The bye week is over.
Now it’s time for the UL Ragin’ Cajuns to prove the rest and extra preparatioin will eliminate the consistency issues that produced some frustrating losses. That opportunity comes at 4 p.m. Saturday against South Alabama at Our Lady of Lourdes Stadium.
“You’ve got to have the Week 1 excitement again to get back out there,” UL coach Michael Desormeaux said. “You need the Week 9 execution and the Week 9 confidence from all the things that you’ve done well throughout the year.”
There are several reasons to believe the Cajuns (5-3, 2-2 Sun Belt) will bounce back against the Jaguars (4-4, 2-2).
For starters, redshirt junior quarterback Lunch Winfield likes the way this young Cajuns team has responded to adversity throughout the season.
“A less mature team would start pointing fingers and blaming other guys,” Winfield said. “This is a team that’s more like, ‘I could have done better.’ That’s what I love about this team. These guys are very mature for a young team. They don’t point fingers at all.
“These guys are unselfish. When the time comes next year and the years after that, it’s going to be really dangerous.”
The injury report is another reason. Redshirt senior safety Collin Jacob is expected to return from a broken arm to help the defense be more consistent against the pass and respond after giving up 286 yards rushing during a 35-31 road loss to Southern Miss.
“We’ve got to get back to where we were in that area,” Desormeaux said. “That’s got to be a blip on the radar. It can’t turn into a spiral. We can’t let that turn into something bigger than what it is. We didn’t leverage the ball well. We were not very physical in the way we tackled.”
Desormeaux also said starting right guard Matt Broussard is “finally back to where he was” and will start again.
“Jakoby (Isom) is playing well, too, but he’s really still a freshman,” Desormeaux said. “They’ll both play. This is just the first time Matt has looked 100% since he’s been back.”
For most of the season, the defensive front has flourished, but that wasn’t the case in Hattiesburg.
“That just wasn’t us,” redshirt senior defensive lineman Maxie Baudoin said. “We didn’t meet that standard against Southern Miss. We could have fit gaps better across the board — D-line, secondary.
“I think the bye week helped a lot. For me personally, it allowed me to refocus and just take a load off my body. We just were able to talk and communicate everything that we had to get figured out and straightened up.”
The Jaguars are scoring 35.3 points a game and are third in the Sun Belt in total yards at 416.3 yards a game.
Quarterback Jared Hollins has completed only 52% of his 156 attempts for 1,195 yards and nine touchdowns. His top two targets are Brendan Jenkins (27-451, 3 TDs) and Anthony Eager (20-450, 6 TDs).
Running backs Keenan Phillips (107-576, 6 TDs) and PJ Martin (118-552, 7 TDs) power South Alabama’s rushing attack that leads the Sun Belt at 232 yards in league games.
On paper, the pressure’s on Winfield and the passing game. South Alabama is physical on both sides of the line of scrimmage, but it has given up 287 yards passing per game.
The Cajuns offense still has a run-first mentality. Winfield has thrown for 1,452 yards and six touchdowns with five interceptions. Russell Babineaux and Trenton Chaney lead the team with 17 receptions, and KeDarius Wade has the most yards at 279.
“It’s going to be a challenge,” Desormeaux said. “A lot of the games and the points that they gave up were throwing games, where people were throwing the ball over the place and that’s just really not who we are.”
The South Alabama defense is aggressive and lives on offensive miscues.
“They’re good at changing up their defenses, their blitzes and their fronts,” Winfield said. “So you just have got to stay true to yourself and have a good game plan going into it.
“They live off negative plays — the big fumble or the big interception. So we just have to protect the ball and stay in front of the sticks.”
Desormeaux wants to stay away from third-and-long scenarios against Jaguars defensive coordinator Todd Orlando.
“They’re aggressive with their linebackers and the way they play, they kind of thrive on the negative play,” Desormeaux said. “When they get you behind the sticks, they have really good third-down packages. They’re really tough to convert on third-and-longer distances, especially.”
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