Photo by Gerald Castillo
Bobcats fall flat against Eagles, 38-30, lose out on bowl eligibility
Texas State head coach Jake Spavital called Saturday’s game against Georgia State one of the strangest he’s been a part of.
There were a number of plays that made it an odd evening. Two punts were blocked and recovered for touchdowns — one for each team. There were four missed field goal attempts despite the teams entering the game a combined 18-21 on field goals.
Twenty seniors were honored before playing in their final game at Bobcat Stadium in — quarterbacks D.J. Bolger and Tyler Vitt, tight end Seth Caillouet, linebackers Markeveon Coleman, Zane Little, Brayden Stringer and Sione Tupou, defensive backs Auston Deason, Troy Lefeged Jr., Eric Sutton and D.C. Williams, offensive linemen Liam Dobson, Charles Fletcher, Jacob Fryrear and Tate Heitmeier, defensive linemen Emmanuel Galvin-Vazquez, Nick McCann, Caeveon Patton and Jaquel Pierce, and running back Caleb Twyford.
None were made available to the media after the game.
One thing that wasn’t strange about Saturday, though, was the end result — a 38-30 loss against a team that Texas State has yet to beat in five tries. The loss is the Bobcats’ seventh of the season, making the team ineligible for a bowl game for the seventh year in a row.
“At the end of the day, the story of this game is we beat ourselves,” Spavital said. “There was two targeting penalties, there was three holding penalties, there was dropped balls, there was bad execution on third down. And that's hard to overcome … Overall, we made too many mistakes.”
Special teams played a major role in the outcome. Just before the end of the first quarter, with the maroon and gold trailing 3-0, Texas State sophomore punter Seamus O’Kelly got “spooked” by an Eagles defender who was dangerously close to blocking the kick. O’Kelly instead tucked the ball and tried to run on 4th and 15, but was knocked down for a 15-yard loss. Georgia Southern got into field goal range on the ensuing drive but failed to convert on a 48-yard attempt.
The hosts scored a touchdown on their next possession, a 13-yard rush by redshirt freshman running back Calvin Hill, but the visitors did the same on their next two drives to take a 17-7 lead. Redshirt sophomore kicker Seth Keller made a 45-yard field goal with 1:17 left in the half to make it a one-score game again.
The Eagles were stopped with nine seconds remaining in the second quarter. But the team’s punt was blocked by freshman linebacker Kenny Haynes, who chased the ball across the goal line and recovered it in the end zone for a game-tying touchdown.
Here's the block and score by @HaynesKendis that tied the game back up for #TXST @smdrsports https://t.co/wpjsuH3xGB pic.twitter.com/es0gC27HAe
— Drew King (@drewking0222) November 13, 2021
“(Special teams coordinator Nick) Whitworth does an unbelievable job for us. I think across the board, we're one of the better special teams units in our conference,” Spavital said. “With blocked kicks, we're always in position for them. We scheme it up like crazy, we knew we had to block that punt, that's why used the timeouts … They do a really good job at it and they bring it every single play.”
The block, along with a defensive stop to begin the second half, gave the Bobcats momentum and a chance to take their first lead of the game. But the offense was held to a three-and-out and Georgia Southern blocked O’Kelly’s punt and returned it for a touchdown to go back up 24-17.
Texas State knotted the score up again with a six-play, 45-yard drive that was punctuated by a one-yard touchdown rush by sophomore tailback Jahmyl Jeter. And the team was seemingly going to keep it that way after blocking a 37-yard field goal attempt by the visitors on the next drive.
But officials ruled on the field that the miss was recovered by the Bobcats, fumbled, then recovered by the Eagles, resulting in a new series for the visitors. Spavital said his players told him no one had scooped up the ball, but that there was not sufficient evidence in replay to overturn the call. Georgia Southern scored two plays later on a 25-yard throw from redshirt junior quarterback Justin Tomlin to redshirt sophomore tight end Beau Johnson.
Um, ruling on the field: #TXST blocks a field, recovers the ball, fumbles it, recovered by #GS on the 25. Touchdown doesn't stand but it does result in a new series for the Eagles
The play is under review @smdrsports pic.twitter.com/1cYjVRgOFb— Drew King (@drewking0222) November 13, 2021
The hosts got inside the Eagles’ 30-yard line twice at the start of the fourth quarter. The first time resulted in a missed 50-yard field goal by Keller. Sophomore defensive back DeJordan Mask snagged his first career interception on the first play of the next possession to set Texas State up with good field goal position but the team still couldn’t capitalize, settling for a 33-yard made kick from Keller.
Georgia Southern crossed the goal line one more time and Keller made another field goal to make it 38-30. But the Bobcats couldn’t recover their onside kick and the Eagles kneeled to run out the rest of the clock and hand Texas State the defeat.
“I just thought the whole night was off, just how it was kind of flowing,” Spavital said. “You know, when the defense was playing good, then the offense would struggle. And when the defense was playing bad, the offense would go and do something good, at least. And then there was just a time where I thought everything was bad at the moment. So it's something that I gotta look at on tape because I still don't understand how the flow of that game correctly occurred today.”
Vitt finished the game completing 29-of-46 passes for 276 yards with one interception. Sophomore wideout Ashtyn Hawkins was his top receiver with nine catches for 66 yards. Hill led the backfield with 43 yards and a touchdown on 10 carries.
Tupou had a team-high 10 tackles. Sophomore defensive lineman Jordan Revels finished with 1.5 tackles for loss. Williams and Lefeged were both flagged for targeting penalties in the second half of Saturday’s game and will miss the first half of the Bobcats’ road game at Coastal Carolina (8-2, 4-2 Sun Belt) next week in Conway, S.C.
The Bobcats (3-7, 2-4) will look to beat the reigning conference co-champions, rather than themselves, when they kick off at noon CST.
