| 9/15/2024 | Football BOCA RATON, Fla. – The Florida Atlantic football team won their seventh straight Shula Bowl on Saturday evening, taking down FIU in a 38-20 victory. Despite boasting a new team with a new coaching staff since their last meeting in 2022, Hagerty Family Head Football Coach Tom Herman made sure to instill the importance of the 20+ year rivalry and trophy. The Owls battled through a 90+ minute weather delay and an early 7-0 deficit to defend their title. FAU moves to 17-4 all-time in Shula Bowl victories. FIRST HALF The turning point came with 2:34 to go in the first quarter when redshirt freshman DE Eric Brantley Jr. blew up a rush to force a fumble that was recovered by senior DL Jaden Wheeler. From then on, the remainder of the half was all Owls. Zuberi Mobley punched it in from one yard out for his first touchdown since 2022. There was more to come on the very next offensive possession, with Mobley taking a handoff to the right sideline and rushing his way to the end zone for a career-long 72-yard touchdown to take a 14-7 lead. It was then the defense’s turn to showcase their playmaking ability. Senior CB Daedae Hill recorded his first interception of the season, leading to a Morgan Suarez field goal. When FIU returned to the field, Florida Atlantic recorded another takeaway, junior S Phillip Dunnam’s second red zone interception. The defense gave the ball right back to the offense for their third consecutive drive when, for the second straight game, true freshman safety C.J. Heard recovered a fumble. This led to Mobley’s hat trick touchdown to end the first half up 24-7. SECOND HALF Scoring continued in the third for the Owls with junior QB Cam Fancher taking it to the end zone himself for a 12-yard rushing TD. Later in the quarter, redshirt junior RB C.J. Campbell joined the rushing party for his first touchdown as an Owl. In an evening of repeat highlights, graduate DB “Buggs” Khazir Brown made his second acrobatic INT of the season to give FAU the ball back for the final time as the Owls rushed to the trophy once the clock struck zero. OFFENSE Five touchdown runs for the offense is tied for the third most in program history. This has occurred seven times, four have been against FIU Mobley is the first Owl to record three rushing touchdowns in a game since Malcolm Davidson, also in a Shula Bowl, on November 9, 2019 He also owns FAU’s first 100+ yard rushing game of the season with 134 yards In addition to his 61 rushing yards, Campbell led the way in receiving with four catches for 59 yards Fancher added 64 yards on the ground DEFENSE The Owls won the takeaway battle 5-0 Redshirt junior safety Jayden Williams led the way with seven tackles Brown now has eight career interceptions, Dunnam has five, and Hill has three Graduate DL Chisom Ifeayani registered his first sack as an Owl Heard, the nation’s leader in tackles among freshman, recorded six on the night to up his season total to 20 QUOTABLE Hagerty Family Head Football Coach Tom Herman “Excited to get the win in the Shula Bowl, excited to get the win for our team, to go through the frustration of the first couple of weeks knowing that we didn’t play up to our standard for most of those games. For this one, we decided in the first quarter that we were going to do everything we could to lose the game. But I was so proud of our guys for responding. I don’t know if we could have withstood that first quarter just two weeks ago, and we did. We withstood it, we have to make sure that doesn’t happen again and then we have to figure out how to win too. When you have a 34-point lead going into the fourth quarter, you have to put your foot on people’s throat. I was proud of the offense on the last drive, but we have to do a better job finishing teams off. But that second and third quarter was indictive of the way that we can play. But I told the team that we’re going to celebrate the hell out of this, it has been almost a calendar year since we won a game, and we won a rivalry game to boot. But I think we all know that the competition level is going to increase and we have to continue to increase our level of play in order to accomplish the things that we want to accomplish.” Junior QB Cam Fancher “Coach said before the game nothing should get you more fired up than coming to play this game, I definitely felt that intensity and energy from the guys.” Redshirt Junior RB Zuberi Mobley “Obviously we knew it was going to be a big game, credit to the o-line and everybody that helped us out in the run game. I knew this was going to be a big game and we were going to have to set the tone and that’s what happened.” Senior CB Daedae Hill “We got to win the turnover battle to try win the game. You come out there and go get takeaways and have their offense looking like they have to find something else to do instead of just throwing the ball. We come out there and try to attack the ball.” Redshirt Senior OL Federico Maranages “This was my fifth year winning the Shula Bowl. That’s always a great rivalry against FIU, I can play against teammates that I used to play with in high school. It’s definitely fun to see friendly faces, but it’s a lot more fun to win, so it’s great to win the Shula Bowl. UP NEXT Florida Atlantic heads back on the road on Saturday, Sep. 21 to take on UConn (1-2). The game will air on CBS Sports Network at 7 p.m. EST. FOLLOW ON SOCIAL Stay informed by reading FAUSports.com or through football’s Twitter and Instagram accounts @FAUFootball. |
