First Half Struggles Doom Cajuns In Loss At South Alabama

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MOBILE, Ala. – Three Louisiana first-half turnovers half helped stake South Alabama to a 30-0 halftime lead, allowing the Jaguars to cruise to a 30-8 Sun Belt Conference victory Saturday night at Ladd-Peebles Stadium.

The loss, the second straight by the Cajuns (8-4, 5-2 Sun Belt) since putting together a school-record eight-game winning streak, denied Louisiana its first outright Sun Belt Conference title. South Alabama (6-6, 4-3 Sun Belt) closed the year with three straight victories to finish in a third-place tie in the league race while becoming bowl eligible for the first time in the young program's history.

"I am proud of this team," Louisiana head coach Mark Hudspeth said. "We went into the game with a bunch of freshmen quarterbacks who had hardly played a snap and we just couldn't get it done. We've had some bad breaks lately, but that's football. I am not going to take anything away from this team because I have seen how hard they have worked since January 15th to become champions."

Playing without injured quarterback Terrance Broadway, the Cajuns struggled to sustain an offensive drive. The Cajuns picked up 67 yards of total offense in the first quarter (50 rushing) and 114 yards at halftime (65 rushing) with seven first downs.

Making his first career start, redshirt freshman Brooks Haack completed 5 of 14 passes for 49 yards with an interception before giving way to freshman D'Shaie Landor, who was 0-for-3 passing, late in the third quarter.

Freshman Jalen Nixon, the Cajuns' fourth-string quarterback, came on in the fourth quarter to complete four of his nine passes for 94 yards, including a 47-yard touchdown pass to senior Ricky Johnson with 4:50 left in the game. Nixon added a two-point attempt in to make the game a 30-8 final.

"I'm also proud of our quarterbacks," Hudspeth said. "They worked their butts off this week to get prepared and even though things didn't go our way, they kept trying."

With a 23-0 lead in the first half, South Alabama put an exclamation point on a dominating 30 minutes when Qudarius Ford stepped in front of a Haack pass for an interception and returned it 42 yards for a touchdown with 16 seconds remaining before intermission.

Playing in his final game at South Alabama, Ross Metheny completed 13-of-23 passed for 171 yards while Jay Jones rushed 19 times for 105 yards.

Alonzo Harris led the Cajuns' ground game with 60 yards on 15 carries.

The Cajuns took a chance on their second possession of the game, faking a punt on a fourth-and-6 play from their own 49, but Nixon's pass intended for Larry Pettis fell incomplete, giving the Jaguars the ball.

On the ensuing drive, the Jaguars were aided by a face-mask penalty by the Cajuns, taking a 3-0 lead on a 40-yard field goal by Aleem Sunanon with 5:53 left in the opening quarter.

On the first play of the next drive, Harris fumbled the handoff and Romelle Jones recovered for South Alabama at the Louisiana 28. Jay Jones would gain 22 yards to the 1-yard line for the Jaguars before Kendall Houston scored to make it 10-0 with 4:45 left in the quarter.

Torrey Pierce fumbled the ensuing kickoff with Charles Harris recovering for the Jaguars at the 29. A 25-yard Metheny pass to Wes Saxton gave a USA a first-and-goal at the Cajuns 4, setting up a Houston TD run on the next play that gave South Alabama a 17-0 lead with 3:29 left.

"It's easy to move the ball when you get the ball at the 25 all the time," Hudspeth said. "The fake punt didn't work, and that's on me, and then we had a couple of turnovers that gave them a short field.

"It wasn't just the turnovers that we gave them, we gave them the momentum and we never got it back. We played well enough defensively to win the game, but we turned the ball over too much."

The Cajuns could do nothing with their next possession and were forced to punt. The Jaguars took the ball and drove 83 yards in 12 plays covering 5:35 but had to settle for a 19-yard Sunanon field goal to take a 20-0 lead with 10:16 left. USA had a first-and-goal at the Cajuns 4 for the second time, but the Cajuns defense stiffened, stopping the Jaguars on three straight running plays.

Another goal-line stand by the Cajuns late in the quarter led to a 20-yard field goal by Sunanon, his third of the half, giving the Jaguars a 23-0 lead with 55 seconds left in the half.

The Cajuns returned the kickoff to the Louisiana 30 and Haack quickly completed a 9-yard pass to Effrem Reed. On the next play, Haack spotted Jamal Robinson open on the left sideline, but Ford got to the pass first and took the interception back for a touchdown to dash hopes of a comeback.

Louisiana punter Daniel Cadona set career highs for punts (eight), yards (384) and average (48.0), having three punts downed inside the 20 with four kicks of 50 yards or better.

"I am not going to let this ruin the entire season," Hudspeth said. "We are the Sun Belt Conference champions. Even though we finished tied (with Arkansas State), we beat the team head-to-head that we finished tied with and we won eight games in a row.

"We won a conference title in just our third year together and we are going to our third straight bowl. The negative people can get off the train and the positive ones can join me in New Orleans because we're going back to a bowl."

The Cajuns will now have two weeks to prepare for Tulane, who they will face on Dec. 21 in the Mercedes-Benz Superdome in their third consecutive R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl appearance. Kickoff is scheduled for 8 p.m. and will be carried by ESPN.

First Half Struggles Doom Cajuns In Loss At South Alabama

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Team Stats

Jalen Nixon

Brooks Haack

D'Shaie Landor

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