Southern Miss responded to head coach Charles Huff’s challenge with its most complete performance of his tenure, rolling past defending Conference USA champion Jacksonville State 42-25 on Saturday at M.M. Roberts Stadium.
Huff said he had a “stern conversation” with his team after last week’s loss at Louisiana Tech.
“There probably wouldn't be enough bleeps to go out for me to tell you what I said to them,” Huff said. “But there was a challenge. I can’t tell you how proud I am of this football team. They made a choice to respond. Instead of letting last week beat you twice, they made a choice to respond.”
The Golden Eagles used a strong defensive effort and steady offense to dominate defending C-USA champions Jacksonville State 42-25. The victory comes just one year after the Gamecocks dominated Southern Miss a season ago, effectively ending the Will Hall era, and sending that season spiraling downward.
If anything, this win does exactly the opposite.
It closed out non-conference play and lifted Southern Miss to a winning record heading into October for the first time since 2019.
Defensive dominance
Southern Miss’ defense was the story, holding Jacksonville State to 390 total yards — 151 of which came in the fourth quarter when most of the Golden Eagles’ starters were out of the game.
The Gamecocks entered as one of the nation’s top rushing offenses, but Southern Miss controlled the line of scrimmage and bottled up star running back Cam Cook, who came in averaging more than 6 yards per carry. Cook finished with 83 yards on 23 attempts, just 3.5 yards per carry.
While Jacksonville State finished with 262 yards rushing, most of that came from quarterback Caden Creel, who accounted for 177 on the ground. Of those, 147 came in the second half after the Golden Eagles had already built an insurmountable lead.
Huff wasn’t ready to declare the “Nasty Bunch” fully back, but he acknowledged the progress.
“We’re getting better each week,” Huff said. “The one thing about the Nasty Bunch was they were consistent. It wasn’t one game a good half, one game a bad half, one game three-and-a-half really good quarters. We’ve still got to earn that. But I think we’re chasing what has been a standard around here for a long time.”
The Golden Eagles forced four turnovers, three of which directly led to touchdowns.
The first came on Jacksonville State’s opening offensive play when defensive end JJ Hawkins stripped quarterback Gavin Wimsatt, and Ian Foster recovered at the Gamecocks’ 25.
“It gave us a lot of momentum on defense,” Hawkins said. “It lit a fire in us.”
That fire translated into a quick 25-yard scoring drive, capped by Jeffery Pittman’s 1-yard touchdown run for a 7-0 lead.
Pittman added another score on Southern Miss’ next possession with a 3-yard run. He finished with 18 carries for 82 yards and two touchdowns.
“I feel like tonight we just started with the O-line being back on point,” Pittman said. “We were being physical and running the ball.”
Later in the second quarter, linebacker Avery Sledge recovered a fumble from Creel, setting up another Golden Eagle score. Southern Miss marched 48 yards in 11 plays, and quarterback Braylon Braxton scrambled for a 6-yard touchdown just before halftime, stretching the lead to 21-3.
With the way the defense was playing, that proved to be more than enough.
Southern Miss also came up with a fourth-down stop at the 1-inch line in the second quarter, turning away Jacksonville State’s best chance to climb back into the game.
Despite being down starters Jabari Ishmael and later Isaiah Gibson on the defensive line, the Golden Eagles held strong. Hawkins helped fill the void with five tackles, a strip sack and a tackle for loss. Michael Montgomery led the defense with nine tackles, while the unit as a whole recorded four sacks.
The secondary locked down Jacksonville State’s passing game, limiting the Gamecocks to just two completions of more than 5 yards all night.
Balanced offense
While the defense set the tone, the offense did its part.
Braxton shook off a quiet first half (12 attempts, 59 yards) to throw two touchdowns after the break. He connected with Kadinn Morris for a 6-yard score and Carl Chester for a 13-yard strike in the third quarter.
Braxton finished 13 of 22 for 152 yards and two touchdowns, while adding the rushing score late in the first half.
Southern Miss leaned heavily on its run game, posting a season-high 225 rushing yards. In addition to Pittman’s 82 yards, Matt Jones added 45 and Jaylin Carter chipped in 44 — both season highs.
The combination of timely passing and a three-headed ground attack gave Southern Miss its most balanced performance of the season.
Turning point performance
Altogether, Southern Miss cashed in Jacksonville State’s mistakes for 21 points and never allowed the Gamecocks to find a rhythm.
One could argue it was the program’s most complete performance not only of the Huff era, but of the past five years.
The victory also provided the response to Huff desperately wanted to see from his team post Louisiana Tech.
“They made that choice on the way home from last week’s game,” Huff said. “They followed it up with the best week of practice we’ve ever had. So now we know what it looks like. Now we’ve got to repeat that every week. But I can’t tell you how proud I am of this football team, every player in that locker room, every coach, every assistant, every administrator. Heck of a job tonight.”
Southern Miss (3-2, 1-0 Sun Belt) now has a bye week before traveling to Georgia Southern (2-3, 0-1) for a Thursday night matchup on Oct. 9.
