Pratt accounts for 5 TDS, Tulane tops UCF 45-28 to win AAC
NEW ORLEANS — Michael Pratt accounted for 442 total yards and five touchdowns, Tyjae Spears highlighted his 199 yards rushing with a 60-yard score and No. 18 Tulane beat No. 22 UCF, 45-28, on Saturday night in the American Athletic Conference championship game.
The victory virtually assured Tulane (11-2) would play in the Cotton Bowl — its first major New Year’s Day bowl since the 1939 season — only one season after going 2-10. Jubilant fans stormed field as the game ended, capping a campaign that would have been hard to conceive of a year ago with an equally unthinkable celebratory scene.
Pratt passed for a career-high 394 yards, including touchdowns of 73 yards to Duece Watts, 60 and 10 yards to Shae Wyatt and 43 yards to Lawrence Keys. Pratt also ran for a pivotal 18-yard touchdown with 4:04 left.
Spears electrified the sellout crowd of 30,118 at Tulane’s cozy, on-campus Yulman Stadium with his long scoring run on which he broke two tackles near the line of scrimmage, made two other defenders miss and hurndled his own fallen teammate after cutting back inside.
The Green Wave, which earned the right to host the title game by ending Cincinnati’s 32-game home winning streak last weekend, avenged a 38-31 regular-season loss to UCF (9-4) on the same field three weeks ago.
But UCF was not quite the same team because of QB John Rhys Plumlee’s nagging hamstring injury, which appeared to rob him of the explosiveness he displayed by running for 176 yards at Tulane on Nov. 12.
Plumlee struggled so much early on that coach Gus Malzahn pulled him from the game in the second quarter favor of Thomas Castellanos. But with Tulane up 24-7 in the middle of the third quarter, Malzahn put Plumlee back in as primarily a passer — and he nearly led the Kights all the way back.
Plumlee led UCF quickly for a touchdown to make it 24-14, converting a fourthand-10 pass along the way and capping the drive with a 17-yarder to Kobe Hudson.
Tulane responded when both UCF safeties froze on a play-fake to Spears and Pratt found Watts running free behind the defense.
UCF cut it to 31-21 when former Virginia QB RJ Harvey took a backward pass from Plumlee and launched a 49-yard TD pass to Hudson.
And the Knights got the ball right back when Spears fumbled after catching a short pass on the Green Wave 30. And Isaiah Bowser’s 10-yard run shortly after got UCF as close as 31-28 with 9:48 still to play.
But Pratt again found a way to lead the Wave down the field, connecting with Wyatt for the longer of his two touchdowns, and UCF didn’t threaten again.
SUN BELT: TROY 45, COASTAL CAROLINA 26
TROY, Ala. — Gunnar Watson and the streaking Troy Trojans came out with a flurry of big plays and a defense that was barely budging.
Watson passed for 318 yards and three long touchdowns to lead the Trojans to a 45-26 victory — their 10th straight — over Coastal Carolina in the Sun Belt Conference championship game on Saturday.
“It seemed like everything was going right for us,” Watson said.
The early domination didn’t last, but it was enough.
The Trojans (11-2) raced ahead 31-0 and with a 316-22 advantage in total yards en route to their Sun Belt-record seventh league title. Coach Jon Sumrall’s first season began 1-2, with one loss on a Hail Mary pass, and ended with fans celebrating Troy’s first Sun Belt title since 2017 by storming the field and bringing down a goal post.
A group of students carried part of the goal post out of the stadium to the parking lot. It ended up in a nearby fountain.
“That probably will be one of the coolest memories I’ll ever have here,” Troy linebacker KJ Robertson said. “That was awesome for me. I don’t know how they’re paying for that.”
By the time three-time Sun Belt player of the year Grayson Mccall got the offense going for Coastal Carolina (9-3), it was all but over. Mccall started at quarterback after missing the past two games with a foot injury.
“They came out and really took it to us from the opening drive and we could not respond at all there in the first half,” said Chanticleers coach Jamey Chadwell. “I was proud of our team trying to come back in the second half. I thought we showed a lot of effort and fight.”
