Nothing on the Bulldogs

Well if you take anything away from the first half of the football season so far, it should be that Louisiana Tech is anything but predictable. In a game that anticipated a dominant bulldog win over winless rival ULM, the score was all zeroes at the half. It was clear that the Warhawk defense had prepared their approach to Tech’s scheme perfectly and shut down key players such as Eli Finley, Talyn Shettron, and even Jalen Mickens (to a degree). The Bulldogs, in their own right, made an incredible halftime adjustment to emerge with a much more successful latter performance. In a grand shift of offensive scheming, the Bulldogs brought out a look that resembled 12-personnel for extra pass blocking and a boost in the run game. This adjustment turned out to be the perfect storm for Tech to march down the field and score touchdowns on three of their first four possessions in the second half, as well as a field goal to top off the surge in points. The defense held ULM scoreless even in the second half and completed their first shutout of the year, aided by outstanding deep-ball play and elite tackling. It may have been a less-than-desirable open to the renewed rivalry, but it absolutely concluded with dominance and Bulldog pride.

Slow Start, Resilient Finish

Like mentioned before, this game kicked off with an impressive series of counter-scheming of the Tech offense from the low-ranked Warhawk defense. Tech’s first shot deep from Trey Kukuk was covered well and intercepted, killing the opening possession for Tech. It seemed that everything Tech was attempting in their effort to move the ball was ineffective, both runs and dropbacks. Dropbacks in particular saw an uptick of indecisiveness and more sacks taken from Blake Baker. While he did not force the ball at all, he was unable to find players open within his reads. ULM did a great job of covering the deeper shots that Blake was looking to capitalize on early and for the remainder of the half, Baker and the offensive staff struggled to find plays that could succeed. Tech managed to make its way to ULM territory and even the redzone a handful of times, but failed on three straight field goal attempt to remain scoreless heading into the locker room.

The second half couldn’t have been any different. Tech would kickoff to ULM but the Warhawks would give the ball right back with an Aidan Armenta interception by Taedyn Rogers on the opening snap. With this spark of hope, the Bulldog offense returned to the field and never looked back. Starting with a 30-yard heave downfield, Blake Baker led his squad to the first points of the game in three minutes as Marcus Calwise Jr. would be attributed two catches for 47 yards. The next possession featured a series of hard-nosed runs from Andrew Burnette, another big catch from Calwise, and an intriguing goal-line play that faked a QB run and actually resulted in a shovel pass to TE Brayden Bockler up the middle of the field for a touchdown. While Tech did not score on their third possession of the half, they did on their fourth after a 56-yard run from Marcus Calwise (yes, him again) and a rollout pass in the redzone to Brayden Bockler yet again. Tech wrapped up their scoring with just under four minutes remaining in the game as they hit their first field goal of the game. Just an outstanding display of perseverance and flexibility among an extremely prepared Warhawk front that was looking to spoil Tech’s win streak.

Warhawk Eggs

Like what we saw from ULM in the first half, Louisiana Tech came to play decisive, terrifying defense in this game. ULM only had four meaningful possessions in the first half and none of them saw a seventh play run–they all capped out at six. ULM had but four first downs in this half and nonexistent longevity in their possessions. Once the second half hit, the Bulldogs were even more impactful, beginning like I said before with an INT from Taedyn Rogers. Tech had another interception later in the fourth quarter as ULM attempted to capitalize on one of their longer possessions of the night. Following a pass interference call on the Bulldogs, Aidan Armenta attempted to dump off a ball to his running back and Kam Franklin read the play from the jump, hawking Armenta’s pass and nearly housing his grab to set up an eventual field goal. The Bulldogs would cap the night off with an electric stop on fourth & short in their own territory to ensure that the Warhawks would never reach the endzone. 

A couple of Bulldogs had big nights, especially the returning Alonzo Jackson Jr. who led the team in tackles and TFL’s with eight and two respectively. Taedyn Rogers did more than grab his interception, as he also made five tackles all by himself at DB in this game. Jaden Mayfield and Kolbe Fields had 6+ tackles each and Fields had half a TFL to his name by the end of the night. While the team did not record any sacks in this one, they continued their inside dominance and prevented big runs from bursting through at all points of the game. The secondary performed a lot better and managed to prevent super explosive plays that were common last week against the Ragin Cajuns. To shut out any team is an incredible feat and it feels even more accomplishing to do it to a rival down the street. 

Conclusions

While the first half was a major struggle for Louisiana Tech’s offense, their prowess and abilities on defense kept the team in this game until the offense could develop a better strategy for victory. When they strutted out of that locker room at the half, this team had something different about them that they brought to the field. The adaptation to find success was key in the achievement of a game winning second half and without it, we likely would have never seen a point scored in this game. I just hope that in future matchups, struggles like these can result in a great shift much earlier if no success is found. There may not be a team faced in the future with the offensive struggles of ULM to bank on while your own offense figures out how to find the endzone. Tech needs to develop a quicker adaptability model if they want to succeed against these tougher conference opponents in the stretch, especially on the road. Luckily for them, there is some time and more chances to prove the worth of the squad. Homecoming is right around the corner! Go Dogs!!!