We’re officially halfway through the college football regular season; six down, six to go.
With that being said, Bowling Green sits at 2-4 (0-2 MAC) with a tough test in Buffalo looming this week.
After Saturday’s 27-0 shutout loss at Miami of Ohio, head coach Scot Loeffler harped on the team’s inconsistency, and picked up right where he left off at his weekly press conference on Monday.
“We’re at the halfway point, and it’s quite obvious that our issue is consistency. We’re 2-4 right now, love to be 4-2 or 3-3, so we’re behind slightly of where we want to be,” said Loeffler. “The teams that beat us are 21-2. You’d love to have been able to sneak one more, be 3-3 at the halfway point. The discouraging piece is, I spent the last day watching all our cutups from the last six games, and there’s no reason this team couldn’t have been 4-2, but that’s where we’re at, it’s inconsistency. The whole goal in these next six weeks is to find a way to become consistent.”
“Jekyll and Hyde” has been the way to describe the team so far this season, and the last two weeks embody it perfectly. Two weeks ago, the offense put up 38 unanswered points on Georgia Tech. The defense forced multiple turnovers and kept their offense at bay.
The very next week, against a Miami team that isn’t a slouch by any means, but is still not on the level of Georgia Tech, the Falcons allowed the RedHawks to march up and down the field and get shut out on offense.
“When we play to our potential and we’re focused and unselfish, we’re a really good team. When we don’t it’s quite obvious that it’s either feast or famine,” Loeffler said. “We need to take this one game at a time and find a way to have a really consistent next six weeks, and it starts this week against Buffalo, who’s a really good football team.”
The next six weeks of Bowling Green’s schedule: 10/14 @ Buffalo, 10/21 vs Akron, 11/1 vs Ball State, 11/8 @ Kent State, 11/14 vs Toledo, 11/21 @ Western Michigan.
Those six teams have a combined record of 12-24, and the only team with an overall record over .500 is Toledo.
This is the time to get it going.
“We’ve got six opportunities to see if we can (get through the inconsistencies), if we do, we’ll have a really good season. If we don’t, it’ll be a mediocre to poor season. We’ve got a challenge, and let’s see if we can push this rock of inconsistency over the top,” said Loeffler. “I’ve seen us play our best football in these last six weeks and I’ve seen us play our worst football, and nothing in between.”
The Falcons sit at 0-2 in conference play, with both losses coming in blowout fashion to MAC East rivals. BG has been outscored 62-7 in those games. In their other four contests, it’s 107-106.
But Loeffler is putting the past behind him, and focusing only on what he can control.
“I’m not worried about the two losses in the MAC. I’m worried about Buffalo, I’m worried about getting consistent, and the rest will take care of itself. That’s not our issue, our issue is consistency and we’ve got to get over the top of that issue,” he said. “I’ve went through every self-evaluation piece known to man, we haven’t done one thing different, heck when we go to pregame meal, we have the exact same food. Same exact setup, same exact this. We’ve got to be able to walk into that stadium and do our jobs to our ability, and we’ll be just fine.”
He’s looking forward to the challenge of Buffalo and compares the Bulls to his own team.
“This’ll be a challenge on the road, they’re a good football team, well coached, good scheme. Very similar to us, you watch them, they played fantastic football last week, but I’ve watched them play poor football too,” Loeffler said. “They’re fighting the inconsistent battle just like we are, but they’re well-coached, they’re a good team, but we need to show up and if we do what we are capable of doing, we’ll be just fine.”
The players also recognize the challenge facing them this coming week.
“They’re a really athletic group defensively, they’re starting to get on a roll here, so we’re going to have to go in there and bring our best game,” tight end Levi Gazarek said Monday. “They’re going to be playing for a lot, we’re still playing for a lot.”
Defensive back Jordan Oladokun weighed in on the inconsistency issues as well.
“We’re just trying to stay level-headed and stay consistent, like he’s saying. It’s a grind, we have 12 games this year, so whatever happened the first half of the season in those six games, we’re putting that behind us and just getting out there and trying to get as consistent as we can,” Oladokun said.
As a team captain, Gazarek said the key to keeping the team focused is to take everything one day at a time and to control the things you can control.
“Other than consistency, a big message is ‘One day at a time, one week at a time.’ We can’t be looking down the road next week, we have to focus on Buffalo. Once we take care of that, then the next week. That’s going to be a big part of it,” he said. “Focus on the present moment. When you’re out there, and a play doesn’t go the way you want it to, you can’t change that either, even though it just happened 10 seconds ago, you’ve got to be able to regroup, come back, and play forward from there.”
Bowling Green will look to regroup on the final leg of their road trip and pick up their first Mid-American Conference victory of the 2023 season out east in Buffalo on October 14. Kickoff is set for 3:30 p.m.
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