It looked like Memphis football again
Maybe it was when Darrell Henderson made three different UConn defenders look silly with three ankle-breaking cuts on one touchdown run.
Or when he and tailback Patrick Taylor Jr. combined for 250 rushing yards and five touchdowns on 16 carries in the first half.
Or when quarterback Brady White didn’t throw an incompletion until the third quarter.
Or when the defense gave up a succession of third-down conversions to start the game and closed the night with four turnovers.
Or maybe it was when coach Mike Norvell won the opening coin toss and decided to put his offense on the field right away, as opposed to deferring possession like he did a week ago.
But at a certain point Saturday at Liberty Bowl Memorial Stadium, and it didn’t take very long during a 55-14 homecoming romp over UConn, this Memphis football team looked like a Memphis football team again.
“I didn’t want to wait," Norvell said. "Whatever was going to happen, we were throttle down. We were going.”
Sure, the opponent was one of the worst teams in the country this year.
For goodness sake, even Rhode Island put up 49 points in UConn's only win of the season. Memphis actually helped the Huskies improve their season average by gaining 634 yards on offense.
For that reason, it’s hard to determine whether Norvell, his staff and these players actually corrected the issues that plagued them last week.
It was nonetheless better than whatever happened at Tulane,
when the Tigers looked listless and left New Orleans looking like a team coming apart at the seams.
"We played our brand of football," White said. "We played like we know how to."
That’s all you could really hope for on a night when about the only drama happened 800 miles away in Orlando, when UCF quarterback McKenzie Milton briefly left the Knights’ game against SMU. He returned one series later, and will return to Memphis next Saturday for a rematch of last year’s American Athletic Conference Championship.
That’s when we’ll learn if the Tigers can still be a contender in this league, or if they’re just another bowl team feasting on inferior competition this year.
"It’s going to be a great atmosphere and we’re going to be ready to go," Henderson said. "We got to get revenge."
There were promising signs heading into that marquee matchup.
Memphis opened Saturday's game using its two tight ends — Joey Magnifico and Sean Dykes — at the line of scrimmage to combat the recent trend of opposing defenses stacking the box to slow down Henderson. Magnifico even caught a touchdown pass to open the scoring.
The nation’s leading rusher then proceeded to run wild again, after a one-game detour, ripping off four more runs of at least 25 yards. On Henderson’s 61-yard touchdown run in the second quarter, he pulled off moves that appeared to be straight out of a video game. On a 29-yard jaunt in the third quarter, he carried defenders with him like he was Hodor from "Game of Thrones."
This may be sacrilege in a FedEx town. But through the air, through the ground, what can Henderson do for you? Everything, it appears.
If not for the lopsided score and the re-emergence of Taylor, Henderson would have reached 1,000 yards rushing in one-half of a season.
No matter what happens next week when UCF comes to town, no matter what the Tigers end up doing this season, none of it will diminish the mind-boggling numbers Henderson is putting up right now.
This week, though, he got plenty of help. After he and Taylor combined to rush for more than 100 yards apiece four times a year ago, the two juniors accomplished the feat for the first time this year.
Henderson finished with 174 yards and three touchdowns. Taylor had 161 yards and three touchdowns, too.
When asked for a nickname, Henderson proclaimed the duo to be "a two-headed monster."
But don't forget White, who rebounded from a scary showing at Tulane. On Saturday, he didn’t throw his first incompletion until nearly five minutes had elapsed in the third quarter and it came on a smart throw away out of bounds.
Even better: the Memphis signal caller looked more confident throwing the ball downfield.
The Tigers’ defense, meanwhile, seemed competent again after giving up a discouraging 17-play touchdown drive to begin the game.
Of course, all of these developments came with an asterisk because they happened against UConn.
It looked like Memphis football again. But through six games, it's still unclear what this Memphis football team can be.
“I didn’t care what the situation, what the circumstance, I wanted to see a response," Norvell said. “We played like Memphis Tigers, and that’s what I was most pleased with.”