Inexplicable. There is no other word to describe it. There is no explanation for how this game ended.
Southern was dead in the water. In what was seemingly their final chance, down 17-12 with 1:30 left and 2 time outs, Jags quarterback Noah Bodden narrowly avoided the sack to throw the ball away in the Jags own endzone. Unfortunately, there was no receiver anywhere near his pass, and the play was ruled intentional grounding. That play resulted in a safety, making the score 19-12 and forcing the Jags to give the ball back to the Texas Southern Tigers with 1:26 left in the game. In a normal game, that would be it.
This was not a normal game.
Instead, this confluence of events happened:
- Instead of being returned like a normal kickoff, Texas Southern just lets the ball hit the ground and roll all the way to the 3 yard line before picking it up, giving the Tigers terrible field position, starting at their own 13 yard line.
- They got nothing done on offense as the Southern defense got another great stop, and because of the Jags’ two timeouts, had to punt the ball with 26 seconds left.
- Despite Southern not actually blocking the punt, the punt goes straight into the hands of one of the attempted blockers, who was nowhere near the punter. It was as if the punter just whiffed the kick. That led to the Jags getting the ball on the 16 yard line with 24 seconds left. It’s one of the weirdest-looking plays I’ve ever seen.
- A Jags offense that struggled the entire game found an immediate explosive play, a strike into the endzone to tie things up.
- Then in OT, the Tigers missed a 41 yard field goal to give the Jags an easy FG to win the game.
In the span of about 30 minutes of real time, the Jags went from completely dead in the water to celebrating yet another nail biting conference victory. It wasn’t pretty. It wasn’t clean. But Southern got the job done on the road in SWAC play again, a feat that is not easy in the slightest. At the end of the day, that’s all that matters.
In a resemblance that feels almost uncanny, this game had a stunning number of commonalities with Southern’s win over Prairie View, their other trip to the Houston area. In both games, the Jags had a terrible 1st half and then caught fire in the 2nd half to lead a huge comeback. In both games, Noah Bodden started and finished the game, but missed some plays at the end of the first half. In both games, the Jags outgained their opponent by a large margin but struggled to show it on the scoreboard. In both games, the Jags barely tied up the game after a big deficit and sent it to overtime thanks to one of the weirdest plays I’ve ever seen. And once both games got to overtime, Southern left no doubt.
As per the Prairie View script, the first half was a complete disaster for the Jags. The first quarter and a half were uneventful, with tons of punts and 0 points for either team. Noah Bodden started the game for the team, but with nothing happening on offense, the Jags looked to the bench yet again this season to try to find a spark. That change was a celebration for the Jags fanbase – the long-awaited return for Czavian Teasett, who won the job in the Savannah St game but got injured against Jackson St and hadn’t seen the field since. He dressed for the game, but his status was still unclear because he didn’t start the game.
Unfortunately for the Jags, that celebration was short lived. On Teasett’s first play in the game, he threw an interception to MJ Hinson that got returned for a Tigers touchdown, the first points of the game for either team. Things only got worse for Teasett from there. The next drive looked promising before it got cut short by a Kobe Dillon fumble. Then after a TS fumble, Teasett got strip-sacked and the Tigers recovered deep in Southern territory. It only took one play for the TS to take advantage, as a Trenton Leary rush immediately scored the game’s first offensive touchdown, and gave us our halftime score of 14-0. All 3 of Teasett’s drives in the game ended in turnovers.
In the second half, Noah Bodden took back over and the offense as a whole looked completely different. Chunk plays came quickly and the offense looked efficient for the first time since, well, the 2nd half of the Prairie View game. Bodden’s final statline was nothing to write home about (13/32, 181, 1 TD), but he was able to lead the offense and put together multiple promising drives.
However, the points were still difficult to come by. Three redzone drives in quick succession resulted in just 6 points, and the game continued to grind until the Jags finally broke through late in the third quarter. Kendric Rhymes found the endzone, giving the Jags a chance to tie the game with a 2pt try. They failed, but they clearly were going to have a shot to win the game in the 4th quarter, as they only trailed 14-12. The Jags outgained the Tigers by 150 yards at the end of the 3rd quarter, but they didn’t have the lead to show for it.
The 4th quarter saw a return to offensive stagnation for both teams, until the Tigers eventually were able to negotiate field position enough to notch a field goal, making it 17-12. After another Jags punt, TS got another drive into Jags territory late in the game with a chance to put things away. They eventually stalled out, but were able to successfully punt the ball and pin the Jags deep in their own territory. This was seemingly their final chance, with 2 minutes to go, 90 yards to go, and 2 time outs.
One holding and intentional grounding leading to a safety later, and we’ve now reached the position where we began the recap. The safety punt was poorly fielded, the ensuing Tigers punt was disastrous, and Noah Bodden just needed one play to find Quay Davis in the endzone to tie up the game.
The Jags owned overtime. The Texas Southern field goal was no good, and Joshua Griffin, who had struggles to start the season, sent the Jags home happy with his left leg.
It goes without saying, but this is obviously a huge win for Southern. Despite the rocky start to the year, the Jags still have a 0 in the most important column – losses in SWAC play. They move to 2-0 on the year in the SWAC, and still have all of their goals in front of them because of it. The Jags are one of only two remaining undefeated teams in the SWAC west, the other being the team they host next week, Alcorn St. That game is also homecoming for the Jags, and it is next Saturday at 6:00.
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