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High-scoring No. 17 South Florida takes aim at Houston (Oct 28, 2017)
TAMPA, Fla. -- No. 17 South Florida puts its undefeated record on the line Saturday against Houston, but both teams must be careful about letting leads slip away in the second half.
USF (7-0, 4-0 American Athletic Conference) got a scare last week, leading Tulane 34-7, only to see the Green Wave score 21 unanswered points late, attempting three onside kicks. The Bulls recovered two of them to hold on, but it served as a reminder not to let up under any circumstances.
"There's always room for improvement," said receiver Marquez Valdes-Scantling, who leads USF with 382 receiving yards and four touchdown catches. "You're never going to be perfect, so it's, 'Let's do it right next time.'"
The Bulls have the nation's longest win streak at 12 games and, perhaps more impressively, have scored at least 30 points in 24 straight games, a modern-era record that Houston (4-3, 2-2) will try to stop.
The Cougars, however, have given up at least 40 points in their last two losses, falling 45-17 to Tulsa and 42-38 to Memphis, the latter seeing Houston give up two touchdowns in the final six minutes to spoil a 10-point fourth-quarter lead.
Houston has outscored its opponents 126-42 in the first half, but those numbers are nearly the opposite after halftime, with the Cougars being outscored 126-65.
"We've looked at halftime in terms of adjustments: Are we putting too much on them? Are we not making enough adjustments?" Houston coach Major Applewhite said. "It's been execution, and doing exactly what you're supposed to do."
The win over Tulane was USF's first this season by fewer than 14 points. The Bulls are likely not in the national championship picture because of a weak schedule, but they are seeking the first conference title in the program's 21-year history. They're seen as being on a collision course with No. 18 Central Florida next month, but they must continue to pull out the easier wins until then.
"It's going to be a really good battle for us," USF coach Charlie Strong said, pleased with his team's three-headed running attack of quarterback Quinton Flowers and running backs Darius Tice and D'Ernest Johnson. "That's what we are hanging our hat on, being a physical football team."
Tice has rushed for 634 yards and nine touchdowns, Flowers has rushed for 613 yards and seven scores (along with 1,245 passing yards and 12 touchdown passes) and Johnson has 569 yards and five touchdowns.
Leading Houston's efforts to stop that running attack is sophomore defensive tackle Ed Oliver, who has 42 tackles, including seven for loss, along with two forced fumbles. Strong remembers recruiting him when he was the head coach at Texas.
"I knew that he was going to be an outstanding football player," Strong said. "Very aggressive, very physical at the point of attack. He's one of the better defensive linemen in the country."
Houston has 11 turnovers in its three losses this season, and USF's defense leads the nation with 16 interceptions, including four from safety Devin Abraham, who was left off the 13-player semifinalist list for the Jim Thorpe Award this week.
"We're just worried about the next game ahead of us," Abraham said. "We have to keep pushing, have to keep making plays."
Houston has two of the AAC's top six receivers by yardage in Linell Bonner (465) and Steven Dunbar (514), and it will be counting on running back Duke Catalon (496 yards, seven TDs) all the more with backup Dillon Birden out with an elbow injury.
USF and Houston are in similar situations -- college teams in pro sports towns, trying to keep up with Power Five teams for in-state recruits. Both have lost high-profile coaches of late, with USF losing Willie Taggart to Oregon and Houston losing Tom Herman to Texas, replacing Strong.
The Bulls have a chance to raise their profile if they can continue their impressive streaks, but Houston would like to get in the way of that. Applewhite compared the team's last game to the Conor McGregor-Floyd Mayweather fight, reiterating to his team that they must be ready to go the distance and outlast their opponent.
"It's going to be a 15-round bout," he said. "We're going to have to be a disciplined fighter."
