JONESBORO — Arkansas State football Coach Hugh Freeze was relaxing at home during his team’s bye weekend when he found out the Red Wolves had moved atop the Sun Belt Conference.
Freeze watched bits of Middle Tennessee’s game with Florida Atlantic, but the score of greater importance was Western Kentucky defeated Louisiana-Lafayette - a defeat that left ASU as the Sun Belt’s lone undefeated team.
The Red Wolves (5-2, 3-0) can nab something as elusive as first place at 6 p.m. today against visiting North Texas: bowl eligibility for the first time in six seasons.
Freeze sounded leery Monday about Arkansas State’s new vantage point.
“There’s so many games to be played that I don’t know if anyone is out of it,” he said.“We are thrilled that we can control our own destiny, but also very guarded with our optimism.”
The Sun Belt race hasn’t been kind to those at the front of the pack.
Florida International opened the season with a 41-16 shellacking of North Texas (3-5, 2-2), looking every part the preseason favorite to repeat as conference champion. That was until Louisiana-Lafayette walked into Miami and left with a 36-31 victory on Sept. 24., and in an instant the Ragin’ Cajuns - picked eighth in the preseason poll - took up the mantle during a six-game winning streak.
Those good vibes dissolved with a 42-23 loss last week to the Hilltoppers, who hadn’t won in Bowling Green, Ky., in 18 games.
The Red Wolves don’t want to lose their first-place standing over as easily.
“We know battles are coming,” Freeze said. “Anybody can beat you on any given day, and that’s proven over and over again in this conference.”
The prospect of reaching postseason play for the second time in 21 seasons as a Football Bowl Subdivision program isn’t a circumstance veterans deny thinking about.
“This is something huge for this program,” said senior running back Derek Lawson, who is from Jonesboro. “If we can wrap it up and be bowl eligible, that would be nice, but mainly we just want awin. It’s not anything fancy. We need it.”
ASU faces a North Texas team that has won of two of its past three games and knocked off Big Ten doormat Indiana earlier this season.
The Mean Green sputtered in its opening three games against Florida International, No. 17 Houston and No. 2 Alabama, losing by an average of30.3 points while breaking in first-year starting quarterback Derek Thompson and an offensive line featuring three freshmen.
“These guys have been through a lot of hard times, hardships and been beaten down repeatedly week after week and season after season,” first-year Coach Dan McCarney said. “But you don’t run around making excuses. You just put your system in place and show a lot of faith.”
Running back Lance Dunbar struggled early in the season, averaging 40.2 yards during an 0-3 start. Dunbar ran for 1,553 yards last season to rank second the in Sun Belt.
Dunbar is back on track, scoring four touchdowns and averaging 110.2 rushing yards over the past five games, including a season-high 139 yards and a 60-yard scoring run in a 38-21 victory against Louisiana-Monroe a weekago.
“We’re doing a better job blocking,” McCarney said. “We just got dominated in the trenches at times early in the season, and at points were almost inept with three freshmen.”
Freeze said Thompson’s development in the passing game, which still ranks No. 97 nationally at 190 yards per game, eased some pressure on Dunbar. Against the Warhawks, Thompson threw for 332 yards and three touchdowns.
It’s an evolution Freeze is keen to remind his team could spell doom if the Red Wolves are tempted to revel in their start to the season.
“That’s my biggest worry,” Freeze said, “that they hear too much from all the excited people around here, which is great. That’s what we preached to them. It hasn’t gotten to that point yet, but it’s something we think about.”
Sports, Pages 21 on 10/29/2011