The Good, the Bad, & the Ugly: Tulane Needs Better Play, Now
Tulane Football Schedule
Opponent | Time/Date | Result | Score | Record |
|---|---|---|---|---|
at Duke | 2:30PM, 9/5 | L | 17-3 | 0-1 |
Sou Alabama | 6PM, 9/12 | W | 28-24 | 1-1 |
@ K-State | 11AM, 9/19 | L | 31-20 | 1-2 |
Sou Miss | 6PM, 9/26 | W | 24-21 | 2-2 |
OPEN | 10/3 | -- | -- | -- |
@ Army | 11AM, 10/10 | |||
Memphis | 6:30PM, 10/16 | |||
UTSA | TBD, 10/24 | |||
@ Charlotte | 6PM, 10/30 | |||
Tulsa | TBD, 11/7 | |||
@ Rice | TBD, 11/14 | |||
Nor Texas | TBD, 11/21 | |||
@ Sou Fla | TBD, 11/27 |
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Tulane won the Battle for the Bell on Saturday night, as the Green Wave held on for dear life to defeat Southern Miss, 24-21. The Wave had to use defensive lineman Josh Lewis' push through the middle of the line to block a late field goal that would have tied the game and use three quarterbacks to make it through the night.
Before we get to the topic at hand, two important quotes from Tulane coach Will Hall after the game that we will discuss at the end.
"That was a huge comeback win by our young men in a game where we were not playing well and nothing was going our way," Tulane coach Hall said, "and a lot of that is a credit to Southern Miss. But, the way we kept fighting and the way we kept believing, a lot of young men nowadays, that's not the cool thing to do anymore. Keep believing when things aren't happening your way and to keep fighting and keep trusting in each other, we've got that. We've got character, we've got heart, we've got effort, we've got love for each other.
"We've got to play better. We've got to catch balls in the hands, we've got to read things correctly. We've got to leverage the ball to the boundary and unbalance there at the end. There's all kind of things that are simple that we can fix, but we've got to fix them. As a coaching staff, we have to fix it. We've got to coach better, and that starts with me."
The Good
Mo Turner and the Running Game
It didn't start as "a good." The whole Wave rushing game had 16-yards in the first 15-minutes.
Just when the Green Wave needed him, Mo Turner broke the game he had been wanting to have since transferring from Louisville to Tulane over a year ago, but his day didn't begin that way.
"Starting off the game, I was down on myself," Turner confided. "I had two bad runs, two misreads, and the room as a whole, they came up to me and they were like, 'You know you can do this. You're better. Just get out of your own head.' They really helped me out right there. I made one big explosive run and it just took off from there."
Twelve carries, 200-yards on the nose, making Turner only the second running back in Yulman Stadium history to hit the double-century mark. The first was Jaylin Lucas earlier this month against South Alabama.
The Green Wave rushing game garnered 281-out-of-the Wave's 445-yards.
We knew this running back room was special from early in Spring practice.
A Punter? We've Got One Right Here from Our Own Backyard
The guy who walked on as punter from Jesuit, William Hudlow has proven his worth. The New Orleans native has had to navigate other punters being brought to Uptown (think Alec Clark last season and Brooks Moore this year). Now, the redshirt junior has claimed the job.
"He was probably the most doubted young man in our program where that position was," Hall said after the game. "We brought in a true freshman that was highly recruited (Moore), and he (Hudlow) just comes to work every day."
Hudlow punted seven times, five of them over 50-yards, averaging 54.3-yards per punt, flipping the field over-and-over for the Wave.
There's a New Kicker in Town
Cooper Helmke is your placekicker for Tulane. The St. Martin product didn't just handle kickoffs, he took care of extra points and field goals, hitting a 26-yarder in Trace Johnson's first drive as a collegiate quarterback. Hall said afterwards that Helmke earned the opportunity to be the Wave's kicker. He didn't let his coach or his team down.
