“It’s good to win again.”
That is how Liberty head coach Jamey Chadwell began his press conference Saturday afternoon just a few minutes after the clock ran out at Floyd Stadium in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. The Flames (6-2, 4-2 CUSA) got back into the win column and secured bowl eligibility with a 37-17 win over Middle Tennessee (3-7, 2-4 CUSA).
The win ends Liberty’s two game losing streak with losses to Jacksonville State and Kennesaw State in the last two outings. It had been over a month – 32 days to be exact – since the team’s last win – a 31-24 overtime triumph against FIU on October 8 at Williams Stadium and just the second win since Sept. 21. That is quite the change for a program that had won 17 consecutive regular season contests, the longest active streak in the country at the time, and had won 18 out of 19 overall.
“The locker room when you when you lose, it’s not a fun locker room,” Chadwell continued. “It was good to come back in that locker room and have a victory. Very pleased with our effort in all three phases. I thought we played clean, as far as from a penalty standpoint, although we had some turnovers early, but we didn’t let it affect us. I was pleased that we played together for four quarters.”
The Flames are now bowl eligible for a sixth straight year, achieving bowl eligibility in every year the program has been at the FBS level.
“A check point to get bowl eligible, but it’s hard to win,” said Chadwell. “You don’t want to be the team or the coach that breaks the six year streak, so that was good to get that and what I’m encouraged by is we played really well. We can do things better, and I’m hoping this team stays hungry.”
Liberty entered the day ranked No. 9 in the country in rushing at 228.6 yards per game, ran the ball 51 times and averaged 6.6 yards per carry. The Flames finished the contest with a season-high 339 yards on the ground. It marked the fifth time in eight games Liberty has rushed for 200 or more yards in 2024.
Quinton Cooley paced the rushing attack with 24 carries for 136 yards and his team leading eighth rushing touchdown. It was his 13th career 100 yard game and sixth of the season. Kaidon Salter rushed nine times for a season-high 94 yards, including a 41-yard scamper that put the Flames on the board, tying the score at 7 in the first quarter.
“We needed to get back to our identity,” Chadwell said of the rushing attack. “We lost that a little bit, and I thought it was good to go to it. The way they were playing is they were not going to give up any big plays. They wanted to see, ‘Hey, will you be patient enough?’ Our guys did a great job. Then when we did throw, we were able to hit some quick outs, get some balls across the middle, make some explosive plays there. It was one of those things we wanted to come in and control the line of scrimmage. We put a lot of emphasis on that. We can really challenge our offensive line and really everybody. We anticipated they were going to play that way. I really liked how our guys executed.”
The Flames lost fumbles on two of its first three drives. One was a backward lateral screen pass to Juju Gray and the other was an option pitch by Salter which MTSU recovered before going out of bounds. Other than those two drives, Liberty scored a touchdown on every drive of the first half, scoring four touchdowns to take a commanding 27-7 lead into the locker room at halftime.
Coming out of the break, the Flames went three and out and had to punt. The Blue Raiders took possession and needed to score to stay in the game. They drove the length of the field on a 17-play drive that included a fourth down conversion. MTSU faced a 4th and 1 from the Liberty 5-yard line and decided to go for it. Liberty’s defense would get the stop and force the turnover on downs, ending a drive that lasted over 8 minutes and virtually sealing MTSU’s fate.
“A couple huge stops,” Chadwell said of his defense. “That one right out of half time, when they get down there, and we stop them a half a yard, that’s huge because we’re up, 27-7. They score there, 27-14 and they’re in the game. That was a big deal. I thought they played really well. I know defensively, they feel like there’s some things they left out there too. You want to come out with a victory and be able to be excited about it, but also know there’s room to improve.”
Juju Gray, an NC State transfer, had his first breakout game as a Flame. He missed several games during the year with an injury suffered in the season opener. He finished the game with two touchdowns while rushing the ball for 57 yards and also 34 yards receiving. He took a reverse around the left side of the field for a 41-yard rushing touchdown and hauled in his only pass in the second half resulting in a 34-yard touchdown score.
“I mean, he’s explosive,” Chadwell said of Gray. “He’s been hurt all year, and we’re still working through some things,. He looked up and dropped a pass and ended up being behind the line of scrimmage, it’s a fumble. Still working on some things because all the time he missed. But you can see when the ball is in his hands, he’s got some explosiveness to him. He obviously had a huge game today, and we need to be able to use him, because he does give us a different dimension than we’ve had.”
In addition to his rushing feat, Salter also completed 11 of 15 passes for 154 yards and two touchdowns.
“I thought he did well,” said Chadwell of his quarterback. “The one pass that he fumbled, just a terrible decision. He owned it, which is good to see. ‘Hey, I screwed that up as my fault.’ He stayed locked in. I thought he did a really nice job of commanding our offense. He knew they were playing us a certain way. I thought he did a good job of distributing to who we needed him to distribute and managing the clock and the things that we needed to do. So it’s good to see. I think there’s been some growth from him last couple weeks, which has been really good. If he can continue to do that and we can continue to be better around him and be more consistent, then we got a chance to be better offensively.”
Jerome Jolly led Liberty’s defensive attack with seven tackles, including a sack and forced fumble. The fumble was recovered by linebacker Ethan Crisp and returned deep into MTSU territory late in the first half. It set the Flames up with great field position to punch in its final touchdown of the first half. Crisp, playing in front of a lot of family and friends from his nearby hometown of Mount Juliet, Tennessee, had two tackles for loss and the fumble recovery. Liberty held Middle Tennessee to 88 rushing yards on the day.
Liberty returns to action on Saturday at UMass in a non-conference tilt. The Flames and Minutemen are scheduled to kick off at Noon in a game that will be streamed on ESPN+.
*photo courtesy Liberty University Athletics