How Coastal Carolina fared against Texas State in its final game of the season
Coastal Carolina finished its season with a win Saturday to notch a second consecutive 5-7 season and avoid tying for last place in the Sun Belt Conference.
The Chanticleers defeated Texas State 24-21 at Brooks Stadium to snap a three-game losing streak and improve to 2-6 in the conference, the same record as the Bobcats (3-9) and one game better than South Alabama (2-10, 1-7).
Coastal has finished 2-6 in league play in each of its three seasons since moving up to the FBS level from FCS and joining the Sun Belt.
“Any time you can go in and end your last one with a win it just gives you a little bit of pep,” CCU coach Jamey Chadwell said. “The coaches talk with their wives more, the girlfriends talk to the players more and all that stuff, there’s a positive from that standpoint. We needed some positive momentum because if we had come out and lost and it had been another close one, that’s the story that’s been written a bunch.
“Hopefully we can build off of it and build off the season because there was a lot of positive things that happened.”
Junior running back C.J. Marable gained 121 yards and a touchdown on 25 carries Saturday to finish the season with 1,085 yards rushing and become the fourth player in program history to rush for 1,000 yards in a season.
Sophomore quarterback Bryce Carpenter started his sixth consecutive game and completed 10 of 11 passes for 114 yards and a touchdown while splitting time with Fred Payton, and sophomore tight end Isaiah Likely had six receptions for 107 yards and a touchdown.
The Chants scored the first 10 points of the second half to take the lead for good after the game was tied at halftime and survived a late Texas State score by recovering an onside kick with 1:30 remaining.
Coastal had 380 yards of offense, including 223 rushing, and held the Bobcats to 329 yards of offense, including just 36 yards rushing on 17 attempts, which is the fewest rushing attempts eve by a CCU opponent. Texas State averaged less than 80 yards rushing per game this season, and sophomore quarterback Tyler Vitt completed 23 of 33 passes for 285 yards with two touchdowns and an interception on Saturday.
CCU junior defensive end Tarron Jackson had three sacks to set a CCU single-season record with 10 and senior cornerback Chandler Kryst recorded his fifth interception of the season in the third quarter.
“I thought for the most part we did a good job [defensively],” Chadwell said. “We gave up one big one from an RPO (run-pass option) standpoint but I thought our guys did a good job of making them one-dimensional, where if they did run it we were able to rally around it.”
After the Bobcats’ missed a 47-yard field goal attempt to come up short on a 13-play drive to begin the second half, the Chants took a 14-7 lead on a 28-yard touchdown reception by Likely from Carpenter.
Likely reached out with his left hand and batted the ball into his body at the 5 yard line and stretched the ball out inside the right pylon as his momentum was taking him out of bounds. Two plays earlier, Carpenter hit Jeremiah Miller over the middle for a 14-yard gain to convert a third-and-9 at the Texas State 38.
Massimo Biscardi made a 47-yard field goal that barely cleared the crossbar with 11:30 to play to culminate an 11-play, 50-yard drive and give the Chants a 17-7 lead.
Texas State needed just four plays to march 67 yards for a touchdown following the field goal and cut the deficit to three points with 9:38 to play. Hutch White was left alone on the right side for an 8-yard touchdown pass from Vitt that followed a pass interference call on CCU in the end zone.
The Chants answered with a 10-play, 69-yard scoring drive that was capped by a 3-yard Marable touchdown run over the right side of the line with 4 minutes to play.
The drive was extended by a 7-yard Payton pass to Likely on fourth-and-3 at the Texas State 15 that followed an acrobatic Jaivon Heiligh attempted catch in the end zone that was ruled to be out of bounds.
A Jacoby Hopkins 18-yard touchdown reception pulled the Bobcats within a field goal but Coastal iced the win with a first down following the onside kick.
Coastal took a 7-0 lead on a 1-yard pass from Payton to senior tight end Shadell Bell midway through the second quarter. The score completed a methodical 13-play, 64-yard drive that included 11 runs, a fourth-and-1 conversion at CCU’s 45-yard line, and runs of 14 yards by Jacqez Hairston and 16 yards by Payton.
Texas State tied the score on a 64-yard Vitt pass down the middle to Mason Hays with 3 minutes remaining in the half.
Each team missed field goals in a scoreless first quarter.
A 27-yard punt return by Hutch White to the Coastal 36 led to Texas State’s missed 46-yard attempt, and a 51-yard completion from Carpenter to Likely down the middle of the field set up Coastal’s missed 35-yard attempt. The Chants reached the Bobcats’ 4-yard line but were driven back by a holding penalty and loss of 4 yards on a pass completion.
Ten Coastal seniors played their final college game on Saturday.
“It means a lot to me because I wanted to give these seniors a chance to go out on a win,” Jackson said. “We’ve been grinding with these boys since January and I’m glad we could as a team come together to help them do that.”
This story was originally published November 30, 2019 at 3:26 PM.
