The No. 9/10 Cincinnati Bearcats traveled to No. 16 SMU Mustangs for their first road game of the season. Last week’s game against Tulsa was postponed due to covid issues with Cincinnati, so they had to be ready to travel to Dallas, Texas for an American Athletic Conference matchup.
Wide receiver Alec Pierce made his return Saturday night, but guard Jeremy Cooper, safety Javon Hicks and linebacker Wilson Huber didn’t make the trip. Center Jakari Robinson didn’t start, but was available Jake Renfro started for Robinson and Dylan O’Quinn started for Cooper.
The Bearcats defense came out hard in the first drive stopping the high powered SMU attack and then it was followed by a nice drive by the offense that led to a Desmond Ridder 9 yard touchdown pass to Josh Whyle. In the second drive Jarell White had a big sack that led to a three and out for SMU and Ridder scored on a 15 yard broken play to put the good guys up 14-0. With a little help from the referees calling a bad pass interference call on Ahmad Gardner, SMU ended up scoring a 9 yard touchdown pass from Shane Buechele to Rashee Rice. After a missed targeting call during the Gerrid Doaks fumble, Chris Naggar missed a 46 yard field. Later in the quarter a big third down drop by Michael Young, Jr. gave SMU life as they got a field goal by Naggar after a blown clock management situation and another bad call on Myjai Sanders by the referees. With all of that being said the Bearcats went into the half up 14-10. SMU outgained Cincinnati 151-144 in the first half.
In the second half the Bearcats started with a three and out, but then stopped SMU and after that they never looked back. After grinding Doaks scored from 1 yard out on fourth down. After stopping SMU against Ridder scored from 32 yards out on a designed run to put the Bearcats up 28-10. SMU scored their last points on a field goal by Naggar to push the score to 28-13. Sprinkle in an interception by Gardner, a fumble by Jerome Ford and consistent big plays by Myjai Sanders, White and Darrick Forrest it was a dominate performance in the second half and overall. Ridder had a 91 yard touchdown run to ice the game and the following possession Doaks had a 35 yard touchdown run to put the icing on the cake. The Bearcats won 42-13 on the road and truly dominated SMU on their home turf.
Ridder did enough with his arm to make SMU respect him, but he killed them with his legs. He went 13-of-21 for 126 yards and a touchdown and added eight carries for 179 yards and three touchdowns. Doaks added 20 carries for 105 yards and two touchdowns. White finished with 13 tackles, 2.0 tackles for loss and a sack. Sanders had a dominating three tackles and sack. They outgained SMU 439-to-290. They held SMU to 7-of-20 on third down and 1-of-5 on fourth down. SMU had at eight drops that I counted, but the Bearcats defense was bringing the wood so they were hearing footsteps.
With the 42-13 win the Bearcats are 4-0 and 2-0 in the AAC. They have Memphis next Saturday at home on ESPN at noon.
Note: This was the first road win against a ranked opponent since 2009
