CFB Week 11 Thursday

Kyle Kirms
7 hours ago
4 min read

UTSA @ SOUTH FLORIDA - 7:30 PM

South Florida coming off a heartbreaker. They blew a 14 point 4th quarter lead. They outgained Memphis 564-370 in the game. It felt like they were in complete control for most of it.

UTSA laid it on Tulane in a violent way last week to keep their streak alive. That now makes 24 consecutive home wins for UTSA. Sumrall made comments about UTSA illegally pumping fake crowd noise into the stadium which made the matchup interesting.

But... that game was at home in the Alamodome. We know the story with this UTSA offense. It was the same thing last year. For whatever reason, this offense just doesn't look nearly as good outdoors. They're an arena football team.

Raymond James is most definitely outdoors. For those that didn't know, South Florida plays their home games in the same stadium the Bucs play in in Tampa.

And they're not just going outdoors... they're going outdoors to play against the best defense in the conference. In fact, South Florida might have the best Group of 5 defense in the entire country. Now UTSA might be getting WR Willie McCoy back. He was the team's leading receiver last year and he's been out this entire season.

The Roadrunners are definitely coming into this one with some confidence though. Owen McCown was essentially perfect last week. 31/33 with 4 TDs. Yes it was in the Alamodome... but it was against Tulane. In terms of defenses in the conference, it's South Florida, Memphis and Tulane. Those are the 3 toughest teams.

And we did just see South Florida get thrown on last week. Now the Memphis offense is a lot different than UTSA's. Lewis dropped back 44 times in the game and used his mobility a lot. McCown is a pocket passer... slightly different.

But we've also seen a pocket passer piece this South Florida defense up back in Week 3. Now this is Miami... certainly different than UTSA.

Now they've been mostly lockdown... I was just pointing out that they have been thrown on.

South Florida blitzes a lot... McCown's got great numbers against the blitz. He also gets the ball out quickly.

I actually think there's a path to UTSA running the ball a bit in this game. Robert Henry Jr. is one of the best RBs in the country. South Florida's got pretty elite numbers against the run this year... but if you look at their schedule, it doesn't look as impressive.

If you isolate it to just teams that can run the ball, South Florida's numbers against the run don't look as good. I think UTSA can move the ball in this game.

The question is on the other side... can this defense make stops? Because Byrum Brown looks good. They're hoping to get WR1 Chas Nimrod back. He's missed the last two games and is listed as questionable.

It felt like Byrum Brown had all day to throw in most of the Memphis game. UTSA's pass rush has been ok... but it's nothing elite.

UTSA's defense was actually playing really well for a stretch there, but it's really come back down to earth now that they've seen tougher opponents.

USF is gonna score points... but I really think UTSA can move the ball a bit in this game. 14.5 is too many points if you ask me. UTSA +14.5.

GEORGIA SOUTHERN @ APPALACHIAN STATE - 7:30 PM

Deeper Than Hate Rivalry. I'm not joking... that's what it's called. App State fans are doing a white-out.

Who's playing QB? AJ Swann started the season... he was benched for JJ Kohl. Then last week, Kohl was really struggling and they went back to AJ Swann and he marched down the field twice to actually make the end of the game interesting.

Now the good news is... regardless of who's playing QB, they should be able to score points against Georgia Southern's defense because this is probably the worst defense in the Sun Belt Conference. Unfortunately, App State's offense is currently hit with the injury bug though. LT and RG Trent and Jayden Ramsey both missed the ODU game and are questionable. TE Izayah Cummings is most likely out for the season (was the team leader in receptions).

I will say... when it comes to Georgia Southern's defense, they might be a BIT undervalued. They started off the season with back to back road games on the other side of the country and they just got completely lit up. Since they've come back to the east coast and got into conference play, they're still a bad defense but not nearly as bad.

App State has really struggled to consistently run the ball the last few weeks, but Georgia Southern has a terrible run defense. Even with the injuries to the offensive line, I would imagine they're able to establish the run in this one.

Arkansas State's been struggling to run the ball for most of this season... they didn't have trouble. GASO LB and leading tackler Brendan Harrington is a transfer from App State.

But we know the question when you play Georgia Southern is not "can you move the ball?"... cuz the answer to that is almost always yes. It's can you stop the offense?

Passer rating wise, JC French is coming off his two best games of the year. They've also been efficient on the ground. Georgia Southern looks pretty good right now on this side of the ball.