Inside Tulane week 11

[kgreene829]

Hey guys so after making my midseason Tulane media I forgot that I did this but now after a 2 week break inside Tulane is back to catch you up after the bye week Tulane had a strong game and got the win over UCF another top team in the conference. The next week they would lose their second game and first conference game of the season to Houston who was able to exploit Tulane's weak pass protection and weak run defense. Needing to bounce back Tulane was back at home facing off against 5-4 Temple who is fighting to make the CCG.

 

Tulane after a disappointing game where a team exploited every weakness they had wanted to focus on balancing the offense and they showed the work they put into the ground game early. First play was a 7 yard carry for QB turned RB Haloti Thomas before going out of bounds the next play was a 23 yard run by running back Alexi Patterson. Tulane has talked about how they want to improve on the ground because they want to be a complete team that can play however the need to get the win.

 

 

Quick side note on the running back situation for Tulane. Tulane is losing their top 2 RBs as Hector Lee and Alexi Patterson are graduating. QB Haloti Thomas will be considered for the starting QB role after Bronson Morel graduates but if he does not win the spot Tulane is not scared to play him at RB again. In addition to Thomas other candidates for the starting RB spot will be red shirt freshman Shin-Soo Martinez, redshirt sophomore Kapri Stephenson if they can make a big jump in their game if not Tulane would look to junior Scott Castillo and any additional players they can get to commit. Haloti Thomas is the most likely starter moving forward as Tulane is very high on the freshmen QB they redshirted this year Paul McCullers-Sanders who has older brothers starting on other college teams and even some in the NFL.

 

Back to the game Bronson Morel passes for 55 yards over 7 plays finding Fernando Thomas from 3 yards out to put Tulane up 7-0 early. Moving forward a little bit Tulane takes advantage of great starting field position starting at the Temple 41 driving down for a 4 yard pass from Morel to Treveon Love for a 4 yard touchdown putting Tulane up 14-0 near the end of the 1st quarter. Getting the ball back early in the 2nd quarter Tulane not yet satisfied finds Devante Pina projected WR1 for next season for 23 yards and cap of the drive with a 5 yard run by Alexi Patterson for the touchdown to put Tulane up 21-0 early in the 2nd quarter.

 

However Temple does not give up and shows great resilience by immediately driving down after a 33 yards pass from Le'Veon Levine to Tejan Hekker and then a 25 yard carry by Garrett Maxey. The drive ends 2 plays later with Le'Veon Levine finding RB Denyi Maldonado on a 6 yard pass for a touchdown bringing our score to 21-7 Tulane lead. Each team punts the ball away after a drive and then Tulane gets the ball at the Temple 32 and get a 40 yard completion to Robinson Rios and then after 2 incompletions on 3rd and 10 finds Treveon Love for 32 yard and a touchdown putting Tulane up 28-7. After Temple fails to convert on 4th down Tulane takes over at the 40 and on the 3rd play of the drive with 9 seconds left in the half finds his favorite receiver Fernando Thomas for 36 yards and another touchdown putting Tulane up 35-7 at the end of the 1st half.

 

Both teams start the second half slow but Temple digs deep to put together a 2 play 57 yard drive where Le'Veon Levine finds Tejan Hekker for 43 yards and a touchdown to make the game 35-14. Then after a Tulane drive ends thanks in part to a false start on Sam Mercer negating a 22 yard pass to Robinson Rios Temple takes over at Tulane's 49. 1 incomplete pass and a 3 yard run later Le'Veon Levine finds breakout WR Tejan Hekker for 46 yards and another touchdown cutting Tulane's lead to 14. Now skipping ahead to the 4th quarter Bronson Morel throughs a pass which is picked off by FS Brett Ross and the Temple offense takes over at the Tulane 31 but go 3 and out and punt the ball 69 yards from Tulane's 29 yard line. With 4 minutes left Tulane is driving knowing a score puts this game away and Bronson Morel throws his second interception of the game to CB Reggie Ladendorf but Temple starting at their own 7 can not drive down enough as time expires with a final score of Tulane 35, Temple 21.

 

Tulane comes away with the win and after Tulsa beats UCF and Memphis takes down USF Tulane clenches the AAC Conference Championship Game. When asked each player we interviewed said that they did not know about it until coach Kgreene829 told them in the locker room after the game but they then said that their coach told them not to let their foot off the gas they are still fighting for a playoff spot and need to fight hard in every game to take this season as far as it can go.

 

Bronson Morel and Fernando Thomas were asked on how they bounced back from the loss and what they did to try and avoid a similar performance.

 

Morel said that the O-Line worked hard to fix mistakes made the week before and gave him more time to throw and when he did throw Morel said that he was told that he has some great WRs and needs to trust them so Morel said he starting making throws that he hasn't made before to WRs he hasn't utilized to this point. Morel then said "I don't know most of the game is a blur I just felt like everything was starting to come easy and the game just kind of slowed down around me I was 100% in the zone." Morel did not have his best performance statistically but I would consider this his best game because he bounced back from a bit of a slump.

 

Fernando Thomas echoed the same thing saying that at one point in the 2nd quarter he was talking to Morel right before they got on the field and as they were about to start walking on the field Morel turned to him slapped him and yelled "FOOTBALL" and then went on to score a touchdown shortly later.

 

Reports coming out that Tulane may look into an exorcist if he keeps that up coach Kgreene829 said in his interview

 

"Well he was a little demonic and we are currently looking into an exorcist worst case scenario just to have one on call. Football is really important to us here at Tulane but it is not worth this great player having his soul stolen and body taken over by a demon."

 

Thats all for this week see you next week where Tulane will play USF and we will get a chance to see how Tulane changes their offense to try to stop the run as USF is a very run heavy team.