Jim Mashek

WESTERN IS ON THE ROAD SATURDAY AT TEXAS-SAN ANTONIO

Three quarterbacks were pretty much the story Saturday night at Western Kentucky’s Houchens-Smith Stadium.

To wit:

*-WKU’s starter, Austin Reed, is off to a nice start since succeeding the New England Patriots’ Bailey Zappe as the Hilltoppers quarterback. Busted a hump again on Saturday.

*-The Troy Trojans’ starter, Gunnar Watson, turned in a solid three quarters before being sidelined with an injury, while Troy was trying to hold off the Hilltoppers down the stretch.

*-And Behind Door Number 3, wouldn’t you know it, erstwhile WKU quarterback Jarrett Doege, who transferred from West Virginia to Western and then finally Troy University, all in a matter of months.

Watson scored on a razzle-dazzle play, a double-handoff throwback to the quarterback, with wideout Tez Johnson hitting Watson in the right corner of the end zone for a 7-yard touchdown pass, early in the second half, before Doege completed the task at hand, throwing for two TD passes to send the Trojans to a 34-27 upset of WKU.

‘Fifth-year WKU coach Tyson Helton wasn’t surprised by the Trojans’ strength up front, on both sides of the football, but Western’s home crowd of about 20,000 — give or take a few late arrivals, perpetual tailgaters — seemed to grow more restless with each passing touchdown.

The Troy touchdowns.

Even though Reed, the redshirt junior transfer from West Florida, did everything he could to get the Toppers back into the game.

Western dropped to 3-2 overall and the Hilltoppers will resume Conference USA play on the road Saturday against Texas-San Antonio (3-2, 1-0 C-USA).

UT-SA left-hander Frank Harris passed for 414 yards and two touchdowns, while adding two more scores on the ground, on Saturday evening to lead the Roadrunners past Middle Tennessee State 45-30 in Murfreesboro, Tennessee.

As fate would have it, the Hilltoppers will be on the road against MTSU in two weeks, when the “100 Miles of Hate” rivalry resumes to a series that dates back to the two schools’ membership in the Ohio Valley Conference.

So forgive Tyson Hilton and his WKU players taking the missed opportunity against Troy in stride — relatively speaking, of course — while instead looking forward to the return of conference play.

When championships are won, and bowl games assignments fall into place, and recruiting starts to amp up, etc. …

“It doesn’t get any easier,” Helton said. “Nobody feels sorry for us … We don’t feel sorry for ourselves.

“Austin tried to do what he could, under the circumstances. I thought (Troy’s) front seven was good. They got good push tonight, their coverage was solid. I think we may have held onto the ball too long a few times, but (Troy) was solid.

“When we needed to convert, we couldn’t convert, and when we needed to get a key stop, on defense, we couldn’t.”

The Trojans used the back-yard play of the handoff/end-around, pass-across-the-field-to-the-quarterback play in the formative moments of the second half, with Troy’s Tez Johnson hitting 6-foot-3 junior quarterback Gunnar Watson in the right corner of the end zone for the game’s critical score. That put Troy in front 20-17, and from there, the Hilltoppers never really regained their footing.

At least when it was still a competitive game.

“They were solid on defense. Their front seven was probably the best front seven we’ve seen all year,” Reed said. “ … We could have done things a little bit better, I could have done things a little bit better …

“They just played a really good game. At the end, we had a chance to go win it and we didn’t do it. At the end, it just falls on us.”

Western got away from its ground game in the second half, and Reed was game under pressure, completing 39 of 56 passes for 406 yards and three touchdowns. He was sacked five times while throwing one interception.

The Hilltoppers have several big-play threats at wide receiver, players they’ll need over the course of the next six games, all against Conference USA opponents. Daewood Davis, a redshirt senior who previously played at North Carolina, had a game-high 12 receptions for 122 yards and the Hilltoppers’ final TD, a 9-yard scoring strike from Reed with 4:20 left in the game.

Michael Mathison, a junior transfer who came to WKU from the University of Akron, caught eight passes for a game-high 152 yards and a second-quarter score, a 34-yard TD pass from Reed late in the first half.

Meanwhile, Troy’s Jarrett Doege, who stuck around Bowling Green for little more than a donut and a cup of coffee, before returning to the transfer portal, had a memorable night in relief of teammate Gunnar Watson.

Doege completed 7 of 8 passes for 71 yards and two touchdowns as Troy improved to 10-2-1 all-time against the ‘Toppers. It was Western’s first game against Troy since the 2013 season.

“I thought they got the best of us,” WKU linebacker Derrick Smith said.

“Today, we were definitely in a dogfight,” Reed added. “Obviously, the main focus of our team is conference play, but it’s always tough to lose a game like this … We just have to get back to work.”