GAMEDAY: Troy vs. North Texas
October 23, 2009
At 2:30 p.m. today, hopefully a beautiful afternoon of football, Troy (4-2, 3-0) hosts North Texas (1-5, 0-3) for homecoming. HERE is the advancer I wrote.
THE SKINNY: Troy has hit its stride in the last four games after starting the season off slow. If not for fumbles and a few penalties, last week’s 42-33 win at FIU would have been much worse. Levi Brown is making his case for Sun Belt Player of the Year and threw for 391 yards against this same defense last year. DuJuan Harris isn’t putting up the numbers he did last year, but he’s got two improved backs behind him who have earned carries in Shawn Southward and Maurice Greer. Jerrel Jernigan looked like the Jerrel of old, but he’s got some running mates out wide, too, as TeBiarus Gill has produced and Josh Jarboe looked like he’s over his nagging injuries and Zack Marcum has stepped up this year. The defense has been very good lately and there’s not a front 7 in the league that matches Troy’s talent there. Going unnoticed is the play of the secondary, led by freshman cornerback Bryan Willis. Is he the next NFL defensive back of this bunch?
North Texas started the season off with a bang, winning at Ball State. That win has been cheapened a little bit because Ball State is pretty bad, but UNT hasn’t rolled over and died like it did in just about every game last year. Troy coaches have expressed concern with stopping UNT’s offense, especially with the strength being its offensive line (probably the best outside of Florida it will have seen this year) and the play lately of running back Lance Dunbar. However, at QB you’ll see either pocket passer Nathan Tune (good arm, no mobility) or Riley Dodge (accurate arm, no deep threat, but mobility very limited with ankle injury, plus durability a question). If UNT can’t get any good play out of the QB, the run game won’t be as effective as it was against ULL and Troy’s defense. UNT’s defense has struggled this year.
KEYS TO THE GAME: For UNT, score early. Put pressure on Troy and show that you’re not the team of old. For Troy, don’t turn the ball over and watch out for the late hits to the quarterback, legit or not.
WHAT TO EXPECT: While UNT is good offensively, it hasn’t faced a defense like Troy. I still think the Trojans get another huge day from Levi Brown and win comfortably. Troy 45-13
FOLLOW ME: I’ll give game updates/thoughts on TWITTER. You can follow me at twitter.com/dothaneagletroy. Any questions during the game? Post a comment on the blog, or for quicker response, send a twitter update to me by mentioning @dothaneagletroy in your post. This worked pretty well last week at FIU.
AROUND THE SUN BELT: I’ll make my score predictions quick here. Let’s go Middle Tennessee 34, Western Kentucky 17; UL-Lafayette 34, FAU 30; Arkansas State 27, FIU 21; Kentucky 35, ULM 7
