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| Furman's Xavier Stephens celebrates a sack during the Paladins' 24-20 loss to Charleston Southern. Photo courtesy of Furman |
Following Furman's 24-20 home loss to Charleston Southern Saturday, Clay Hendrix couldn't recall if he's ever been involved in a win where his team was at least minus-four in the turnover battle. During his tenure as the Paladins' head coach, that's definitely the case for one simple reason. Saturday marked the first time that Furman had four more turnovers than an opponent in Hendrix's eight-year head coaching career.
The last time it happened to Furman was in 2016, when the Paladins lost four and forced none in back-to-back losses to Coastal Carolina and Kennesaw State.
There are plenty of things to work on moving forward for Furman (0-2), but turnovers were the biggest factor in Saturday's loss. For the game, the Paladins had a 336-257 advantage in total offense, 20-14 edge in first downs and had time of possession more than four minutes longer than CSU (1-1).
"Obviously, the glaring thing is the turnovers. ... We had every opportunity to still win the game," Hendrix said. "I kind of see that as a positive. But we also haven't created any (turnovers) and that's something we've been really, really good at."
The first turnover came on the third play of the game when Carson Jones' third-down pass was picked off by Chandler Perry near midfield. That didn't turn out to be too critical thanks to a fourth-down sack by Luke Clark on the Bucs' ensuing possession.
Furman avoided what could've been a disastrous turnover after the teams exchanged scores late in the first half. Freshman quarterback Trey Hedden took over at quarterback with 5:40 left in the second quarter and directed a drive that ended with a push pass to Colton Hinton for a five-yard touchdown that gave the Paladins a 10-6 lead. CSU answered with the first of two fantastic touchdown catches by a well-covered Noah Jennings. A two-point run by punter Gilbert Brown put the Bucs up 14-10.
"They throw two go (up and get it) balls. We're in great position on both of them, but their guys makes a play on both for two touchdowns," Hendrix said. "I've talked about us being better at throwing the ball downfield and we have been all August. We throw two the other night that weren't well covered. One was a gimme touchdown, but we overthrew it. The other one we throw out of bounds. We had a couple of those at Ole Miss too."
After the kickoff, Furman took over at its own 22 with 23 seconds left. On first down, Hedden dropped back to pass and was hammered by Tylan Hollis forcing a fumble that was recovered by tight end Brock Chappell. The Paladins wisely simply let the clock run out following the recovery.
Furman wasn't quite as fortunate with turnovers in the second half. Midway through the third quarter, Hedden's pass was intercepted by Hollis, who returned it to the Furman nine-yard line. Two plays later, CSU took a 21-17 lead thanks to Autavius Ison's seven-yard touchdown run.
The Paladins responded with what looked to be their best possession of the night. The 13th play of the drive, which took 6:36 off the clock, was a first-and-goal at the CSU seven-yard line. Hedden scrambled from the pocket and just dropped the ball, which the Bucs recovered at their own nine-yard line.
Furman trailed 21-20 midway through the fourth quarter when Hedden was sacked by Perry, causing a fumble that was recovered by Hollis at the Paladins' 17-yard line. A personal foul pushed CSU back to the Furman 32, but that just gave the Bucs more room to shave off more clock before a field goal pushed its lead to 24-20.
"Trey came in and did some good stuff, but you've got to take care of the ball. I don't care what level of football you play, you've got to take care of the ball," Hendrix said. "We will learn from this and get better. We're a work in progress."
After a touchback on the kickoff, Furman should've began at its own 25 with 2:18 left. Instead, it started at the 20 thanks to an unfathomable delay of game penalty before the first play of the drive. Four Hedden incompletions later, the Bucs ran out the clock.
"I want to give them (CSU) a bunch of credit for doing what they had to to win the game. They took care of the ball, their receiver made two big plays for touchdowns and took advantage of a lot of mistakes we made," Hendrix said. "We talk a lot about Furman not beating Furman and man, we did a lot of stuff to beat ourselves."
In addition to losing four turnovers, Furman also didn't force any for the second consecutive game. The last time the Paladins went back-to-back games without getting a turnover on defense occurred in blowout losses to Clemson and Elon to start the 2018 season. In fact, over the last four seasons Furman's defense forced at least one turnover in all but one game each season.
"Those are things we're working hard daily to get better at. Everything we want is still out there in front of us," Hendrix said. "I told my staff (Monday) morning, I feel like we're five games in with the way the thing has started, but we're not. We just lost a game the other night that we felt like we should've won.
"We've still got a couple of weeks to get to the conference schedule, which is the most important part of all of us."
Paladins drop out of polls
The turnover streaks weren't the only ones to end for Furman, which dropped out of both the FCS media and coaches polls this week. The Paladins had been ranked for 22 consecutive weeks dating back to late October of 2022.
They weren't the only Southern Conference team to fall from the polls. After an overall rotten Saturday for the league, which could be problematic come selection Sunday for the FCS playoffs, Western Carolina also got booted out of both polls. After a strong showing by the Catamounts in a season-opening loss at N.C. State, Western lost its home opener to Campbell Saturday.
Chattanooga also seemed to get unusually hosed in the polls after a 24-21 loss at FBS member Georgia State. The Mocs fell from 10th to 16th in the coaches poll and from No. 11 to No. 14 in the media poll after losing a game in which it led in the fourth quarter.
Mercer (2-0) did enter the poll at No. 23 (media) and No. 24 (coaches) and Wofford (2-0) received votes for both after its fourth consecutive win dating back to last season. The last three of those victories for the Terriers have been against teams that made the 2023 FCS playoffs.
Meanwhile, The Citadel lost in its home opener to South Carolina State Saturday. That came a week after the Bulldogs snapped an 11-game losing streak by rallying from 21-3 down to beat Charleston Southern. VMI also lost to Bucknell in its home opener.
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