The Long Offseason: OSM{Tulane}

November 19--Tulane wrapped up its conference season with a trip to Rice.  In a game without much offense, Rice slowly built a 13-0 lead until Tulane finally broke through with a touchown early in the fourth quarter, but Rice countered with a touchdown of their own to win 19-7.   The odd thing that stands out to me from the box score was that each team used two different punters.  These four punters combined to punt 14 times.

November 26--The loss at Rice was Tulane's ninth straight loss after a 2-1 start.  Apart from the game against Syracuse, in which they lost on a last second field goal, they lost all of these games by at least 14 points.  Now, most teams after reaching a record of 2-10 would be putting their pads away until spring practice.  Tulane, however, to advantage of the NCAA's rules quirk that allows a team to play an extra regular season game if they play one of those games at the University of Hawaii.  So, without being close to being bowl elligible, Tulane took a Thanksgiving trip to the islands.  They were not destracted by the lush scenery and held their own against the Warriors in the first half.  The even got a third quarter safety, which allows scores points in my book, and a touchdown early in the fourth quarter cut Hawaii's lead to only 28-23.  However, their defense gave up another touchdown that they could not recover from.  But they got to enjoy a season ending trip to Hawaii.