lose your quarterback and then to rebound from that, the ability to refocus away from home, all the challenges and get a win.

Good sign for the team that absolutely every every head coach wants to know.

They know what type of team they have athletically, what they have in their athletic skills.

They don't know what a team is like when they face adversity.

Every coach wants to know what's my team going to do when the bad things happen, are going to be able to dig themselves out of it.

So this is a great sign that your team, they will handle adversity this early in the season, leads to good things later in the season.

Another Swac team in action in North Louisiana on Saturday night, this one just west from home as Grambling travel over to Shreveport Independence Stadium.

They were taking on Langston.

Remember we heard from Mickey Joseph there he is.

The head coach talked about the emotion of this ballgame.

He coached Langston.

He said, hey, they gave me my opportunity while defensively, Grambling was getting it done early.

Warren Robinson with a huge hit in the backfield has Langston pinned against the end zone.

And that gives Grambling great field position.

And Xavier to set up Xavier on T set.

With the beautiful pass to Tyson George 55 yards.

He outruns everybody to the end zone 14 nothing.

Grambling.

Then Langston has the ball back and quarterback Cade Barrett.

He's going to roll left.

He's not going to like this one.

He finds Terrell Ray.

Problem is, he's wearing a Grambling uniform 27 yards on the return.

As he comes back near side.

Watch the stretch though.

He's trying to get to the end zone.

Oh no.

He lost it so close to getting a score.

But at the last second, the reach from two and a half yards out, he loses the ball.

Grambling loses that momentum, but not for the game.

The Tigers rolled on and got the win 55 to 7.

In this ballgame against Langston 25 first downs just six.

And defensively they held negative negative rushing at -32 six first downs and -32 rushing yards.

I was just going to say we talked a lot about a lot of great run defense and the show so far.

Let's give it let's give the award to grandma for run defense.

-32 yards is very impressive offensively.

Grambling offense big bounce coach Mickey just want to be balanced 247 and 219 offensively.

That'll help your defense as well.

Now remember what you said I want to run to run to run.

Last year he was leaning too much on the past.

He wants to focus on the run.

And by the way, if you just saw there at the bottom of the screen, oh, you're going to go up to the horseshoe next week for Grambling.

I guess Ohio State has just got the big win against Texas.

Yo, just come back healthy and do the experience.

Yeah.

Oh absolutely.

You know you look at those games and and sometimes you look at it from the player perspective where you want to win everything.

That's just the way you're train.

You're in a combat mode.

But don't forget to enjoy the moment you get a job opportunity.

Go play in the horseshoe and just take it all in and soak it in.

That would be my advice to the team.

Yeah.

Fair enough.

It should be an interesting appearance.

That's a 230 kick next week up there at the shoe.

All right Nichols.

After the big win we focused on them.

Remember they played week zero.

Kicked off college football for the entire country with a dynamic win over UAW in conference.

They were over in Troy on Saturday stepping up a little bit going up into the Sunbelt Conference.

There's Tommy Wright Backi enjoy talking to him this week and on yesterday's game notes with his interview with feeling confident and why not with the way they played.

Well, watch this on this Troy punt solo.

Lewis yeah he's running solo left side down inside the 50 to the 40.

Great field position for the Colonels off of that punt return.

It would lead to a game show Walter field goal.

And the Colonels on the road take the early lead in the second.

After a scoreless first quarter, it's three nothing after Nichols defense stop Troy on fourth down Michael Brock.

He scores from three yards out.

Hello.

Ten nothing.

Nicole Scott watch the speed as it comes around.

The quick handoff and he's gone.

Speed kills in the game of football if you don't set edges.

We didn't see anybody set edges in a lot of games to say you got to contain the football or things like that.

Have great Paul call there for Nichols and get the score.

But with a minute to go it's Troy finding the end zone.

Goose Crowder to Roman mothership 27 yards for the touchdown.

It's ten seven.

Nichols at the break.

Third quarter opening drive for the Colonels.

Deuce Hogan hits Brock and watch him scoot.

You saw him scoot on the end around there.

He goes on this play 68 yards for the touchdown.

It's 17.

Second quarter seven Colonels on the road now 1710.

Crowder.

He keeps this one for 16 yards.

And we're tied at 17.

And Scott just started to wear on him a little bit the size being on the road.

This is where the Colonel started to see the little decline going backwards if you will after this.

Because after the Colonels kick a field goal of 2017, Crowder to Trey Taylor 28 yards, his first lead of the game Scott.

