Kats back at it following a bye week
10/11/2013 11:21:00 AM | Football
The well-rested No. 2 Sam Houston State football team opens Southland Conference play this homecoming weekend against Lamar.
Sam Houston is coming off its bye week after beating then No. 2 Eastern Washington at Bowers Stadium, while the Cardinals seek a third consecutive win for only the third time since bringing back their football program in 2010.
The Bearkats are excited to compete again, but the bye week came right on time preceding the team's run for a third straight Southland Conference championship.
“Coming off the win against Eastern Washington, that was nice for us,” senior wide receiver Torrance Williams said. “We knew going into that game that we'd have a bye week afterward. We had to focus on the game first. We won, put it behind us.
“Two main focuses during the bye week were rest and recovery, then looking forward to Lamar. We were already pretty healthy as a team going into the Eastern Washington game. We came out of there with no injuries and that was good for us,” he said.
Cardinals players are on record of considering the Bearkats as “the big dogs of the conference,” making this game one that would do a lot to boost the confidence of an improved Lamar team from a year ago. Williams said that while the Bearkats should not have much to worry about as long as they continue playing the way they have, he said Lamar is a lot better.
The Cardinals opened the season with a 75-0 win against Oklahoma Panhandle State on Aug. 31. The next week, Lamar started a two-game losing streak against FBS teams, falling 27-14 to Louisiana Tech and 59-3 to Oklahoma State.
Lamar's most recent wins have come against Bacone College (53-0), and a rally from 16 points down against Grambling to win 27-16.
Lamar head coach Ray Woodard said he expects this game and conference season to be more competitive than the last couple of years when Sam Houston ran through the conference competition.
"We're not coming into this game trying to play perfect, because we won't be perfect," Woodard said during his weekly press conference. "But we need to be closer to perfect than Sam is. Last year we had some opportunities but mistakes hurt us. We have done a pretty good job this year at eliminating mistakes. We are one of the least penalized teams in the Southland, but so is Sam. So we have to cut down on the mistakes.
"We're doing some things good right now, but now we need to do more things right on the road against a very good football team. That is something in the past that we haven't always been able to do," he said.
The Bearkats will also be defending the longest active home winning streak in the FCS with 18 consecutive wins at Bowers Stadium dating back to a win over Texas State in 2010. The Kats are also in pursuit of the ninth season in school history to go undefeated at home.
Senior quarterback Brian Bell said the team is going to continue to take it one game at a time, which means the target for now is Lamar.
“That week off definitely helped us get a lot of guys healthier and rested up,” Bell said. “We never really had anybody truly banged up, but getting everybody really healthy and let mindsets relax a little bit and get the weekend off, it was really good for our bodies and our heads. We really just came into this week ready to go. We started the week off strong and we're looking forward to finishing strong.”
