Reflections on Coastal Carolina
You may have noticed, but it’s been a bit quiet around here. I felt compelled to write after Saturday’s game against Coastal Carolina.
If you’ve ever played sports, like football, you may feel connected to the game in a way where you can just “feel” everything in the air around and in the game. A good analogy is The Force in Star Wars. You can be tapped into an energy that permeates the players, the ball, the field, the coaches, and the crowd like you’re some kind of Jedi.
When I walked into the stadium when the gates opened to watch warmups, I could feel an emptiness. Watching the team warm up if felt like they were more going through the motions than moving with purpose and urgency. The fans entering the stadium and wondering around were not giving off an air of excitement or any energy at all.
There’s a feedback loop between the players and the crowd. When playing at home the energy put out by the crowd can energize a player on the field. You can be tired and sore or hurting, but the sound of the crowd can let you play for another play, then another play, then another, until the game is decided.
But the converse can happen too.
When the crowd is down and low (or no) energy, it can be a power sink from the team. Like an energy vampire. A team can play down because there’s no energy or the visiting team can draw that energy and play better.
There’s nothing better as being an underdog playing in a big stadium and you score and the normally raucous crowd goes deathly silent. Like Boone-Pickens stadium in Oklahoma a couple seasons ago when the Jags put it on Oklahoma State.
I noticed it before the Coastal game and it worried me. It turned out my worry was right.
However, the South Alabama team still managed to play through it for the most part. It wasn’t until unforced errors put the game out of reach late in the fourth quarter did the mountain become insurmountable.
I drifted into a couple X spaces after the game and heard what sounded like a funeral service for the season and the entire athletics department. Coaches will often say a handful of plays really make the game. I can recount four plays that defined the game.
- A shanked punt on the Jags first possession of the second half that led to a touchdown.
- A Bishop Davenport interception on the next Jags possession that led to a touchdown.
- Another Bishop Davenport interception late in the fourth quarter that led to a field goal.
- A strip fumble recovery and touchdown return.
That’s 24 points right there. And that’s not to put Davenport on blast. The first interception could arguably not be entirely a bad decision on his part. The second interception was more-so his fault trying to push the ball down the field, however it did look like the defender may have been shielded from his view behind the referee (who had to duck for the ball even).
People can say “they stunk up the stadium” all they want. But what I saw was a team that fought until the end. Despite the final score, the real story was the game was much closer than the 18-point differential would lead you to believe.
But we are not here for moral victories. We could say Tulane was a bit of a moral victory, we had a chance to take the game into overtime if only for a converted 2-pt conversion. We could say Auburn was a bit of a moral victory, we covered the spread and made people who watched the game worry a little bit about Auburn’s play and how strong South played. But the only thing that counts at the end of the day is how many points are put on the scoreboard.
I’m confident that Coach Applewhite and his staff will adjust and get the team prepared for the next game. North Texas will be a formidable team to play, especially on the road in Denton, Texas.
But, as a fanbase we can do better.
Every defensive third down matters. Every defensive fourth down matters. We have to build that muscle memory that we are going to make noise and not a social gathering. The social gathering happens in the tailgating area.
We want Hancock Whitney Stadium to be more than just a nice, new stadium. We want teams, especially Sun Belt teams, to DREAD having to play in Mobile. We want them to spend time during their week of preparation for South Alabama, to take precious time out of their schedule to prepare for handling the noise issues and the energy we are going to pump into the team by being a raucous crowd. We wear our Red, White, and Blue proudly, hopefully we coordinate which color to wear for the game.
That doesn’t mean we are rude to our guests though. But we want their team to wonder if they are actually playing in Mobile or if they’re playing in a 100,000 seat SEC stadium.
Is that a lofty goal? Maybe it is. But one thing I was taught by my coaches: Without a goal you are directionless.
Thanks for coming to my JAG talk (think in the vein of a TED talk, you get the idea). Go Jags!