Here’s our quick hit notes following Liberty’s 48-41 win on homecoming against Idaho State:
- Any win is a good win as Liberty moves to 4-3 on the season and continues to fight for enough wins to possibly garner a bowl invitation. Idaho State is a borderline top 25 FCS team. Yes, the Flames are now FBS, but just a season ago this would have been looked at as a very good win. Good job by the team to put the Troy game to bed and take care of business. Liberty has a 2 game win streak for the first time this season.
- After initially being ruled out earlier this week for the 2nd straight game with mono, AGG got the start. He went through warmups and was able to play. And what a game he had. He finished with 10 receptions for 142 yards and 2 touchdowns. Postgame he said he had a false positive initial test for mono, his 2nd test came back negative late this week. He was cleared Thursday which is when he returned to practice. He said he started feeling better late last Sunday into Monday.
- Alex Probert also made his season debut. He connected on 6-of-7 extra points. Aaron Peart continued to handle the kickoffs. He mentioned in the postgame press conference that he had a quad injury.
- Liberty started the game with an impressive 15 plays, 78 yard drive that took 6:36. It ended with a Frankie Hickson 6 yard touchdown run as the Flames took an early 7-0 lead. That drive is the longest scoring drive by Liberty this season, both in number of plays and time of possession. The Flames had 14 play drives against New Mexico and Troy and a 4:51 drive against New Mexico State. Buckshot was a perfect 9-for-9 on the drive.
- After an impressive game last week against Troy, the Flames’ coaching staff praised defensive coordinator Robert Wimberly’s move to the press box. This week, against a very good FCS offense, Idaho State racked up over 600 yards of offense. That’s now 5 times in 7 games this season that Liberty has allowed over 500 yards of offense. With 631 yards of total offense, Idaho State nearly set a Liberty opponent record. The current record is 680 yards allowed in 1983 by Central State.
- On a positive note, the Flames defense had 5 sacks and 9 tackles for loss. They also forced 3 turnovers.
- Jessie Lemonier had a record day, leading the team with 9 tackles, 5 tackles for loss, 3 sacks, and 2 forced fumbles.
- The Bengals used a balanced offensive attack, as they rushed for 234 yards and quarterback Tanner Gueller passed for 397 yards. He completed just 20 of 44 passes while throwing 4 touchdowns and 2 interceptions.
- Aidan Alves continues his up and down play this season. After a poor performance last week against Troy, he rebounded today with 5 punts for 226 yards, which is an average of 45.2 yards per punt, he also had 3 inside the 20 and an impressive 73 yard punt. That punt traveled approximately 45-50 yards in the air and then rolled into the end zone for a touchback.
- Frankie Hickson had 133 rushing yards and 3 touchdowns. He missed a little bit of time as he got banged up on a run inside the 5 yard line late in the first half. He returned to the game, and had a huge 47 yard touchdown run to push Liberty’s lead to 48-34 with 87 seconds left in the game.
- BJ Farrow left the game after making a catch on the first drive. He was seen on the sidelines during and after the game with a walking boot on his left foot.
- Attendance was 16,502. Certainly a disappointing number for homecoming.
- The Flames are now 4-3 entering a bye week. Two more FBS wins and Liberty will be eligible for a bowl game provided there is an opening with not enough bowl qualifying teams. We’ll certainly be keeping an eye on this in the coming weeks. Bowl eligibility was a topic of conversation brought up by the players in the post game press conference, saying it is definitely one of their goals they are striving for.