Sports

Grambling shut out by USM in second game of season

The Grambling State Tigers struggled to slow down the Southern Miss Golden Eagles as they lost 37-0 on Saturday night at M.M. Roberts Stadium. 

Coming into the game, the Tigers were seeking their first back to back season opening victories since 2001.

The game started out as more of a defensive battle. Southern Miss broke the score drought in the opening quarter by putting together a 10 play, 68-yard drive.

Grambling nearly cut the deficit with 12:38 left in the second quarter as Garrett Urban’s 47-yard field goal attempt came up just short.

Southern Miss responded with a 47-yard drive as Briggs Bourgeios hit a 40-yard field goal to extend their advantage to 10-0 with 7:39 left in the first half. After a Grambling State punt, Southern Miss took over and landed in field goal range, but Bourgeious' 50-yard attempt was wide left, keeping the Golden Eagles lead at 10-0 with 2:52 remaining in the quarter.

“I thought we played well in the first half and we made some timely mistakes with penalties,” said GSU head coach Broderick Fobbs.

After halftime the Golden Eagles dominated the game. Southern Miss added to the lead in the 3rd scoring a rush touchdown by Frank Gore Jr. and a field goal by Bourgeious’ to extend to the lead to 20-0.

Southern Miss took advantage of a short field, going 57 yards in 51 seconds as Dajon Richard rushed for a 27-yard touchdown early in the 4th

Bourgeious added another field goal with 10:24 left in the fourth quarter for his third field goal of the night.

Southern Miss capped off the night with an AJakarius Caston 11-yard touchdown catch from Ty Keyes.

The Tigers struggles on offense showed in the game. The Tigers only registered 90 pass yards and 62 rush yards.

Aldon Clark and Elijah Walker split time at the quarterback position. Walker came into the game as the starting quarterback.

Darqueze Brutton rushed the ball eight times for a total of 46 yards. That was a team high for the game and season so far.

Donald Johnson III caught three passes for a team-high 26 yards.

Defensively, Blake Thomas recorded eight total tackles and a sack. Lewis Matthew recorded eight tackles, with three solos and one sack. 

Grambling finished with nine first downs and six committed penalties. Southern Miss controlled the time of possession 31:03 to 27:50.

GSU fell to 14-9 during the Fobbs era in night games. The Tigers had not been shutout in 73 games until Saturday night.

Coach Fobbs was proud of the team’s performance in defeat.

 “We came out and competed hard against a good Southern Miss team,” Fobbs said. “Now we’ll go back and look at the film, make adjustments we need to make and prepare for a very good Houston football team.”

Tigers visit the University of Houston next week. 

GSU and Houston have met twice in the series with the Cougars owning a 2-0 all-time series mark. 

Kickoff is set for 6 p.m. from TDECU Stadium and the game will be streamed live on ESPN+.

 

Darqueze Brutton was GSU's leading rusher versus USM.