Welcome to week 10 of the SoConversation, featuring The Citadel beat writer Jeff Hartsell of the Charleston Post and Courier, Elon beat writer Adam Smith of the Burlington Times-News and UTC beat writer John Frierson of the Chattanooga Times Free Press.
Grab a cup of coffee and get comfortable because this is a long one.
Before we discuss what happened elsewhere in the SoCon last week, let’s take a moment to go over what happened with the teams we cover. The Mocs lost a triple-OT heartbreaker, The Citadel lost a regulation heartbreaker and the Phoenix got beat despite another ridiculous game from “Merle.” Thoughts?
JOHN: The Mocs got behind 14-0, trailed 21-10 at the half and led 24-21 early in the fourth quarter. Two special teams turnovers, one in the first quarter and one in the fourth, gave the Eagles the ball on UTC’s half of the field and led to 10 Georgia Southern points. The second one set up the field goal that forced overtime.
UTC was out-gained 427-316, but actually averaged 5.6 yards a play to GSU’s 5.3. The difference: number of plays. The Mocs ran just 43 offensive plays in regulation and GSU had a time of possession advantage of nearly 18 minutes.