By TEDDY ALLEN, Journal Sports
The temperature was colder than your ex-girlfriend’s heart. One elevator didn’t work for a few hours because hydraulics froze. Same with some pipes that made press box flushing nothing more than a dream.
But the hit taken by Shreveport-Bossier in a memorable national winter weather event — 25 degrees at kickoff, “feels like” 12 degrees, and 15 miles-per-hour winds — made little difference in what happened on the field under clear skies Friday afternoon at frigid Independence Stadium. A touchdown favorite, Houston trailed at half, 16-6, but pitched a shutout in the second half and got hot at the right time to beat the University of Louisiana-Lafayette, 23-16, in the 46th Radiance Technologies Independence Bowl.
The paid crowd was 23,410. Only about 4,000 attended, a number cut at least in half by the time 2:59 remained in a 16-16 game. Those shivering brave souls were rewarded by a suddenly scorching Cougar offense that also chose to stick around.
Houston drove 92 yards in seven plays and scored on a 12-yard touchdown pass from senior quarterback Clayton Tune to his favorite target, junior receiver Nathaniel Dell, with 20 seconds left. Kyle Ramsey, who’d missed an extra point try in the first half, made this one for the 23-16 final score.
An interception of a desperation Ragin’ Cajuns pass and a Cougar kneel down ended it.
Noteworthy is that the winning pass was semi-unrehearsed.
“I gave Tune a look,” Dell said, and his quarterback understood, as he has all season. The nation’s leader in touchdown catches — he has 17 after Friday’s two-TD night — Dell turned a corner route into a quick out, made the catch at the 5, planted and quickly turned inside as the defender flew by, took two steps and dove into the end zone.
“Knew he was gonna score,” Tune said.
Ballgame.
ULL will remember the winning drive as something that should have never had a beginning but did because of two plays, each nauseating for the Cajuns, nothing short of splendid for the Cougars.
First, after two straight holding flags produced a typically insurmountable first-and-30 at the UH 21. Tune hit wide receiver KeShan Carter, waaaay behind the Cajun secondary, for 41 yards.
“The kick-start we needed,” Tune said, “the big play to get us going.”
The big play that kick-stopped the Cajuns came five minutes earlier. Freshman quarterback Zeon Chriss, in the game for the fourth quarter’s three drives in place of injured starter Chandler Fields (17-25, 169 yards, 1 TD), helped his team go 75 yards on 10 plays, including a 25-yard rush to the Cougar 9 with nine minutes to play and the game tied at 16.
But Cougar linebacker Jamal Morris forced Chris Smith, ULL’s leading rusher, to fumble and the Cougars recovered. After the teams traded short possessions, Houston got the ball on its own 8 with 2:59 left and mounted the winning drive.
“We made a couple of mistakes late,” ULL coach Michael Desormeaux said. “They didn’t.”
ULL controlled the first half. It started with an opening drive of 75 yards in 15 plays that ended with a somewhat spectacular 4-yard touchdown pass from an on-the-run Fields to senior tight end Johnny Lumpkin in the back corner of the end zone. Sophomore kicker Kenneth Almendares added field goals of 42, 42, and 32 yards — harder than it looks on a bitterly cold afternoon — for the 16-6 lead.
But field goals against high-scoring Houston, a team that averaged 37 points a game, 13th-best in the nation, don’t often age well.
“The bottom line is that you’ve got to put points on the board when you have those situations and you can’t settle for field goals,” Desormeaux said. “We settled for field goals a couple of times in the first half. Those are things, especially when you play an offense like these guys where you know they have the ability to score pretty quickly, you’ve got to continue to put a little pressure on them.”
Both teams are in semi-rebuilding modes after recent success. ULL of the Sun Belt finished 6-7 but has won 40 games in the past four seasons. The Cougars, who move from the American Athletic Conference to the Big 12 next year, finished 8-5 and have won 20 games in the past two seasons; Houston was 12-2 last year.
“I just commend our guys for having a never-quit attitude,” Houston coach Dana Holgorsen said. “They were resilient in creating a pretty special memory, winning a bowl game like this.”
“We had a chance to win in the end,” Desormeaux said. “Make a couple of mistakes down there in critical situations and it costs you a win. But, I’ve never been more proud of this group than I am right now.”
Contact Teddy at teddy@latech.edu or Twitter @MamaLuvsManning
