CHAMPIONSHIP CENTRAL | CHAMPIONSHIP GAME TICKETS
NEW ORLEANS — Marshall (9-3, 7-1 SBC) is seeking its first Sun Belt football championship in Saturday’s Hercules Tires Sun Belt Football Championship Game at Cajun Field in Lafayette, La. The game is set for 7:30 p.m. ET/6:30 p.m. CT and will be broadcast nationwide on ESPN.
A first-time championship game qualifier in their third year as a Sun Belt Conference member, the Thundering Herd will aim to become the first-ever road victor in the contest. Home teams are 5-0 all-time in the championship game and Marshall is 3-3 on the road this season and 12-12 on the road in four seasons under head coach Charles Huff.
A Marshall win over Louisiana (10-2, 7-1 SBC) would also be the first championship game victory for a Sun Belt East Division team since App State won back-to-back titles in 2018 and 2019. A Thundering Herd win would secure the program’s first 10-win season since a string of three-straight from 2013-15.
Marshall is no stranger to the postseason, owning the ninth-longest active bowl streak in the country at eight-straight years, trailing only Memphis (10 years) among non-autonomy conference programs. The Thundering Herd is 13-6 in 19 all-time Bowl Season appearances.
The Thundering Herd last played for a conference title in 2020 as a member of Conference USA and won its last conference championship in 2014.
Marshall opened its season with a 45-3 victory over Stony Brook, before dropping a pair of road games to autonomy conference foes—a 31-14 loss to a bowl-bound Virginia Tech program and a 49-14 loss to an Ohio State team that is No. 6 in the latest College Football Playoff rankings. Marshall added a 27-20 home win over a bowl-bound Western Michigan club to close its non-conference slate.
In his first start in a Marshall uniform, redshirt junior quarterback Braylon Braxton had a coming-out party in the Thundering Herd’s conference opener against App State. Braxton accounted for 269 yards and five touchdowns to lead Marshall to a convincing 52-37 win over the Sun Belt East Division preseason favorite Mountaineers.
On the road in its second conference contest, Marshall fell victim to a 21-point fourth-quarter comeback in a 24-23 loss to Georgia Southern—its lone blemish in conference action. Since a 3-3 start, the Thundering Herd has rattled off six-straight conference wins to claim the Sun Belt East Division crown and earn the date with Sun Belt West Division champion Louisiana Saturday. Three of those victories have been by multiple possessions—35-20 over Georgia State, 37-3 at Southern Miss and 31-19 over Coastal Carolina—with Marshall pulling away with multi-touchdown fourth quarters in a 28-23 win over ULM and a 42-35 victory at Old Dominion.
The Thundering Herd clinched its spot in the 2024 Hercules Tires Sun Belt Football Championship Game by virtue of a 35-33 double-overtime win at James Madison in the regular-season finale, arguably the statement win of Marshall’s season. After erasing a 17-0 halftime deficit, Marshall failed to convert a potential game-winning field goal as time expired in regulation, forcing overtime. There, the Thundering Herd sealed the victory in the second overtime period with a two-point conversion on a pass from Braxton to redshirt junior wide receiver Charles Montgomery on a flip from senior running back Ethan Payne, who received the direct snap in the backfield.
Marshall’s six-game winning streak entering the championship game paces the Sun Belt and is tied for the sixth-longest in the country, trailing only Oregon (13), Boise State (10), Notre Dame (10) and Miami (OH) (7).
Marshall has protected the football the season, ranking second in the country having conceded just four interceptions, 15th in the nation with just 10 turnovers and 17th in the FBS with a +0.75 turnover margin. The Thundering Herd has also dominated the battle in the trenches, conceding just 4.08 tackles for loss (19th in the country) and 1.33 sacks (30th in the country) per game while producing 6.80 tackles for loss (24th in the country) and 2.83 sacks (20th in the country) per game. The offensive line has propelled a Top 20 rushing offense that is averaging 200.4 rushing yards per contest.
Despite starting just eight games, Braxton has thrown for 1,431 yards and 17 touchdowns, while rushing for 544 yards and four scores. He ranks among the Top 50 nationally in passing efficiency (17th, 154.6), passing yards per completion (21st, 13.50), yards per pass attempt (33rd, 7.95), points responsible for per game (44th, 13.0) and passing touchdowns (50th, 17).
Braxton’s top targets have been redshirt senior wide receiver Christian Fitzpatrick—with 32 catches for 569 yards and six touchdowns; Montgomery—with 28 catches for 343 yards and three touchdowns; and redshirt sophomore tight end Toby Payne with 16 catches for 163 yards and six touchdowns. The running back trio of redshirt sophomore A.J. Turner—104 carries for 864 yards and six touchdowns; redshirt senior Jordan Houston—94 carries for 475 yards and a touchdown; and Ethan Payne—56 carries for 284 yards and six touchdowns—have provided Marshall with a balanced attack.
On the defensive side of the ball, sophomore linebacker Jaden Yates has compiled a team-high 114 tackles and ranks 17th in the country at 9.5 tackles per game. Redshirt sophomore defensive lineman Mike Green has tallied a team-high 21 tackles for loss and leads the nation with 1.8 tackles for loss per game, while adding 16 sacks and ranking second in the country at 1.33 sacks per game. In the secondary, redshirt senior defensive back J.J. Roberts (14) and redshirt sophomore defensive back Jacobie Henderson (10) have double-digit pass breakups, while junior defensive back Josh Moten owns four interceptions, a total that ranks 15th in the country.
Redshirt freshman return specialist Ian Foster leads the nation, averaging 33.4 yards per kickoff return and ranks 11th in the country with 501 combined kick return yards.
A win Saturday would secure the first Sun Belt title for the Thundering Herd and would be the first victory by the road team in the seven-year history of the event. Louisiana is a perfect 2-0 in the all-time series with Marshall with a 36-21 victory in the 2021 R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl in its first game under head coach Michael Desormeaux and a 23-13 win in the first-ever Sun Belt Conference meeting in Huntington, W.Va., in 2022. Saturday’s Hercules Tires Sun Belt Football Championship Game will be the first-ever meeting between the two teams in Lafayette, La.