It’s been a slow process with UL’s special teams this season.
But it was the kicking game that delivered the first big break to the Ragin’ Cajuns in Saturday’s 33-6 home victory over Troy.
After the first drive of the game, UL punter Mason Golding hammered a high 50-yard punt that made it difficult for Trojans’ returner Noreel White to field.
He fumbled it and true freshman Harrison Kidder recovered at the 8.
Two plays later, Lunch Winfield hit KeDarius Wade on a 3-yard touchdown catch to put UL up for good at 7-0.
“It was a huge play,” UL coach Michael Desormeaux said. “Those are plays that change the game completely from the beginning. It’s a unit that we’ve had a lot of work to do on it. The cover units, to get down there and make it was huge. Mason hit a great ball. So it was a really big play in the game.”
From the beginning of the season, Desormeaux talked about the youth on this year’s squad. Once the injuries came, the area depending the most on young players became the special teams.
“I’m really proud of that group, because have a lot of youth on our special teams now,” Desormeaux said. “I know there isn’t anybody in the building that stays up here later than (coordinator) Mike G (Giuliani). It matters to him a whole lot and he doesn’t have an easy task this year with the youth we have.
“The guys pours into them day after day … he wears his heart on his sleeve. Has it been perfect this year? No. Will the statistics at the end of the year be good? No. But the improvement from week to week has been outstanding.”
Certainly there was still some bad in Saturday’s win – from the botched extra point to a kickoff out of bounds to more flags in the return game.
The best thing the special teams do is placekicker Tony Sterner, who continues to be perfect on the season with field goals of 42 and 46 yards.
On the other side, Troy’s kicker missed a 42-yarder.
But it went beyond that. Desormeaux also saw improvement in kickoff coverage.
“We did a much better job containing,” Desormeaux said. “Look, you put something bad on tape, you’re going to see it again and again. They kept trying to bounce the field returns because we’ve gotten hurt on it. And we did a really good job.
“We’ve got to get our tackle zoned down, all that stuff and got to tackle a little bit better, but we contained the ball and got it on the ground.”
Focused effort
Almost all the discussion about Saturday’s home game against Troy centered around the Cajuns bouncing back from the 32-31 road loss in Ruston.
After the 27-point win over Troy, though, there was another angle high on the minds of UL players and coaches.
Redshirt senior defensive tackle Fitzgerald West made it seem like a pretty simple situation.
“If you look at the stat sheet, since the Sun Belt has split into two different sides, the West has either been won by either Troy or UL,” West said. “That’s the stat. So that tells you exactly why. It’s either us or them and we won.”
Indeed, that process began in 2018 with the Cajuns winning the division the first four seasons.
Troy then won in 2022-23, before the Cajuns returned in 2024. The Trojans then made it three times in the last four years last season.
“We talked about it all week,” redshirt senior linebacker Jake St. Andre said. “Since 2018, this game carries massive implications and that was something we talked about. We understood as a team and tried to go out there and execute.”
No turnovers
After three crippling turnovers in the 32-31 loss to Louisiana Tech last weekend, the Cajuns officially had no turnovers against Troy.
Peeling back a layer, however, Lunch Winfield did throw what looked like an interception approaching the red zone, but the low pass was fortunately not corralled near the ground.
Also, JJ Garner did drop a ball on his way to a 7-yard run for a first down. The ball bounced right back up to Garner, though.
It was pretty obvious in the postgame press conference, however, that did little to make that fumble easier for Desormeaux to witness.
“We’ve got to quit putting the ball on the ground,” Desormeaux said. “That’s been something that’s been a black eye for us right now. The ball hitting the ground is inexcusable.
“That bottom line is we’ve got to quit putting the ball on the ground. There’s no two ways about it.”
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