Bobcats coach pleased with offense in Saturday's victory
SAN MARCOS — Texas State nearly tripled its offensive produc t ion from a season-opening loss to Rutgers in Saturday’s 36-20 victory over Texas Southern.
The Bobcats (1-1) put up 547 yards of offense while scoring two touchdowns and kicking five filed goals.
It’s the kind of production head coach Everett Withers has been expecting with his up-tempo style offense.
“Offensively, I thought we did a really great job of moving the ball,” Withers said at his weekly press conference on Monday. “Five hundred forty-seven yards of offense on 81 plays. Kind of what we envisioned it being, 6.8 yards per play. Over 300
yards rushing on offense, with 107 of that coming from (quarterback) Willie Jones (III) who did a nice job of managing the game with the read-option run game. I thought he improved tre- mendously from week one to week two as far as managing the ball game.”
Jones completed 17 of 28 passes for 233 yards with a touchdown and no turn- overs, completing a pass to nine different receivers. The sophomore led the team in rushing yards with 107 on 18 carries, averaging 5.9 yards per carry.
Grad transfer tight end Kennen Brown caught Jones’ lone touchdown pass, which was the first collegiate touchdown for either player. With- ers said getting Brown the ball was a big emphasis in practice this week, which was evident by him leading the team with seven receptions for 108 yards.
Texas State’s defense scored another touchdown and shut out Texas Southern in the first half. Still, Withers said he thought the Bobcats could have played better in the secondary, specifically in the second half.
“Tale of two halves defen- sively,” he said. “Really good first half I thought. Zero points. For the game, we only gave up 36 yards rushing. Second week in a row we got a touchdown on defense.
“I do not feel we played well on the back end of the second half. In the third quar- ter, we gave up 167 yards passing on 13 attempts and (in the second half ) we gave up 116 yards passing on 17 attempts for 283 yards so that’s not very good on the back end.”
Notes: Senior kicker James Sherman was selected as the Sun Belt Conference special teams player of the week. Sherman made five field goals in Saturday’s game, including twice from a career-high 41 yards . ... Safety JaShon Waddy (leg contusion) didn’t finish Saturday’s game but is expected to play this week at South Alabama (0-2), according to Withers . ... Defensive end Ishmael Davis was held out of the game for an illness and offensive tackle Kam Jemmison is expected back this week after missing the first two games.