Sun Sentinel Palm Beach Edition
Strong defensive play quietly draws notice
BOCA RATON — The effort was lost in all the hoopla surrounding the Florida Atlantic offense.
That tends to happen when a team scores 69 points and tallies 804 total yards, but the Owls’ defense was fine playing in the shadows. It performed just as well in last week’s victory against North Texas and has been the more consistent unit throughout the season.
“We talked about it that I think it was kind of a missed story in all the offensive records last week,” FAU coach Lane Kiffin said. “That [North Texas] was a really good offense, an elite passing game … I thought our defense played really well.”
The Owls allowed 31 points and 420 yards, but the bulk of that came against the reserves in the fourth quarter. Many of the defensive starters were on the sideline enjoying the record-setting victory.
The defense was dominant enough to help build a 41-7 halftime lead. North Texas’ Jalen Guyton entered the game as the leading receiver in Conference USA but was held without a catch.
“I don’t see the defense all the time because I’m making adjustments and stuff,” Kiffin said. “I didn’t realize that (Guyton) didn’t have any catches, so obviously great job by our guys in doing that. That was good because that was one of our big challenges. Coming in he was one of the premier players in the country at his position.”
Still, most of the headlines ignored the defensive play. Instead, they focused on running back Devin “Motor” Singletary breaking the school’s single-season rushing touchdown record, Kerrith Whyte’s 82-yard scoring run and quarterback Jason Driskel winning Conference USA Offensive Player of the Week after throwing for a season-high 357 yards and two touchdowns.
The defense has no problem playing the supporting cast role. It knows it can be counted upon.
“I really don’t care if they get all the attention,” linebacker Azeez Al-Shaair said. “I don’t care who you are or what conference you’re playing in, if you put up points like that, it’s special. We’re just happy that they’re doing their thing and continue to try to do ours and make sure we limit teams.”
The defensive statistics are a bit misleading because of the recent circumstances. The Owls have won by an average of 28.6 points during the three-game winning streak, meaning the coaching staff had time to rest players.
“The stats ended up not great because of our backups giving up big plays at the end,” Kiffin said. “But our guys played really, really well against the best offense in the conference on paper.”
The Owls rank sixth in conference in scoring defense at 26.6 points a game. They are 13th in rushing defense (213.1 yards a game) and eighth in pass defense (208.3) but make up for it with their league-leading 12 interceptions.
“We’re winning games,” safety Jalen Young said. “That’s all that we’re focusing on. We’re winning games, that’s it. I’m not really focused on what side is doing this, what side is doing that. Both sides of the ball have to come to work every day and that’s what we’re doing. From that standpoint, I really couldn’t care less what anybody can say about that.”