The Bad
O-Line to Start, Defense to Finish
As documented above, it was an abysmal first half for the Tulane offense, except for the big pass from Kadin Semonza to Anthony Brown Stephens, a beautiful 47-yard bomb down the middle for the first score of the night. Absent that pass, the Wave passing game had 25-yards. The rushing game was coming to life in the 2nd quarter because of the guy we talked about above, Turner. Otherwise, it was a snoozer. There seems to be a lack of rhythm in the offense, which we'll talk about later.
On the defensive side, the Green Wave forced USM to punt, swarming to the quarterback and the running backs early as Southern Miss went three-and-out on their four opening possessions, even forcing a 5th punt in the first period. The Golden Eagles only punted four more times over the next 45-minutes. Three sacks by a punishing Tulane defense came in quarter one. They wouldn't get another one until the 3rd period, and that would be their last for the night. What turned the defense we saw in the Spring, the Fall, and the 1st period of this game into swiss cheese? Defensive back TJ Smith, who made a game-saving break up in the end zone near game's end, said it comes down to break downs.
"It's just us," Smith explained. "It's just a break down in communications. Some plays we had miscommunication, and ends up a bust...We've got to eliminate that."
The Ugly
As Hall said earlier, he's got good athletes, he's got good people, his team has love for each other. They're not playing well. He laid the responsibilities upon himself and his coaches. That's a good start.
In addition, a player-led team, which is how Hall has described his program, must have players showing the way as well. That seems to happen at times:
- Three and out four straight times to start the game by the Tulane defense,
- Great blocking by the Tulane offensive front from the 2nd quarter and on to give their running backs room to roam
- Superb kicking game numbers during punts, kicks, and returns
However, a majority of the beginning of this 2026 season hasn't seen that happen:
- An offensive line that has given up 13-sacks this season
- Dropped passes, as mentioned by Hall on a regular basis. There were three recorded in the official stat line against USM. We had six on our notepad.
- A bend-but-don't-break defense that then breaks way too often
- An offense without rhythm, running backs running into their offensive linemen's backs, no holes opening, taking a quarter or more to get into a running pace.
- No quarterback taking the reins.
In the Spring and throughout the Fall, no one quarterback was "the guy."
- Zeon Chriss-Gremillion was chosen as the guy before game one. He played one-half of football and hasn't been seen since.
- Kadin Semonza was the guy, and he was pulled in the 4th quarter against Southern Miss.
- True freshman Trace Johnson drove the Wave on two scoring drives (truth be told, one of them was a Mo Turner 74-yard touchdown on the 2nd play, but who's counting?).
- Then, when they needed a first down at the end of the game, Dagan Bruno comes on to run the option and picks it up.
Four quarterbacks in four games, with three in a little over a quarter Saturday.
Maybe it's just the transition from Jon Sumrall to Will Hall. Maybe it's a lack of the right personnel. Maybe, as Hall said, it's coaching that must do better.
Tulane is four games into the season, with an open date next Saturday and the American Conference opener at Army on October 10th. Whatever the reason or reasons, time is up. It's put up or shut up in less than two weeks.
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Doug has covered a gamut of sporting events in his fifty-plus years in the field. He started doing sideline reporting for Louisiana Tech football games for the student radio station. Doug was Sports Director for KNOE-AM/FM in Monroe in the mid-80s, winning numerous awards from the Louisiana Sports Writers Association for Best Sportscast and Best Play-by-Play. High school play-by-play for teams in Monroe, Natchitoches, New Orleans, and Thibodaux, LA dot his resume. He did college play-by-play for Northwestern State University in Natchitoches for nine years. Then, moving to the Crescent City, Doug did television PBP of Tulane games and even filled in for legendary Tulane broadcaster, Ken Berthelot in the only game Kenny ever missed while doing the Green Wave games. His father was an alumnus of Tulane in the 1940s, so Doug has attended Tulane football games in old Tulane Stadium, the Superdome, and Yulman. He was one of the 86,000 plus on December 1, 1973, sitting in the North End Zone to seeTulane shutout the LSU Tigers, 14-0. He was there when the Posse ruled Fogelman and in Turchin when the Wave made it to the World Series. He currently is the public address voice of the Tulane baseball team.