Jacksonville State defeats MTSU for fourth straight win

Rich Rodriguez sat down, exhaled and said four words in his postgame press conference after Jacksonville State's win on Wednesday.

“It's hard to win,” the coach said, repeating again: “It's hard to win.”

While that was the first thing the coach said, his Jax State team made Wednesday's win in Jacksonville look easy again.

The Gamecocks earned their fourth straight win on Wednesday night, defeating Middle Tennessee State with a 42-20 win at AmFirst Stadium.

The win moved the Gamecocks to 3-0 in Conference USA and in a tie with Western Kentucky for the conference lead.

“When it comes to our games, our conference, every conference, there are good coaches, good players everywhere and every week is a challenge,” Rodriguez said. “I don’t think we played our best in certain areas at times tonight, but we played hard and the guys continue to play hard. We ran the ball, controlled the game a little with our running game and got a nice win.

“I'm happy with that. On to the next one.”

Tre Stewart shined again in the win, totaling 210 yards and a touchdown on 21 carries. He was the first 200-yard rusher for Jax State since Troymaine Pope ran for 250 yards in an FCS playoff win over Charleston Southern in 2015.

Pope, now an offensive assistant at Jax State, quickly learned that Stewart had broken his streak.

“I did a little bit,” the Limestone transfer said when asked if he made fun of Pope for breaking his streak. “But he always helped me.”

Stewart and quarterback Tyler Huff also combined for the most rushing yards since that win; Huff ran for 151 yards and two touchdowns in the win.

Andrew Paul had the other two rushing touchdowns for the Gamecocks, scoring from 4 and 26 yards in Anwar Lewis' absence.

“Tyler ran really hard, Tre ran really hard, Andrew ran hard,” Rodriguez said. “The guys up front did a good job. I thought our tight ends did a great job and our wide receivers blocked downfield.

“I don’t know what we got ourselves into; 438? That's not bad. But that was a difference in the game. We didn’t commit any turnovers, which is usually hard to win, but we controlled it with our running game.”

The victory continued one of the best offensive streaks in Jax State history, with the last four wins combining for the most points in a four-game stretch since 2015; The Gamecocks scored a total of 203 points in wins over Southern Miss, Kennesaw State, New Mexico State and MTSU.

“It's progressing, but we always have to keep a cool head because sometimes wins can push you too far,” linebacker Laletia Hale said of the locker room culture. “But I feel like we have some guys that know what it takes to win, we know what it's like to win, so we're up but not too high.”

The defense was again highlighted by the linebacker tandem of Hale and Ole Miss transfer Reginald Hughes; Hughes finished the game with a team-high seven tackles and half a sack, while Hale had five tackles and half a sack.

“Our two supporters Reggie and Laletia have been really good in the last four or five games; I’m talking about really good, outstanding linebacker play,” Rodriguez said. They're big guys, they're physical guys, they understand defense a little bit better. We did a few things differently today, we still need to clean up a little in some areas, but they're trying hard and that's what I'm most proud of: that's our standard, no matter how hard we try to play, no matter how The result is that no matter what team, no matter what time it is, the game should never change. I think from my perspective they played pretty hard.”

Fred Davis II had 1.5 tackles for loss to lead the team, while Zechariah Poyser had two of the team's six pass breakups.

Jacksonville State (4-3, 3-0 CUSA) will travel to Liberty on Wednesday looking to stay atop the Conference USA standings.

Liberty fell to winless Kennesaw State 27-24 on Wednesday.

“I heard Liberty lost, but they're going to be at home, it's going to be a big crowd, it's going to be a big game,” Rodriguez said. “We must have a great week of preparation.”