Box Score MIAMI (Saturday, Sept. 24) -- Despite a stellar night for running back Kedrick Rhodes, the FIU football team could not contain Louisiana's offense as the Ragin' Cajuns beat the Panthers, 36-31, Saturday night in Miami.
Playing most of the game without T.Y. Hilton or Wesley Carroll, FIU had to rely on Rhodes, who responded with a career-best 157 yards on the ground to go along with three touchdowns. Backing up Carroll, redshirt freshman Jake Medlock threw for 216 yards. Wayne Times led all FIU receivers with 75 yards, and added 158 yards on kickoff returns. Defensively, Jordan Hunt led the way with eight tackles.
The loss snaps a four-game winning streak for the Panthers and drops their record to 3-1 on the season, and 1-1 in conference play. Louisiana moves to 3-1 and 1-0 in Sun Belt games.
Rhodes got the scoring started for FIU with a 43-yard touchdown on FIU's first drive of the ballgame. After Times returned the opening kickoff to the FIU 33-yard line, the Panthers drove 67 yards to take a 7-0 lead with 13:04 left in the first quarter.
After the teams traded punts, FIU was backed up on its own one-yard line. On third down, FIU was flagged for a holding penalty in the endzone, which by rule results in a safety. The penalty gave Louisiana its first points of the game, cutting FIU's lead to 7-2 with a little over seven minutes to play in the first.
Louisiana took advantage of the possession following the safety as they kicked a field goal with 5:07 to go in the first quarter to make the score 7-5.
After FIU was forced to start inside its own two-yard line once again, Louisiana was armed with great field position on its next drive and capitalized with a 39-yard field goal to take an 8-7 lead with 11:39 to go in the first half.
With 50 seconds to go in the half, Louisiana scored on a 41-yard pass from Blaine Gautier to Ladarius Green. The play came on 4th-and-1 where Green got behind the FIU defense, which had committed to stopping the run on a play-action pass. With the touchdown, the Ragin' Cajuns took a 15-7 lead.
The ensuing kickoff was taken by Times who returned it 69 yards to the Louisiana 11-yard line. Two plays later, Rhodes found the endzone again to cut the lead to just one as the teams headed into the halftime break with the score 15-14.
Coming out of the halftime break, the Cajuns added to their lead with a 22-yard touchdown pass from Gautier to Darryl Surgent. The score pushed UL's lead to 22-14 with 13:24 to go in the third quarter.
FIU responded with a touchdown of its own on the next drive, this time by Medlock who punched the ball in from the two-yard line. The score was set up by strong running from Rhodes who picked up 37 rushing yards on the drive. With the touchdown, FIU closed to within one at 22-21 with 10:16 to go in the third.
Louisiana came right back and scored a touchdown on their next drive, finding the endzone on a 13-yard scamper by Alonzo Harris to push UL's lead to 29-21 at the 8:20 mark of the third.
FIU put three points on the board at the 14:06 mark of the fourth. The Jack Griffin field goal capped off a 93-yard drive for the Panthers and cut the UL lead to five at 29-24.
The Cajuns offense kept coming at FIU as the Cajuns scored another touchdown on their next drive when Gautier found Javone Lawson for a 46-yard completion to push the Cajun lead to 36-24 with 12:40 to go in the game.
With 6:51 to go in the game, FIU found the endzone on another run by Rhodes to cut the Cajuns lead to 36-31. The score was set up by a 54-yard connection from Medlock to Times that put the ball on the UL five.
The Panthers had two more possessions, but couldn't find the endzone as the Cajuns held on for the 36-31 victory.
The Panthers will next host the Duke Blue Devils on Saturday, Oct. 1. Kickoff is scheduled for 7 p.m.