Watson completed 12 of 17 passes, including touchdowns of 67 yards and 36 yards to Rajae’ Johnson and a 65-yarder to Deshon Stoudemire. Watson was hit as he was throwing the 67-yarder with Johnson stretching out to grab it.
Johnson then snagged the ball one-handed to answer the Chanticleers’ second touchdown.
“I saw the replay and I was like, ‘Holy crap,’” Watson said.
DK Billingsley ran for three touchdowns, including a 33-yarder, for the Trojans.
Troy, which was coming off three straight five-win seasons, hasn’t lost since that Appalachian State Hail Mary on Sept. 17. Sumrall & Co. left the field in a much better mood this time.
MOUNTAIN WEST: FRESNO STATE 28, BOISE STATE 16
BOISE, Idaho — Jake Haener threw for 184 yards and a touchdown, Nikko Remigio returned a punt 70 yards for a score, and Fresno State defeated Boise State, 28-16, to win the Mountain West Conference championship Saturday.
Fresno State (9-4) overcame a 1-4 start to
the season and a rash of injuries to win its final eight games, claiming the program’s third Mountain West crown.
Boise State (9-4), which won 40-20 in the regular-season match-up between the teams, fell to 3-3 in Mountain West title games.
Boise State controlled the game early but struggled to find the end zone, clinging to a 3-0 lead late in the first half. But that all changed when Fresno State scored two touchdowns in a span of 2:36 right before halftime.
Remigio’s electric return snaking back and forth across the field sparked Fresno State before Cameron Lockridge intercepted the first of two passes, returning it 25 yards to the Broncos’ 17-yard line. Three plays later, Jordan Mims scored on a 2-yard run to put the Bulldogs up 14-3. They never relinquished the lead.
After Boise State edged within 14-9 in the third quarter, Fresno State tacked on two more touchdowns in the fourth quarter to put the game out of reach.
Jordan Mims rushed for 83 yards and a pair of scores for Fresno State.
Boise State’s Taylen Green was 17-of-38 passing for 175 yards with a touchdown and two interceptions.
SWAC: JACKSON STATE 43, SOUTHERN 24
JACKSON, Miss. — Shedeur Sanders threw for four touchdowns, including two on three first-quarter turnovers, staking Jackson State to a big early lead on the way to routing Southern, 43-24, in Saturday’s Southwest Athletic Conference championship that was possibly Deion Sanders’ final game as Tigers coach.
Reports swirled before the game that Sanders would announce his departure from the FCS program after three seasons to become head coach at Colorado. Sanders acknowledged an offer from the school earlier this week and added that he had talked to other FBS programs about vacancies. Colorado’s board of regents called a special meeting for Sunday but hasn’t commented on any candidates taking over the Buffaloes.
JSU (12-0) quashed any questions about Sanders’ future being a distraction by completing the first unbeaten regular season in school history and claiming its second consecutive SWAC championship. The Tigers’ topranked defense set the tone by quickly pouncing on the Jaguars for three turnovers in eight plays in the first quarter.
Shedeur Sanders, the Hall of Fame coach’s son, and the Tigers easily converted the takeaways into a 26-0 lead after 15 minutes, a run boosted by Sy’veon Wilkerson’s 1-yard TD run two plays after Herman Smith III’S 37-yard interception return. Two fumbles created chances for Sanders to hit Shane Hooks for TD passes of 14 and 40 yards and two-point conversions to Kevin Coleman Jr.
Sanders’ 14-yard TD pass to Coleman made it 33-7 at halftime, but Southern (7-5) didn’t quit and even got within 36-24 late in the in third quarter on Glendon Mcdaniel’s 42-yard TD run.
Sanders, the SWAC’S offensive player of the year, completed 31 of 44 passes for 305 yards. Hooks caught five passes for 98 yards and Wilkerson rushed 15 times for 61 yards.
Mcdaniel was 15 of 34 passing for 220 yards and a TD for Southern.
The Tigers advanced to the Celebration Bowl for historically Black colleges on Dec. 17 in Atlanta against Mid-eastern Athletic Conference champion North Carolina Central.