what is the deal with USM - they have sorta put their foot in our rear the last couple of years.....heck, the sorta whooped us worse than most P5 programs have recently...in fact, I can't remember a P5 beat down in recent years like USM has been kicking us. We need to get that fixed this year.
My best guess: we underestimated them in 2015. Then in 2016 we saw them lose several games in a row and thought victory was going to be easy. We talked way too much smack and then surprise! Nick Mullens is back. Not to mention in both years we had to play double digits games without a week off and people got beat up. When the bye finally came they got a little out of rhythm and the exhaustion finally caught up.
As long as we don't over think it this year, we should be fine.
Last year SoMiss had to beat us to qualify for a bowl game, so it was either shut us down or stay home. Further, it seems they cared more about their senior day than we did in 2015. In 2015, they also had a big motivation, as that game was for the West division championship. It seems we did not care as much about it as them, were too injured, and/or became complacent/overlooked them. SoMiss would have been pretty motivated in 2015 to win the conference, as the upperclassmen would have had to go through those dismal years in 2012-2014. I also believe that the rivalry means more to the SoMiss team and fans then they let on.
Let's hope this year we can right the ship, and take a 3-2 lead in the CUSA books, and since it'll be in the middle of the season, hopefully fatigue and the stress of division championship won't be so much of an issue.
The "Higg" would have hit 5,000 yards if he'd avoided the DUI game suspension.
Garment metaphor in an Elite Offense thread??? Gonna be a long summer.