Blue Raider Podcast | 11/06/26

[00:00:00] We're the Good Neighbor Network, FM 101.9 and AM 1450, Murfreesboro, FM 100.5, Smarna, audio and video, streaming at WGNSRadio.com This is the Blue Raider Podcast on WGNS. It's your all-access pass to everything Middle Tennessee sports. Game recaps, player spotlights, and the latest from the heart of Blue Raider Nation.

[00:00:27] Now, here's your host, Jake Bolden. Welcome back into the Blue Raider Podcast. Happy to have you kicking off a marathon of Blue Raider basketball this evening. Of course, we're going to have a shortened show today as we're going to be turning it over to Greg Pogue, who's down in Memphis, where the Lady Raiders have their first road contest of the year. But we've got so much to cover in today's episode in such short time, so we're glad you're with us.

[00:00:56] Of course, tomorrow is the 100 Miles of Hate homecoming here in Murfreesboro. That game will kick off at 2.30. The parade is happening in the morning at 9.30. So a lot of festivities going on at campus. Excited for that. We're going to be previewing that matchup. Of course, talking more basketball, too. They kicked off their season, or I should say tipped off their season on Monday night. We'll be going over, recapping some of those wins. Volleyball and soccer get closer to their postseason.

[00:01:22] And then cross-country actually won a pair of conference championships this last weekend. So really so much to get to today. Before we dive into it, I do want to remind you to follow the Blue Raider podcast on any of your social media, at Blue Raider Pod. We're on X, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and of course today's live stream, as we do every Friday at 5 p.m. Recap, our Blue Raider recap. Before we get into the football discussion, women's volleyball had four matches since our last episode here.

[00:01:52] And they have gone 2-2 over the week. And really, two of their better opponents of the season, Missouri State, who is currently sitting in second place, and I would say comfortably in second place, they split a pair of matches up in Springfield, winning match 1-3-2, and then losing that second match 0-3. And then they actually wrapped up their series with Sam Houston today. They had a midday matchup, matinee, but they lost last night,

[00:02:21] really in a disappointing fashion, 2-3. I thought they were the better team for a majority of that match, particularly in the back half. And they were two points away from taking last night's match, but Sam Houston went on a 4-0 run to conclude that one. So lost 2-3 to Sam Houston, but did fight back and won today 3-1. Sophia Henry had a double-double in both of the Sam Houston matches, and Caroline McHander added her own double-double today of 22 assists and 12 digs.

[00:02:47] So volleyball right now sitting tied for fourth place as we sit currently. But as far as the conference outlook goes, you have Liberty, who is in solo third place, but they start a two-game set with Western Kentucky tonight, who is currently undefeated in Conference USA. So it's likely that if that holds true, Liberty will fall at the end of this weekend down to fifth place, and MTSU and Sam Houston will be tied in third place.

[00:03:16] And then next weekend, MTSU finishes the season up on the road at Kennesaw State, and Sam Houston finishes the season at home against Western Kentucky. So once again, MTSU really on the better side of the scheduling opportunities in regards to seeding for the Conference USA tournament that's in two weeks. If all things hold true, you sweep Kennesaw State, which you probably should sweep Kennesaw State. And then Sam Houston is where to get swept, and Liberty were to also get swept by Western Kentucky.

[00:03:45] That puts volleyball in the driver's seat for the third seed, which is great. Obviously puts you on a good side with Missouri State, a team that you've already beaten once this year, opposite of the bracket of a good Western Kentucky team for a potential championship. So volleyball's done a good job to get themselves in the position they're in. Going in preseason, I believe they were ninth in the preseason poll, and now they're looking to finish third. Other fall sports, cross country, like I said, they had their championships this last weekend.

[00:04:15] Men and women both picking up conference championships for the team. Coach Frohman made the joke it's the first time that the men have ever actually won the Conference USA championship on an even number of years, so that curse is officially broken. Kelvin Tanui had a personal best 23-33 to put him in third place to lead the men. And then for the women, Evelyn Wambui, she placed first, the sophomore placed first, and set a Conference USA record at 19-25.

[00:04:44] So big congratulations to those teams, and they have their South Region championship coming up this next weekend where they will hopefully be qualifying for a national championship bid, as well as individual awards too. So their season's not over, but obviously nice to go ahead and get two championship trophies in the fall sports categories. Women's soccer wrapped up their regular season on Sunday. They lost their 100 miles of hate with Western Kentucky by a score of 1-3.