Here's how fast things can change to Nichols.

Deuce Hogan gets pick interception turnovers.

It changes momentum in the football game.

Gives it gives the other sideline a lot of energy.

And you know how next play after the interception.

This happens.

Tay Meadows needs nine seconds to go 47 yards.

And after getting their first lead of the game three minutes prior, they now have a dominating lead.

Troy would add to it, but hey look, no, no, nothing wrong with Nichols great effort on the road against a bigger team.

They ran out of gas in the fourth quarter and there we are again with that rushing stat.

65 yards rushing to 272 for Troy who won the second half 31 to 10.

Next up for Nichols, they'll be back home.

They'll host West Georgia.

That's a 6:00 kick down in Twitter.

To your point, you just said in a moment go talk about Grambling.

Everybody wants to go in and win a game.

There's nothing wrong with the effort.

For three quarters, Nichols was on top on the road at Troy and playing well.

But at some point, if you're a bigger team, a stronger team, maybe a deeper team, it starts to wear on you.

And as you mentioned, that interception as soon as Troy got the lead, if you could hold that possession and get it back, it's a different game.

Interception.

Next play 47 yards.

Now you're down by nine.

I mean now you're down by by 10 or 11.

Oh now its momentum is real and momentum is real especially in high school and college football.

And I think the one thing you have to try to get your team to understand is for us, we'll just call those watch the situations.

Let's go out and kill the buzz in the air.

Let's go kill the buzz in the air.

This momentum that everybody thinks they have.

Let's go make a play and get the ball right back.

And I think you're right.

I think Nichols a really good football team.

They just kind of wore down against a bigger Troy team in the line of scrimmage, giving up 6.3 yards per carry in the running game.

It's hard to to win a lot of football games, but I think this Nichols, they still have a bright future.

They have a chance to have a really good year, and they have a chance to be one of the best defenses in their conference.

I think if more about the opponent they play played than about them, like it was just a couple years ago.

They won the Southland Conference.

That win against UAW, as you hear people say, that, you know, sometimes you don't win it.

Some people lose it.

They won that game against you.

Who won the conference a year ago was picked to win it again.

They battled in this one and led for three quarters.

So to your point, I think they're in fine shape, especially when I get back to the South.

And what the talk about Troy and its talent when they got things going for 416 total yards with 272 on the ground to the 65 yards rushing for Nichols, just not able to control it.

And this was third down conversion nine of 15 is outstanding on any level.

Third down for Troy just four of 11.

And if you look at the correlation third down conversions are good because you're able to run the football when you're able to run the football, that means you're getting into third and short, third and four, unless you're going to convert a lot of third downs.

And when you don't have good third down conversions usually means you're not running the football and you're in third and ten plus.

Now the defense is tough on you.

Yeah.

They start they start to get themselves ready to go.

Indeed.

So it was a full fun weekend of week one for college football.

Let's take a look at games we're looking ahead to for next week.

And we told you about some of them in the in-state rival.

We'll see with Louisiana Tech making its way down to Baton Rouge as they will take on LSU next Saturday night.

Again, that's a 630 kick.

But some of the other games we will keep our eye on with Northwestern State on the road at Minnesota, the first of two back to back on the road, we talked about Grambling already going up to the shoe.

Alabama State will be at southern, where they have their first home game of the season on the Bluff Union Road, a title town for an Alabama team that's wavering a little bit after the big loss.

And then McNeese and Louisiana, the one hour apart I-10 rivalry there between Lake Charles and in Lafayette.

We're off and running some good games to look forward to and get ready for some exciting games.

A preview can't wait for next week already.

Give these guys some more shine and some more due credit, because there's a lot of really good football in the state of Louisiana, and it's fun to cover.

It is.

And we're going to have fun doing.

And we hope to see you next Saturday when we kick it off for Game Note Saturday morning at 10:00.

Until then for Scott Shanley, I'm Victor Howell, thanks for joining us on LP back.

Major production funding for game notes is provided by Southern University and A&M College and Hargrove Engineers and Constructors, with additional support from Lafayette Travel, the LSU Alumni Association, and the Cook Hotel and Conference Center at LSU, Louisiana Tech University, Natchitoches Regional Medical Center, Northwestern State University, Red Stick Sports, the U.S. Army Baton Rouge Recruiting Battalion, the Foundation for Excellence in Louisiana Public Broadcasting, and viewers like you.

Thank you.