Rice's shot at first victory plundered by Pirates, Navy

By Meghan Hall     10/22/09 7:00pm

After a 63-14 thrashing at the hands of the United States Naval Academy and a 49-13 loss to East Carolina University, Rice has officially hit rock bottom. And with their 0-7 record, the Owls (0-3 Conference USA) have no more excuses left to use. Injuries and inexperience have plagued this team, but the tides are slowly turning in those areas. Redshirt sophomore quarterback Nick Fanuzzi now has two games under his belt after his shoulder injury, while the patchwork offensive line has played three consecutive games together.

Senior wide receiver Toren Dixon had a few things to say regarding the team's inexperience.

"Every week I'm seeing guys grow up," Dixon said. "We wish we could get more guys, instead of every week just one individual. Hopefully we can get the whole group to grow up and-maybe that will change the outcome of some of these games."

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Like the contest with Navy, the game against ECU looked to be decided early, but Rice at least showed some fight against the Pirates (4-3, 3-1 C-USA), particularly in the third quarter.

The teams went into halftime with the score at 28-10, the highlight of the first half being an 80-yard touchdown pass from Fanuzzi to Dixon. They started a promising drive in the third but stalled before settling on a field goal.

"I think at times Saturday, offensively, was probably as good as we've looked in quite a while," Head Coach David Bailiff said. "They actually played with effort at times. It's sometimes, though, where we're playing with so much effort we're not doing what we're supposed to do because we're trying to make every play. We've got to get it to where everybody on that field is accountable to each other and knows what their one-eleventh is."

Rice's field goal in the third quarter represented its last points of the day. Meanwhile, the Pirates opened the floodgates and notched three more touchdowns in the fourth for the final 49-13 score. Dramatic scoring by the opponent in the last two quarters has been an unfortunate theme for the Owls this season, something Bailiff and the coaching staff are attempting to fix.

"When something bad happens in football you cannot forget your techniques and your fundamentals, and that's what we've been doing," Bailiff said. "When something bad happens, we start to press and then everybody tries to make every play.

"From that point on, we continue to play worse defensively, worse offensively and worse on special teams. We've got to get that out of them."

There were offensive bright spots, particularly the Fanuzzi's play. He completed 25 passes on 43 attempts for 231 yards, one touchdown and one interception, with an average of over nine yards per completion. He passed the ball around to 10 different receivers, with Dixon's 115 yards leading the way.

But only a few of the 11 defensive players appeared to be on task and ready to play, among them sophomore defensive back Travis Bradshaw and junior defensive end Cheta Ozougwu, who both finished with 10 tackles. And Rice will be losing one of those 11 for the rest of the season after senior safety Andrew Sendejo's ankle sprain. Rice defense has given up an average of 45 points per game, last in the nation, and losing a preseason All C-USA selection will only hurt that number.

For Rice to come away with a win against conference rival University of Central Florida (3-3, 1-2 C-USA) tomorrow at 2:30 p.m., the team needs Fanuzzi to solidify his position as an offensive leader and find a way to stop making unnecessary mistakes.

"Once again, when we make mistakes it is almost like we beat ourselves," Dixon said. "We shot ourselves in the foot numerous times. I think if we were to eliminate those mistakes, we would see different results and we would get a win around here.

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