[00:05:13] Despite that, Demi Gronauer did have a career-high 14 saves, and Aniyah Denham puts up a Conference USA leading ninth goal in the 67th minute of that one. And that's really enough for Aniyah as it was announced today. She is Conference USA freshman of the year, so big congratulations to her. And then the senior, Hannah Murphy, also made the Conference USA first team list. And more importantly, the soccer program, despite really spiraling there at the end of the season,

[00:05:41] did find their way into the Conference tournament. They will actually be facing Delaware, the host school. It's all the way up in Newark. That starts up this upcoming weekend on Sunday, to be exact, at 12.30 p.m. against the three seed on ESPN+. And, of course, the remainder of that tournament will be on Tuesday, where they'll play the winner of Western Kentucky and Kennesaw State. So, all things considered, you've snuck into the postseason.

[00:06:09] I still think this team is good enough to potentially go on a run. Obviously, it's nice being on the opposite side of the bracket of Liberty, who is regular season champions. You get another shot at Delaware and Western Kentucky, potentially, both teams that you have lost to in the regular season. And in close matches, all things considered. So, that will do it for our Raider wrap-up. Of course, we've got men's and women's basketball, and we'll try to get more into that, into the second segment of today's Shorten show.

[00:06:35] But I really want to get into football as we preview this upcoming matchup. Obviously, coming off that really, really bad taste in your mouth, 44-28 loss to Kennesaw State to wrap up the CUSA midweek. I spent so much of last week's episode capping it with, it came down to four big plays, and you didn't capitalize on your two turnovers there in the third quarter to just try to trim and cut into that deficit. And they just weren't opportunistic, where Kennesaw State was very opportunistic.

[00:07:04] And played like a team that was trying to stave off any chance of being eliminated from bowl eligibility. Where MTSU this weekend, it's going to be that. They still have some room to spare with four games left, and you only need two wins. But if you lose to Western Kentucky, your options get whittled down significantly. Obviously, next week you're on the road in Lynchburg against a team that is likely to make the Conference USA championship game.

[00:07:34] And then you end the season with bottom feeders New Mexico State and Sam Houston, who just fired their coach Phil Longo. So obviously, if you wanted to find your two wins, those two would be fantastic. However, Western Kentucky, MTSU alike, are fighting for their bowl eligibility lives. And Western's schedule gets significantly more difficult after they play MTSU this Saturday. So they also understand that if they want to find bowl eligibility, it's going to start this weekend.

[00:08:02] And Western looked really strong. Now, they had a very easy half of the Conference USA schedule, particularly with New Mexico State, which they had a really bad loss, I would say, too, than Missouri State, Delaware. But Delaware was kind of a surpriser this last week. It was off to the races on the offensive end. 28-21 at halftime, Delaware was leading. There was only one touchdown in the entire second half of that one. So it looks like the defenses certainly made their adjustments.

[00:08:32] And Delaware came out victorious on that one. And Brock Glenn, quarterback for the Hilltoppers, through two interceptions in that second half. But I think more importantly, when you're scouting this matchup this week, he rushed for 129 yards, led Western Kentucky in rushing from the quarterback position for 129 yards. That certainly has been an area that the Blue Raiders have had trouble with. Looking back to this last matchup with Kennesaw State, Ricky Collins, who is one of the more mobile quarterbacks in Conference USA,

[00:09:02] the Blue Raiders actually did a relatively good job containing Collins. He just had 29 yards rushing and had 14 yards on one carry. So that removed, you only allowed Collins for 15 yards. I believe it was on nine rushes thereafter. So you did a good job containing one quarterback. Can you do the same this upcoming Saturday against Western Kentucky and Tyson Helton's second option at quarterback? And when we come back from this break, we're going to be talking a little bit more about the Hilltoppers

[00:09:31] and what to expect in this Saturday homecoming matchup. And of course, previewing a little bit more for basketball ahead of tonight's Friday night matchups. You do not want to miss it. You're listening to the Blue Raider podcast. This is the Blue Raider podcast on FM 101.9 and AM 1450 Murfreesboro, 100.5 Smyrna, WGNSRadio.com, and the Blue Raider podcast YouTube channel.

