Saturday’s 56-7 loss to Tulsa pushed the Cougars back to second place in the Conference USA West Division and catapulted the Golden Hurricane into first place with two games left on each team’s schedule.
Houston (6-4, 5-2 C-USA) can only look forward and take care of its own business because it’ll take a win against Marshall (2-8, 2-4) at 2:30 p.m. Saturday in Robertson Stadium and a loss by Tulsa to Rice on Nov. 24 for the Cougars to get to the C-USA Championship Game.
"Let’s go Rice," senior wide receiver Jeron Harvey jokingly said. "We just got to take care of business with Marshall first, then we can handle everything after…. We’ll just have to let it play out."
It may seem like a lot to hope for, but it wouldn’t be the first time the Cougars needed a miracle to keep their championship hopes from vanishing.
On the next-to-last weekend of the 1984 regular season, the Cougars had to beat Texas Tech and needed Texas, Texas Christian and Arkansas to lose to stay mathematically alive in the race for the Southwest Conference title. Houston defeated Texas Tech, and the other three squads lost.
But that was the easiest part.
The Cougars still had to defeat crosstown rival Rice and needed Texas to beat Texas A’M on the season’s final weekend to clinch the championship.
Somehow, Houston pulled off the miracle by beating the Owls, and Texas defeated Texas A’M. That gave the Cougars the SWC crown and a trip to the Cotton Bowl.
Chances are it won’t take a miracle to defeat Marshall, which is winless on the road this season, but the team is coming off a 26-7 win against East Carolina on Saturday.
This could easily be a trap game for the Cougars, but head coach Art Briles said after Tuesday’s practice they can’t let that happen.
"We can’t allow it to be difficult (to put the Tulsa loss behind us). What’s happened, happened. What’s in front is what’s in store," Briles said. "Our focus, our energy and our attitude is about playing the best we’ve played this season, working the best we’ve worked all year in practice – which we did today."
Saturday’s game also marks Houston’s Homecoming game. It’ll be the last Homecoming for the seniors, including Harvey, running back Anthony Alridge, wide receiver Donnie Avery and linebacker Trent Allen.
"It’s going to be an amped up game," Harvey said. "We lost last week, so coming out this week it should be more energetic. I think we will come out more ready as a team and more focused so we can get a win."
Harvey said the Thundering Herd has good weapons on defense and said the Cougars could be challenged.
"Marshall is a good team," Harvey said. "Their record doesn’t show that they’re a good team but watching film and looking at their players, they have overall speed in the secondary.
"They have some good players out there, so that’s why we’re coming out to practice every day with a different mentality, working out and all. We’re going to come out here with a different motivation… and try to be victorious on Saturday."
One of the areas the Cougars need to pay extra attention to this week is defense. The defense seemed to rise to the occasion this season when it mattered, but everything snowballed against the Golden Hurricane.
Tulsa senior quarterback Paul Smith torched Houston’s secondary, completing 15 of 28 passes for 313 yards and five touchdowns.
The Cougars will face another dual-threat quarterback in Bernard Morris on Saturday, and UH junior safety Kenneth Fontenette said the Thundering Herd’s offense might be tough to stop.
"(Marshall) has a good quarterback. They got some athletic wide receivers, their running back (Darius Marshall) is real good. Their go-to guy is their tight end (Cody Slate), and they’ll be spread out throughout the game. That’s the guy we have to stop," Fontonette said.
Another issue that seemed fixed before last week’s game against Tulsa was the turnover problem.
However, Houston committed five turnovers against Tulsa, and Briles said he knows it’s an issue again.
"It hurt us. They got 35 (points) off of turnovers," Briles said. "What we have to do is play good clean football, and that’s our plan this week.
"We’re going against a good Marshall team. They’re going up against a hungry University of Houston team."
