No win is a bad win, but there is no other way to put it: this win was ugly.
In a weeknight game that felt like it had some kind of weird weeknight voodoo curse put on it, Tulane managed to escape with a conference win over the East Carolina Pirates 26-19. In some ways, it shouldn’t have been that close. In other ways, the fact that Tulane managed to win this game is a minor miracle.
“This team is going to give me health issues. We don’t play with enough discipline or detail yet. We’re going to get there, I’m going to continue to push them. I’m driven to make sure this team gets better, because we’re not there yet.”
Tulane Head Coach Jon Sumrall
College football head coaches have seen a lot, so it took some real With 5 minutes left in the 4th quarter, Tulane had 0 3rd down conversions. They also had only 9 points on 5 redzone trips. And yet? The game was tied 19-19 with the ball in Jake Retzlaff’s hands at the end with a chance to win the game. This is a recap – you know they won the game – but before we get there, to fully appreciate what Tulane was able to do in those final 5 minutes, we must take the bumpy ride of those first 55 minutes.
In the first half, the Green Wave simply rolled. They outgained ECU 260-91, moving the ball seemingly at will through the air. There seemed to be an emphasis on limiting Retzlaff’s carries (he finished the game with only 4), and instead he killed the Pirates through the air. He finished the game 26/36 for 347 passing yards and 2 TDs. Most notably, he completed passes to12 different receivers, the most for any FBS game this season. This Tulane offense was unstoppable…between the 20s.
Once the Green Wave got into the redzone, however, we had a different story. It was like there was a magical forcefield at the goal line that the ball just could not cross. Penalties were a huge problem all night for Tulane – they finished with 11 penalties for 96 yards on the day – but the most important ones came in the first quarter, where a touchdown got negated by a chop block penalty. That led to 4th and goal on the 11 yard line, where Coach Sumrall dialed up a gutsy call, a fake field goal.
Unfortunately, kicker Patrick Durkin (who finished the game with 4 actual field goals) wasn’t as good using his legs to run as he was kicking footballs with them, so the Green Wave came up completely empty on that red zone attempt.
Tulane would continue dominating on both sides in the first half, shutting out ECU and getting 4 redzone trips in total. However, the passing game dried up as the field condensed, and Tulane struggled to run the ball all day. Combine that with the inability to convert on 3rd down, and the other 3 trips all resulted in field goals, propelling Tulane to a solid but hollow 12-0 halftime lead. This was a game that easily could have been a 3 or even 4 score lead going into the half, but ECU was still in it, and they took advantage.
The Pirates came out guns blazing in the 2nd half, slowing down the explosive (but sporadic) Tulane passing attack, and immediately figuring out a way forward on offense. They upped the tempo and didn’t give the Green Wave defense time to react as QB Katin Houser gashed them through the air. After getting nothing in the first half, they suddenly led two straight TD drives to start the 3rd quarter led by big plays through the air and a balanced, up-tempo attack. After a failed 2pt conversion, ECU was suddenly up 13-12. They trailed 12-0 and felt a million miles away from the game at halftime, and before the end of the 3rd quarter the Pirates suddenly had the lead.
When it felt like it couldn’t possibly get worse, it somehow did. The ensuing kick off was surprised onside-kicked, a pooch kick that managed to bounce away from the Tulane return team and get recovered by ECU. The onslaught seemed to continue, but Tulane managed to slow down the bleeding by not letting the drive really get off the ground. ECU still got a field goal out of it because of the great starting field position, but the Green Wave seemed to finally get things back under control, which took us to our 16-12 score going into the 4th quarter.
With 11 minutes left in the 4th quarter, Tulane seemed to potentially get their demons exorcised all at once. After the teams traded punts, Jake Retzlaff took a shot deep, putting it right on Zycarl Lewis, who shook his defender and took the pass 63 yards for a game changing TD. Suddenly, Tulane had the momentum again and led 19-16, still without a 3rd down conversion.
ECU got the ball back and marched down the field with a long drive that ended in a field goal to tie the game up at 19, and the rollercoaster reached its final climax. 55 minutes into the game, Tulane’s theoretical dominance (on the day, the Green Wave averaged 7.4 yards per play and only allowed 4.6) combined with their situational incompetence on 3rd down and in the redzone all evened out and led to a tied game.
And in that moment, when the game was at its highest stakes, the Tulane offense flipped the night’s performance on its head. After being 0-7 on 3rd down in the game and incapable of putting a consistent drive together, Retzlaff and company did exactly that, with 3 crucial 3rd down conversions on the drive. They marched right down the field, and in the final minute of the game, finally converted a red zone opportunity with a full 7 points.
ECU had a chance at the very end with 35 seconds and no timeouts, but came up short in the final Hail Mary attempt. Tulane comes out of one of the ugliest games of the year on top, keeping every goal for the season in front of them. They move to 5-1 on the season and 2-0 in conference play, and come back to Yulman stadium next Saturday to host defending American Conference champion Army. ECU falls to 3-3 on the season and 1-1 in conference, and they have Tulsa next week in another Thursday game.
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