[00:09:58] Now back to your host, Jake Bolden. Welcome back into the Blue Raider podcast. It is an abbreviated episode this evening as after this segment, we're going to be turning it over to Greg Pogue down in Memphis for the women's basketball pregame show. But before we do so, I do want to remind you to follow the Blue Raider podcast anywhere you have social media at Blue Raider pod.

[00:10:23] We're on X, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and of course, today's live stream over on YouTube as we do every Friday at 5 p.m. We were highlighting, previewing this homecoming matchup for MTSU football. Big for a lot of reasons. Obviously, both teams still trying to keep their bowl eligibility lives alive this Saturday at 2.30 kickoff. Blue Raiders have a tall task, I believe, in front of them, mostly because of who the Hilltoppers are bringing at quarterback.

[00:10:52] Going into the year, Rodney Tisdale was one of the more sought-after quarterbacks, I would have to imagine, in the portal. But Tyson Helton did a great job retaining him and actually bringing in more quarterback help with Brock Glenn. Brock Glenn is a Florida State transfer for Coach Helton and offensive coordinator Bodie Reeder, who obviously Blue Raider fans should be familiar with. But Brock Glenn really hasn't been the starter for this team, at least officially a starter for this team, until Conference USA play really hit for him.

[00:11:21] He started the last three games for them after that New Mexico State whooping, I would say, that the Hilltoppers took. But since then, I would say Western Kentucky has turned their season around. At least it looks a lot better for them. And whether that was Brock Glenn's doing or Tyson Helton potentially taking play-calling duties over from Bodie Reeder, there's a lot of speculation in the air about that. But Brock Glenn certainly has been a big help for that. And a part of that is his dual-threat ability.

[00:11:51] This offense collectively runs for 148 yards per game. They're the fourth-best total offense in Conference USA. But ironically, they are the fourth-worst scoring offense. And that's just in Conference USA play. Obviously, they had some non-conference games against Georgia and Indiana, which will really skew those numbers. So I'll try to keep things in context of Conference USA here. But Brock Glenn is, like I said, running for 451 yards.

[00:12:21] He leads the team in rushing yards. He has five touchdowns. Other running back, Jay Allen, has 419 rushing yards and five touchdowns himself. He's a senior transfer in from Tulsa who's well on pace to break his career high for rushing yards in a season. But those two are your biggest running threats in this offense. Obviously, they're going to run a lot of RPO. So you just have to—Brock Glenn is just another guy that you're just going to have to defend.

[00:12:48] And when a team is multidimensional in the backfield like Western Kentucky is, it has certainly created a lot of problems for MTSU. We've seen what they've done against pocket passers, getting good wins against FIU and Delaware, who I would say their quarterbacks were not nearly as mobile as Brock Glenn, obviously. But Ricky Collins last week, who is a more mobile quarterback, did an excellent job. Containing him. So Brock Glenn's got to be number one on that scouting report.

[00:13:15] The team collectively has rushed for over 144 yards in their last three games. Again, that's since Brock Glenn started at quarterback for them. They throw the ball, I would say, pretty average for the rest of the conference. 220 yards, passing yards per game. They're led by Jonathan Stafford, Jr., who has 433 yards on the year and just one touchdown. But he is one of the most targeted wide receivers in the conference.

[00:13:40] Past him, it's really a thin, I would say thin in terms of production, but they do have a lot of depth there. Wide receiver Musa Berry had a really good game against Delaware this last week, 80 yards, which was a season high for him, and he's been a part of that program for quite a while. But when you face a team that has only one threat, I'd say real threat, on the outside, like Jonathan Stafford, we saw with McGuire-Anderson when MTSU faced FIU, did a great job.

[00:14:08] I think McGuire only had one catch in that game down in Miami. I think if your secondary keys in on eliminating Stafford from a passing perspective and force Western Kentucky to be one-dimensional, maybe that's your recipe for success, at least on the defensive side of the ball. But this offense obviously is capable of scoring. But what's so odd about how good they are at running the football is in pass protection, their offensive line has not been great so far this year.

[00:14:34] They've allowed 11 sacks in just Conference USA play, which is the second worst, and they even allowed six in their loss against New Mexico State. So getting to the quarterback, which at that time was Rodney Tisdale, so it is a different quarterback. However, the sack numbers, I think if you're Western Kentucky, is a red flag, no pun intended. Defensively, though, Western is particularly good. Again, barring that loss last week to Delaware, I think they've been relatively good.

