Florida Atlantic's 'comedy of errors' leads to 36-10 home loss to Texas-San Antonio

BOCA RATON — A sweltering defensive effort from the University of Texas at San Antonio led to Florida Atlantic's first loss in the American Athletic Conference, falling 36-10 to the Roadrunners on Saturday night.

The Owls (3-4, 2-1) started the contest with an impressive defensive performance of their own, reeling in two interceptions in the first quarter.

After allowing UTSA (4-3, 3-0) to cap off its opening drive with a 15-yard touchdown rush from Robert Henry, DaeDae Hill won a one-on-one deep ball in FAU territory for his first career interception. In what was a sign of things to come, the Owls failed to capitalize on the turnover and were forced to punt after three consecutive plays of no gain or a loss.

At the end of the first quarter, FAU's Chris Jones got his hands on a pass at the line of scrimmage, which fellow defensive linemen Latrell Jean reeled in and took 9 yards for a Pick Six.

"Big guys don't really get that opportunity [to score], so when you do get that opportunity, it's fun to have," Jean said. "Sadly we didn't get the outcome that we wanted, but when a big guy gets that opportunity it's definitely exciting."

With the defensive score, FAU finished the opening quarter with a 10-7 advantage. However, Jean’s house call was the first and only time the Owls found the end zone in the loss.

Not much clicked for the Owls after that on a homecoming night to forget. FAU tallied just under half of its total offense in the first quarter, as the offensive line struggled to contain pressure from the Roadrunners' front through the next three quarters. In fact, the Owls netted a negative return on rushing yards in the third quarter.

“We’re embarrassed, and we should be,” FAU head coach Tom Herman said. “To play like that at home, knowing what we were going to face, I would imagine if I looked in the mirror I’d have a different look on my face right now than I did at the end of the USF game (a 56-14 win). We’re embarrassed, we’re hurt, and we should be, we really should be.”

UTSA found success collapsing the pocket, and forcing Daniel Richardson to get rid of the ball quicker than what he is comfortable with. The dominant front sacked Richardson five times, while he threw three interceptions, each coming while he was under pressure.

Here are three takeaways from the Owls' loss to the Roadrunners.

The FAU offensive line never gave Richardson a chance.

The Roadrunners defense finished with 13 tackles for loss, five sacks, and three interceptions. They held FAU to 155 yards of total offense, and just 13 rushing yards on 27 carries. Richardson finished 19 of 34 for 142 yards, three interceptions and no touchdowns.

“When you don’t block them, it makes doing anything on offense hard,” Herman said. “When we did block, we didn’t hit the hole right, and I’m not saying that we did that very often, but when we did we dropped passes. A comedy of errors on that side of the football. We got hit in the mouth and didn’t respond.”

Richardson echoed Herman on the mistakes. “It was just like we’d have a good play here or there, then we’ll have a penalty or a false start or something like that,” Richardson said. “The little things matter. It starts in practice. I thought we had a great practice, but at times we had ups and downs, and with us starting a little slow today, it carried over.”

The Owls defense couldn’t contain a balanced UTSA attack.

The Roadrunners finished with 437 yards of total offense. Frank Harris shook off his two early interceptions, and finished 26 of 35 for 261 yards and two touchdowns. Six different players finished with at least 20 receiving yards for UTSA.

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On the ground, three different ball carriers added just over 50 rushing yards, while Robert Henry and Rocko Griffin added one touchdown each on the ground to the winning effort.

“I think the first thing is we have to fit our gaps,” Herman said. “We were out of gaps at times, and allowed the ball carrier to break free, and we got bullied. We got bullied by their ball carriers, we got bullied by their front, we’ve got to bow our backs and when we make contact that’s where the ball carrier has to go down. And tonight, it was an extra four or five yards everytime even when we were in the right gaps.”

Herman: Sometimes it's OK to point fingers

As Herman said, there really wasn’t much that went right for the Owls. Their leading receiver, LaJohntay Wester, was draped in a double team all night, running back Larry McCammon averaged two yards per carry on 15 tries and the defense never found a way to stop the bleeding.

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But in a year of firsts for Herman and company, this loss could be the catalyst for a strong finish. First, they’ll have to have some tough, yet necessary conversations.

“I’m not quite sure that within a family, pointing fingers is always bad thing,” Herman said. “And we’re a family, and conflict is okay within a family. It’s okay to say, ‘you didn’t play good enough.’ Believe it or not, in 2023, it’s okay to call out a teammate, a friend, a loved one, it is okay to tell people they are not doing their job well enough. That is okay in our society, because we all have a job to do in that locker room. Including myself.”

This article originally appeared on Palm Beach Post: FAU Owls lose first AAC football game, falling to UTSA Roadrunners