No Updates for Status of Mustangs' QB Right Now
DALLAS — There won't be any speculation here about what type of injury SMU quarterback Preston Stone suffered in the first half against Navy. It was something to do with a lower leg and it looked terrible watching it live.
"He was in a lot of pain. It's his ankle," Lashlee said after the game. In fairness, a lot of smaller bone leg injuries resemble an ankle at the time. "Is it a sprain? We're not sure yet. He was in the locker room celebrating with team and in good spirits. Wasn't in any pain right there. There's a chance. Obviously it's never good when your quarterback has to ride off into the locker room, but we'll know more probably by (Sunday)."
They are not able to do MRI tests at Gerald J. Ford Stadium so they can't do a full-scale exam. That will come as early as Sunday, but it may be Monday before we'll know anything for sure. We do know he was having a heckuva game in the 59-14 win.
Stone had thrown for 322 yards and three touchdowns on 14-of-19 passing in under two quarters. He had 275 of those yards in the first quarter, the most by any quarterback in the country this year. SMU jumped out to a 28-0 lead and led 28-7 at the end of the first quarter and went up 42-7 with under 10 minutes to go before halftime.
Some will just say the Midshipmen aren't very good and they would be right, but it's not an excuse. If you can pile up those stats playing against air it's not bad. The Ponies did what they were supposed to do in that situation and close out the win.
Now the attention turns to redshirt freshman Kevin Jennings from South Oak Cliff in Dallas. This season he's 18-of-24 passing with three touchdowns. Lashlee put him in the game and got him out in a hurry because they don't think they need to see a lot to know what he can do.
"Fortunately for us, if he's not able to go we've always felt like we had two starting quarterbacks," Lashlee said. "Because of the way the game was, that's why you didn't see Kevin in the second half. There's just no point in it. He even had to pull one zone read and you're screaming 'Get down,' just because you don't know. Once you get to that point, you're one more play away from it getting real thin. (Jennings) was going to start the second half. They took the long drive and then we picked it ran back for a touchdown, so by the time we got the ball half the quarter was gone and we're up more and it just didn't make any sense. We were able to get Alex Padilla and Keldric Luster in there. We were doing our best to get out of there without any more injuries or anything like that."
No. 25 SMU and No. 17 Tulane will kick off the AAC Championship game in New Orleans at 3 p.m. Saturday afternoon on ABC and fuboTV.
PONY EXPRESS:
MUSTANGS BACK IN TOP 25 LATEST THEY'VE BEEN IN A VERY LONG TIME
RHETT LASHLEE DIDN'T USE KEVIN JENNINGS MORE IN WIN OVER NAVY "BECAUSE WE DIDN'T NEED TO"
PONIES' QUARTERBACK PRESTON STONE GOES DOWN WITH SERIOUS-LOOKING INJURY IN SECOND QUARTER
