Frogs, Golden Eagles have much in common
The Frogs and Southern Miss have numerous similarities in style, which makes their games close and exciting.
By Danny Gillham
Sports Editor

When the Frogs line up against Southern Miss Wednesday, they’ll be facing a team that wears gold and black.

However, you could probably put the Golden Eagles in purple and white and not be able to tell much of a difference.

The matchup between two of the front-runners in Conference USA pits two teams who basically have the same style: tough defense, power running, smart play and little talk.

“It’s kind of like a scrimmage against ourselves,” senior safety Kenneth Hilliard said. “We basically run similar schemes, and neither one of us trash talks. We just get out on the field, play hard and grind it out.”

Said senior quarterback Sean Stilley: “(They are) tough, and hard-nosed. They don’t talk any trash, they just get out there and play football.”

Defensive coordinator David Bailiff said the Frogs (6-1, 3-1 Conference USA) pretty much knows what to expect out of the Golden Eagles (5-2, 3-0), as they don’t tend to stray very far from their gameplan.

“They don’t change,” Bailiff said. “They do what they do, and they get really good at it.”

The styles of play reflect in the scores. In the GMAC Mobile Alabama Bowl in December 2000, the Golden Eagles won 28-21, and last December in Hattiesburg, the Frogs squeaked by with a 14-12 victory.

The similarity in the teams has also been heightened by the stakes in the recent games. In 2000, it was for the GMAC Bowl Championship, while in 2001 the winner of the game received an invitation to the galleryfurniture.com Bowl in Houston.

This year the team who wins will be in the driver’s seat of the conference, with the opportunity to control their own destiny in a bid for the title and a trip to the AXA Liberty Bowl.

Head coach Gary Patterson said that most people in the conference look to Southern Miss (and Louisville) as the automatic conference front-runners, and let themselves get down from the start.

“(Conference teams) that have played against them have this feeling like that you’re already a little bit shaken before you get off the bus,” Patterson said. “I don’t think our kids are like that. I think our kids feel like we can play with them, that we have the same type of athletes.”

Danny Gillham