[00:15:03] They're one of the better rush defenses in the conference. They have a really good linebacker core and front seven. Jalen Lewis, 64 tackles. He's third in Conference USA. Weston R., Jalen Wester. That's going to be a tough one for the play-by-play guys. But those two linebackers, they collectively have combined for nine tackles for loss. And then defensive tackle, Machiavelli Malotumau has five tackles for losses,

[00:15:31] senior for the Hilltoppers. And then their secondary, they've got a good safety in Jalen Lewis. Again, 64 tackles. He's third in the conference. And then Justin Brown, who is a redshirt junior from Blackman High School here in Murfreesboro. But he has five tackle for losses and an interception. And then Tony Newsom Jr. has eight pass breakups. He leads Conference USA in pass breakups. And he has two interceptions to his name this year. And I think more importantly that they create a lot of turnovers, 12 turnovers this season,

[00:16:01] one per game in their last four Conference USA games. So defensively, this is a strong unit. They have created a lot of problems defensively through the air. They gave up 400 yards against Delaware. But outside of that one, it's been less than 200. So you're going to have to find some success, in my opinion, through the air to win a football game against Western Kentucky. That was obviously why Delaware was so successful last week is Minacucci throwing for 400 yards.

[00:16:29] I'm not saying you need 400 yards from Roman Gagliano. But it would be nice to see that offense kind of shake off that bad second half against Kennesaw State, get back to what they did really well, which is running the football, establish the run game, and then use a complimentary passing game to go along with it. I think that this defense has its holes. And I think that there is certainly a route for this team to be successful. The line opened as NTSU favorites at 1.5. As of tonight, it's dropped all the way down to Western being a 2.5 point favorite.

[00:16:58] So clearly Vegas and all the money is going for the Hilltoppers. I think Western Kentucky is a talented football team, and for whatever reason, they have not put it together. I think for the rivalry's sake, it's been seven straight years that Western Kentucky has won this matchup. I think it's nine of the last ten, something absurd like that. If you want to win, you've got to play, obviously, solid defense. You've got to be able to contain their quarterback and make them one-dimensional,

[00:17:26] and then offensively, I think if you can get the ground game going, I think the offense will do really, really well. Be opportunistic. Take advantage of those turnovers like you weren't able to do against Kennesaw State. Limit kickoff returns, pump returns. That was two free touchdowns you gave to Kennesaw State, and obviously two essential pick sixes that just put you behind the eight ball. Avoid the big mistakes this weekend. But I personally am picking Western. I think Western is in a state where they have to win if they want to make a bowl of eligibility,

[00:17:55] so it's vital that they win this one on Saturday. I like Western, unfortunately, in this one by a score of 34-28. That's kind of where I had it, six points. It's going to come down to, I think, field possession game. I mean, MTSU has the better special teams unit, but I have reasons for concern after that Kennesaw State loss a couple weeks ago. But wrapping it up here, again, women's basketball on the road at Memphis tonight at six. They had a big overtime win against St. Louis.

[00:18:23] Blair Boggess with a putback and one. The three-point play forcing overtime. Had a few opportunities to win at their late, but they hit the free throw. Jose Whitfield hitting five free throws. Kirsten Verhul hitting five free throws in overtime to get a big win. St. Louis is much improved from where they were last year. Obviously had a really talented guard who I hope she's okay. Came up hobbled there in overtime. Things certainly, momentum shifted when that happened, but nonetheless, a big win. And then, of course, they're on the road this weekend.

[00:18:53] Memphis in the next week and Thursday, they are in Knoxville for that big one against the Lady Vols. So a quick turnaround for this team and a little bit of a round robin, so to speak, for the state of Tennessee. And then men's basketball, obviously, big win. I thought the offense was great. 16 three-pointers. The defense left much to be desired. But they are out in Kansas tonight at 8 p.m. over on ESPNU. And then they return home on Tuesday against Evansville at 6.30 p.m. So we are breezed through today's episode.

[00:19:22] So we are going to be turning it over to Greg Pogue, who's got the pregame show for the women down in Memphis. Thanks to you for tuning in to another episode of the Blue Raider Podcast. Remember to follow us on social media at BlueRaiderPod on X, Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok. And if you're tuned in to our live stream over on YouTube, subscribe so you don't miss another one of our weekly episodes. Thanks to my producer, Jackson Smith. You're listening to the Blue Raider Podcast. Blue Raider Podcast.