WKU (5-5, 3-3) vs. Middle Tennessee (5-5, 3-3)
Friday, Nov. 17 | Houchens-Smith Stadium | 7 p.m. CT
Friday, Nov. 17 | Houchens-Smith Stadium | 7 p.m. CT
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| HILLTOPPERS HOST MIDDLE TENNESSEE ON SENIOR DAY It will be WKU's final home game of the season as the two teams battle for bowl eligibility. |
The Matchup
It will be Senior Day on The Hill as WKU honors the 2017 senior class in their final home game. This senior class is currently 36-15, the sixth-most wins by a senior class in program history and second-most in the FBS era. In the last 10 years, WKU is 7-3 on Senior Day and has won five straight.
WKU's senior class is aiming to become the first senior class in the FBS era to defeat Middle Tennessee three times and the first class since 1980 to do so. With a victory, WKU would become bowl eligible for the seventh consecutive season and extend Conference USA's longest bowl eligibility streak.
The match-up between Middle Tennessee and WKU is Conference USA's most frequently played rivalry game. The teams have combined for 66 games with MT holding a 34-31-1 advantage overall.
Scouting Middle Tennessee
While the Hilltoppers have come up short in the previous three games, the Blue Raiders are riding a two-game winning streak, due in part to the return of quarterback Brent Stockstill. Son of head coach Rick Stockstill, the quarterback has returned from injury and rallied his team to a pair of consecutive victories over UTEP and Charlotte. Stockstill's No. 1 target entering the season, All-American wide receiver Richie James, is out for the season with an injury but fellow receiver Ty Lee is just as dangerous in the pass catching game.
Last week at Charlotte, converted linebacker now running back Tavares Thomas rumbled for 195 yards and two touchdowns in 29 carries.
Defensively, the Blue Raiders are led in tackles by safety Jovante Moffatt with 65 total tackles. Linebacker Khalil Brooks has had a monster season in the backfield where he has tallied 13 tackles for loss. Against Conference USA opponents, the Blue Raiders are behind only the Hilltoppers in pass defense (159 yards to 176 yards allowed) while MT features the No. 3 total defense against league opponents.
2017 Team Captains
WKU's season-long team captains were voted on at the end of fall camp, entirely by the players. Under Sanford, the team has one offensive captain, one defensive captain, one "trenches" captain (from either offensive or defensive line) and a rotating special teams captain.
Offenive Captain: QB Mike White
Defensive Captain: LB Joel Iyiegbuniwe
Trenches Captain: DL Derik Overstreet
Youth Movement
For the year, 24 players have earned their first career start as Hilltoppers on offense or defense, the fifth-most nationally, and 11 true freshman have seen game action. WKU trails Ball State (31), Illinois (29), Baylor (26), and Coastal Carolina (25) in that category.
The 11 true freshmen who have seen have seen game action: Kyle Bailey, Roger Cray, Antwon Kincade, DeAngelo Malone, Jakairi Moses, Ben Reeder, Latheron Rodgers-Anderson, Dionte Ruffin, Jacquez Sloan, Cole Spencer and Steven Witchoskey.
Take Your Pick
In the passing game, the Hilltoppers have proven to spread the ball around to a variety of pass catchers. The Hilltoppers are one of five teams nationally with five or more receivers with 25 or more receptions. Washington State has eight, while Northwestern, Northern Illinois and New Mexico State each have five.
4-2-5 Defense Proving Stout
Removing a pick-six allowed by the offense at Illinois, the Hilltopper defense has allowed just 229 points through 10 games, the fewest through 10 since 2007 (211 points). The 3,680 total yards allowed are the fewest since 2013. Clayton White's crew also averages 4.40 three-and-outs per game, the 16th best mark nationally or 36.4 percent of drives.
A Complete Performance Against Charlotte
WKU founds its offensive rhythm in a big way against Charlotte as the Hilltoppers churned out 627 yards of total offense, including 506 yards through the air, both season-highs by far. It was arguably the most complete performance this season by the team, just six games in to the installation of new offensive and defensive schemes.
Other marks of note included:
- Mike White's monster day (398 passing yards, 5 TDs, 1 rush TD) can stand by itself, but he's the only quarterback in the FBS this season to hit those marks while also completing 70-percent of his passes in a victory.
- The 398 yards are the second-most by a Conference USA passer this season and the most by a C-USA quarterback in a conference game.
- As a team, WKU's 506 yards passing were the fifth-most in a single game in school history.
- WKU ran 92 plays in the game, the eighth-most in a single game in school history.
- The 22 first downs via the pass tied for the second-most in a game in school history while the 34 first downs overall tied for fourth-most in a game in school history.
- The Hilltoppers 4-2-5 defense allowed just 61 yards passing, the fewest allowed to a conference opponent in the program's FBS history.
- Charlotte tallied just nine first downs overall, the fifth-fewest allowed to an opponent in WKU's FBS history. Of those nine first downs, just two came via the pass, the fewest ever allowed to an FBS opponent.
Season Helmet Stickers
WKU will wear a pair of helmet stickers this season, honoring two former Hilltoppers who passed away during the offseason: former assistant coach Butch Gilbert and former tight end Mitchell Henry.
Gilbert regularly passed out butterscotch candies to players and coaches during his visits to practice, which WKU commemorates with a wrapped candy as a helmet sticker. To commemorate Henry, WKU has an "MH" sticker on the helmet.
Who's Next?
With the graduation of Forrest Lamp, Darrell Williams, Max Halpin, Taywan Taylor, Anthony Wales, and Nicholas Norris, the opportunity to make a name for yourself is wide open for the 2017 Hilltoppers. All six had NFL opportunities following their senior campaign and three (Lamp, Taylor, and Williams) made rosters. Between the three offensive lineman (Lamp, Williams, and Halpin), they combined for 140 games played and 129 starts - nearly all of them together. Wales tallied 1,621 rushing yards and led the nation in scoring and touchdowns, while Taylor and Norris combined for over 7,000 receiving yards for their careers as they went 1-2 in the record books in every major receiving category both season and career.
All totaled, those six played in 289 combined games with a staggering 209 combined starts.
The Sanford Era Begins
WKU is in the first season of the Mike Sanford era which began at home with a 31-17 victory over Eastern Kentucky. The nation's second-youngest head coach, Sanford's youth is deceptive. When he was hired on December 14, Sanford was, in fact, more experienced at that point in his coaching career than either of WKU's previous two "first-timers" in Jeff Brohm and Willie Taggart. He was one of just four rookie head coaches (out of 10) in 2017 to win his debut and one of only 12 new coaches overall (out of 24) to win his season opener.
Sanford has 12 years of FBS coaching experience while his predecessors had just 11 when they landed their first head coaching job on The Hill. Additionally, the head Hilltopper has been to five Bowl Championship Series (BCS) or New Year's Six bowl games, compared to just one combined with the previous two first-timers.
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