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Half time for all the 6 PM starts and one surprise. HCU is up 27-9 over McNeese. SELA up by seven over Commerce. Prairie View is playing UIW tough trailing 19-14, with Nicholls up big on Southern 38-0. SFA is up 31-0 on NWST after the first quarter.

Although Lamar doesn't play this week there are still five games involving SLC teams. Three are conference games and two are Non-conference games. The two non-conference games are both against SWAC members with UIW playing Prairie View and Nicholls taking on Southern. The conference games are McNeese at HCU, Commerce at SELA and NWST at SFA.

Soccer sitting at 1-1-1 in conference play with a 4-0 win over Nicholls. The four goals ties for the most in a match this year and with the shutout the largest margin of victory. Hope this is an indication that Soccer is starting a streak toward the top, but Nicholls is last in the conference at 0-3 so far. Volleyball finished the opening weekend with a split and host current conference leader Commerce Thursday before traveling to last place Corpus on Saturday.

The SLC goes two and three this week, but the wins didn't come where you might have wanted or expected. All five games were on the road, HCU and McNeese win while SELA had a chance falling late in the game to Tarleton St. NWST lost by 19 and Lamar as noted on the game thread lost by 20. This week could have had a much better outcome, but all three losses were to ranked teams. Week six will be mostly conference games with only UIW and Nicholls playing non-conference opponents while Lamar has a bye week.

Final score UCA 34 - Lamar 14. In some ways this game was closer than the score shows, but it easily could have been worse. Biggest difference was rushing yards. Lamar could not stop UCA with any consistency. UCA only punted twice. As usual the play calling seemed somewhat questionable as UCA stopped Lamar three times inside the red zone where the Cards tried to tun the ball when a play action pass would have been a good call on a first down. UCA just keyed on Griffin and shut him down for the most part in that location of the field.

After swapping punts on both teams first possessions of the second half each team has a nice drive resulting in touchdowns in the third quarter. UCA has the ball as the game goes from the third to fourth quarters. Score at the end of three UCA 27 - Lamar 14

Been on the road so just catching up. Lamar offense still struggling. Lamar only one for three on field goal attempts with one blocked and one missed. Central Arkansas out rushing Lamar 3-1. Defense has only stopped UCA once. Passing is similar for both teams.

I agree that there are lots of other sports and things in general that should be driving conference realignment, but my position is that college football and basketball tv revenue is the current driving factor. Tell me what other thing other than money makes sense for multiple schools to all want to move conferences at the same time. The PAC 12 was a great conference in all sports except for tv revenue. Because the football playoff system allowed for them to be excluded didn't help but the twelve team playoff system starting this year would have fixed that. Maybe Oregon and others will be able to overcome the perceived competitive advantage of the SEC and Big 10 by playing them consistently but that may take several years. Look at the schools that left other conferences before and tell me how they are doing on a competitive basis. Examples are Missouri or A&M competing for conference championships on a routine basis? What about Nebraska or Colorado? All four were original members of the Big 12.

Lamar is at Conway for a 6 PM start against the Bears Saturday evening. This game will show if Lamar is ready for a playoff berth or not. UCA is ranked #7 in the FCS coach's poll. A road game against a top ten nationally ranked opponent would be a big feather in Lamar's tail.

Only five games on tap this weekend and Lamar at Central Ark is the premier game. SELA takes on Tarleton and McNeese plays Weber St. These three games should provide some real insight for Lamar in conference. HCU plays Indiana St and NWST plays Southeast Missouri. The last two I suspect are losses for the conference. Hopefully the conference can win some of the first three.

Gonzaga doesn't play football, Montana, Montana State and Idaho and the Dakotas are all FCS teams. Hawaii is already a member. FBS schools that make sense geographically are UTEP, Texas St, UTSA, New Mexico, New Mexico St and maybe a couple of others. Now the Mountain West is beginning to look a lot like the old WAC.

I'm not sure any quarterback can be a successful passer if he is worrying about getting sacked every time he goes to throw the ball. Bottom line is the o-line has to protect him consistently. I think the reason so many coaches like or want a dual threat is that the dual threat has a better chance to make something out of a broken play.

Until the o-line improves, especially at pass blocking Lamar is one dimensional and that dimension is named Griffin.

At some point I think you're going to see a conference including the Pac12 disappear not add FCS schools. The prestige of the PAC-12 name may save it as they poach the best from the rest of the conferences. The Sun Belt currently has fourteen members. The Mountain West after the initial poaching is down to eight members. The American has fourteen members. C-USA has ten members, the Mid-American has twelve, The Pac-12 probably needs to get to ten members to be comfortable, but needs two to survive, who are the most likely targets? The Pac-12 may also be thinking that one or two teams might decide to return to get them to ten or twelve but that will be a big pill for the returning teams to swallow. So, who do they go after?

I suppose the question is have both Volleyball and Soccer played tough enough competition to be prepared adequately for conference. We'll see starting this week.

I too am disappointed with the penalties. This week I might give the offense a little break as it is possible that the game plan was more conservative since it was Longino's first start. The o-line has to improve.

Missed a game when I first looked at this weeks schedule. Final count for the week, one loss to an FBS school, three wins against SWAC competition, two wins and two losses against the Big Sky and a loss to MVFC. 5-3 overall versus FCS but not impressive and no wins against upper tier FCS. Looks like the SLC won't deserve more than one bid for the playoffs.

Lamar wins 20-17. Ugly ugly but a win

Thank you TSU for multiple penalties to keep Lamar's drive going. Griffin gets a running touchdown with 1:05 to go.

TSU comes right back with a strong drive to get a touchdown with under four minutes left in the game. They make the extra point to take a four point lead.

Lamar finally takes the lead on a Longino to Gibbs pass, but the extra point is missed. Lamar up by three with 8:32 left in the game.

Including the Lamar's first drive of the 2nd half they have eight penalties for 72 yards. Lamar can't play without yellow flags flying. The O-line can't block without holding. This has to change. Griffin needs to get in better shape. I know he isn't getting much help but as soon as he comes out the offense stalls.

Evening games finds Lamar down by ten at the half, NWST and SELA both down twenty and Commerce down by twenty-seven. UIW is up by three. McNeese and SFA are still in the first quarter with each up by fourteen.

Lamar offense starts out good for about three to four plays before a illegal block cost ten yard followed directly by another penalty stopped the drive.

Texas Southern takes the opening kick off and makes an impressive 16 play drive settling for a field goal to take the early lead. Lamar couldn't stop TSU rush offense until the last two plays at the goal line to hold them to the field goal.