Southern Miss storms back, stuns Arkansas State with walk-on quarterback leading charge
Southern Miss trailed for the first 58 minutes of its homecoming matchup with Sun Belt West rival Arkansas State.
The final two minutes belonged to the Golden Eagles.
Walk-on quarterback Jake Lange led two scoring drives in the final quarter to stun the Red Wolves, 20-19.
Lange entered the game late in the third for a struggling Zach Wilcke and engineered a two-score comeback that gave USM its first conference win as a member of the SBC.
Frank Gore, Jr bounced and sprinted his way to a 30-yard score with nine minutes remaining before Dean hopped into the end zone with about two minutes left on the clock.
“That was a Southern Miss win,” Coach Will Hall said after the game. “When everything was against you and it wasn’t supposed to happen, we just kept freaking fighting and battling...
“I know it’s not pretty and I’m going to be honest with you, it’s probably not going to be pretty for a little while around here. We got to dig in and keep battling and keep recruiting. It’s going to get pretty one day, but it probably ain’t going to be pretty around here for just a little while.”
Lange brings change
The shovel was in the dirt of another USM football game. The Eagles were down 19-7 through three quarters and failing to apply any pressure to the Red Wolves defense. Under Hall, USM was 0-10 when trailing after 45 minutes and seemed to be heading for loss No. 11.
Southern Miss traveled into enemy territory on every first half drive and came away with points only once, a 23-yard pass from Wilcke to Jason Brownlee in the second quarter. The four fruitless ventures ended in either an interception or a punt.
The third quarter didn’t see a single USM first down, but it did witness a bad snap on a Golden Eagle punt attempt that resulted in a demoralizing safety.
Hall then turned to a familiar face in Lange in an effort to reignite the offense. The sophomore’s last extended action was a stretch as the starter in 2021, one that saw USM go 0-4.
“I thought (Lange) gave us the best chance to win the game,” Hall said. “Zach (Wilcke) is a really talented, really good player. He’s turned the ball over a lot here, recently. I thought he was a little emotional early.”
Wilcke threw two interceptions to Arkansas State’s Kenneth Harris, running Wilcke up to five picks tossed over the past two games.
Lange entered and completed six of his 12 pass attempts while protecting the football. The final 15 minutes also saw Hall mix Janari Dean in at running back. Dean rushed for a season-high 43 yards and scored his first touchdown of the season just a few hours before his birthday.
That score was set up by a gutsy two-play sequence that included another unsung hero. Lange created a fourth-and-short situation with a scramble drill that drew a “twinkle toes” remark from Hall postgame.
He then hit seldom-used tight end Cole Cavallo to pick up the first down near the goal line before Dean punched in the go-ahead score.
“I’m so proud of Jake, Jake is a role model for a lot of people,” Hall said. “He comes to work everyday with no promise and no hope of ever getting a reward for it. I got a lot of respect for him. He’s going to be a great, great coach.”
Southern Miss’ journey at the quarterback position hasn’t been smooth under Hall, and Saturday only served to open up even more questions about the future of the position. According to Hall, Wilcke still has the potential to be his man behind center.
“This don’t mean Zach Wilcke is done,” Hall said. “Zach Wilcke is going to be a phenomenal football player for us.”
Bend but don’t break
Arkansas State’s James Blackman couldn’t miss. He was 22-for-24 at one point in the third quarter and making zero mistakes. And yet, the Red Wolves only found the end zone on their scripted drives to open each half.
The Butch Jones-led team never reached the red zone outside of those two possessions and mustered up only 1.6 yards per rush.
Southern Miss had nine tackles for loss and four sacks, while eventually breaking Blackman down and forcing him into completing just three of his last 10 pass attempts.
“We wanted to start disrupting him a lot more because he was staying in the pocket for a little too long,” said linebacker Dominic Quewon, who got his Sun Belt-leading sixth sack in the second quarter. “He was a little too comfortable. So getting back there and trying to shake him up did the job.”
It was Quewon who registered the quarterback hurry on Ark. State’s final play of the game, slamming into Blackman as he launched a prayer downfield that fell incomplete.
Southern Miss is currently allowing over 360 yards of offense per game, but is one of five teams in the league that have allowed 10 or fewer red zone touchdowns.
“(Blackman) was completing passes but they weren’t scoring,” Hall said. “We completed a lot of passes last week, too, but we didn’t score. I felt like we were getting some good hits on him, I thought we were beating him up. He’s a tough guy, I got great respect for James Blackman because he got hit hard, tonight.”
Breakout from the slot
To go along with Lange’s heroic fourth quarter performance and Dean’s coming out party, Southern Miss got an unexpected boost from true freshman slot receiver Ty Mims.
Mims came into the game with just two catches, but was called upon when star wide out Jakarius Caston went down on the first play.
Using speed and shiftiness, Mims caught five passes for 81 yards. Of those 81 yards, 53 were after the catch.
“I’m pretty good at catching the ball and running after because I have good speed,” Mims said. “I just like to cut a lot to make people miss... I was just trying to get it into the end zone.”
Mims left a noticeable impact on the game, especially in the first half. Mims turned an intermediate pass into a 29-yard gain early in the second quarter and then drew a defensive pass interference just a couple of plays later. Those 44 yards led to USM’s first score of the game.
Southern Miss goes back on the road next week in hopes of getting above .500 in conference play. The Golden Eagles will face Texas State at 4 p.m. on ESPN+.
This story was originally published October 15, 2022 at 9:19 PM.
