Who will be QB? Southern Miss looks to keep momentum against Troy’s ‘great tempo’

Southern Miss beat the expected rain from Tropical Storm Nicholas to get back to work Tuesday after winning for the first time this season this past Saturday, defeating Grambling State 37-0.

Head coach Will Hall suggested that maybe there was some divine intervention at work as the Golden Eagles prepare for Saturday game against Troy University. Kickoff Saturday is scheduled for 6 p.m. at M.M. Roberts Stadium.

“Obviously, the good Lord loves the Eagles, right?” Hall said in his remarks to the media following Tuesday’s practice.

“I mean, we got this tropical storm rolling in, but we were still able to get our whole (practice) in, which we’re very thankful for.”

Hall said the impending weather forced the USM coaching staff to cut some things short in order to get everything in, but otherwise he was pleased with how his team came back to the practice field.

“We had to adjust some things to make sure we got it in, so we didn’t get as much of our competition stuff as we needed in,” Hall said. “But we got all our stuff that we needed to work on Troy, so that was good to see.”

Understandably, Hall and defensive coordinator Austin Armstrong were pleased with most facets of the Golden Eagles’ game against Grambling, especially on the defensive side, where Southern Miss got its first shutout in nearly four years.

“The most important thing is the win,” Armstrong said. “It doesn’t matter if it’s a shutout or a 41-40 game.

“I think the biggest thing I saw was how hard our guys played. They flew around the football, were very, very physical and we tackled well again. Our kids practiced well, and they played well.”

While Armstrong was rightly pleased with the overall result, he said it wasn’t a perfect game.

“Sometimes the hardest thing to do is when you have success, you think everything’s great,” Armstrong said. “But there were plays out there that we screwed up that they didn’t take advantage of.

“Sometimes, we were in position to make plays and we didn’t make them. We’ve got to eliminate those things, to have the humility to come in and say, ‘hey, I got a good result, but I didn’t do it the way it was supposed to be done.’”

Both coaches were especially high on redshirt sophomore Malik Shorts, who led the Golden Eagles with six tackles, including one for loss, from his safety position. He also had one key pass breakup when he closed on an open receiver to deny the Tigers a big play.

“He’s played great for two games,” said Hall. “He’s Southern Miss all the way. Bassfield and Jeff Davis County to here. It’s a pipeline and we hope to continue it. Malik loves football, and when you grow up in Bassfield, that’s the ultimate amount of pressure.

“On Friday nights in Bassfield, they turn out the lights because everybody is heading to the game. If you don’t play well, everybody in town knows it ... It’s an extreme amount of pressure and he’s played under it his whole life.”

Hall had mixed reviews about the offense, despite the 37 points it put on the board against the Tigers.

“We did a really good job of blocking our gap schemes, but we did not do a good job blocking our zone schemes,” Hall said.

“Trey (Lowe) played really well. He was 10 of 13, should’ve been 11 of 13, with a drop, had a touchdown pass and was really good with his accuracy and his reads. We didn’t play particularly well in the red zone. I thought we should have had more touchdowns.”

Lowe limped off the field at the end of the first half with what was described as a lower extremity injury. True freshman Ty Keyes came off the bench and seemed to give the team some energy, although his passing numbers were so-so.

Keyes was just 4 of 11 passing for 50 yards and a touchdown, but he ran eight times for a net of 56 yards. Moe importantly, he guided the Golden Eagles to scores on four consecutive possessions in the second half.

“He was a big boost of energy in the second half,” Hall said. “He made some great runs, had some really good throws, with a drop or two in there.”

Hall did not address the quarterback situation for this week’s game, but Lowe and Keyes are listed as co-No. 1s on this week’s depth chart that was released on Wednesday. It is likely that the decision on which player to start may not be made until Saturday.

Looking ahead to Troy

Like Southern Miss, Troy comes into Saturday’s game with a 1-1 record. The Trojans trounced Southern University 55-3, then dropped a tough 21-13 decision to Liberty. This will be the first of three consecutive road games for Troy after playing the first two weeks at home.

“Troy is a really good football team,” Hall said. “They just played a team in Liberty that won 11 games last year to the wire and had a chance to beat them.

“Their backs are against the wall, so we expect a great effort. They’re a proud program like we are. They’ve won a lot of games in the past and we’ve got a lot of respect for them.”

There are plenty of connections between the two programs. Troy head coach Chip Lindsey was offensive coordinator at USM for two seasons (2014-15), and five other members of the Trojans’ staff have ties to Southern Miss. In addition, USM athletics director Jeremy McClain is a former AD at Troy.

This will be the 11th meeting in the series that Southern Miss leads 8-2. The first six games between the two schools came in the late 1930s, then there was another game in 1977. But they did not meet again until the 2008 New Orleans Bowl, won by USM 30-27 in overtime.

Troy won the last time the two teams played in Hattiesburg, 37-31 in 2016, but the Golden Eagles prevailed in the most recent meeting, a wild 47-42 Southern Miss victory at Troy in 2019 in which the two teams combined for 1,154 yards of offense.

The Trojans were 5-6 last year, 3-4 in Sun Belt Conference play. However, four of their six losses were by a combined total of 16 points, including a 42-38 season-ending loss to 11th-ranked Coastal Carolina.

The trigger man for Troy this season is junior quarterback Taylor Powell, who has completed 35 of 52 passes for 442 yards and three touchdowns in the Trojans’ first two games.

Against Liberty last week, he was 18 of 25 for 211 yards and a touchdown. However, he was sacked five times for 41 yards in losses. Powell played two seasons at Missouri, then sat out the 2020 season before transferring to Troy.

“They play with great tempo,” said Armstrong. “We’ve got to handle that. They’ve got some really good skill players, and the quarterback’s an experienced player.

“We’ve got to put them in some second-and-long situations, play good defense on first down, win some one-on-one matchups. We have to stop the run, make them one-dimensional, and do everything we can to affect the quarterback.”

The Golden Eagles hope to counter on offense with a ground-gobbling running game, led by redshirt freshman Frank Gore Jr., who gained 162 yards on 21 carries and a touchdown. In all, Southern Miss ran for 290 yards against Grambling.

Elsewhere on the injury front for the Golden Eagles, there was good news and bad news.

Junior wide receiver Antoine Robinson, who missed the Grambling game with a hand injury, is back in the starting lineup and will play Saturday. However, reserve running back Darius Maberry suffered a leg injury against Grambling that will sideline him for the rest of the season.

Saturday’s game will be livestreamed on ESPN+ and can be heard on the Southern Miss Sports Network from Learfield Sports (WBUV-FM, 104.9 in Gulfport).