No. 25 Football Earns Spot in AAC Championship Game With 35-0 Road Victory Over Navy

Saturday, November 16

Annapolis, MD

11:00 AM

Tulane University

9-2 , 7-0

Navy

7-3 , 5-2

1st

2nd

3rd

4th

Tulane

Navy

Photo by: Parker Waters

No. 25 Football Earns Spot in AAC Championship Game With 35-0 Road Victory Over Navy

Nov 16, 2024 | Football

Box Score

FINAL STATS
ESPN HIGHLIGHTS
POSTGAME SUMRALL/HUGHES/MENSAH/HOWARD PRESS CONFERENCE
PHOTO GALLERY (BY PARKER WATERS)

ANNAPOLIS, MD - The No. 25 AP / No. 25 CFP Tulane football team (9-2,7-0 AAC) shutout the first conference opponent since 1960 to earn an appearance in the 2024 American Athletic Conference Football Championship with a dominate 35-0 road victory over Navy (7-3, 5-2 AAC) on Saturday at Navy-Marine Corps Memorial Stadium.

Darian Mensah had a strong all-around performance in going 10-for-14 for 138 yards and two touchdowns through the air and also running for a career-high 57 and a touchdown in the victory. Makhi Hughes ran for 82 yards and two touchdowns. Arnold Barnes III totaled 62 yards on the ground and also hauled in a touchdown pass. Mario Williams led the squad with his three catches and totaled 46 yards. Dontae Fleming was the receiving leader on the team with his two catches for 56 yards.

Tyler Grubbs led a strong team effort on defense with five tackles. Sam Howard recorded four tackles, a stop for loss, an interception and a fumble recovery. His fumble recovery was his fifth of the season. Gerrod Henderson picked up four tackles. Terrell Allen, Kevin Adams III, Caleb Ransaw all had stops for loss. Deshaun Batiste forced a fumble.

Tulane limited Navy to just 113 yards including only 13 passing yards in the game and 1-for-11 on third down. The Green Wave picked up 358 yards with 138 through the air and 220 on the ground. The team also went 6-for-13 on third down while holding onto the ball for 35:47 and forcing a pair of turnovers.

Tulane scored first after getting an interception for Sam Howard the offense marched down the field on a five play, 63-yard drive that was capped off on a Mensah 14-yard rush to put the score at 7-0 with 1:07 remaining in the opening quarter.

Following a fourth down stop, the Tulane offense kept things in gear as the program drove down the field and scored on a 14-yard rush from Makhi Hughes to put the score at 14-0 with 4:00 left in the second quarter.

The Green Wave got the ball to start the second half and went on a 13-play, 65 yard drive that drained 8:45 off the clock and was capped off on the one-yard rush from Hughes to put Tulane up 21-0 with 6:15 left in the third quarter.

Mensah connected on his first touchdown pass of the game as he hit Alex Bauman on a one-yard to put the Green Wave up 28-0 with 9:19 remaining in the game.

The Green Wave defense again gave the offense a short field as Deshaun Batiste forced a fumble that was recovered by Sam Howard. It was Howard's fifth fumble recovery of the season. The Tulane offense capitalized quickly as Mensah hit Barnes on a one-yard touchdown to increase the margin to 35-0 with 7:38 remaining in what would be the final score.

Next, the football team returns home to host Memphis on Nov. 28 for a Thanksgiving game starting at 6:30 p.m. that will also be shown on ESPN.

NOTES:

- The Green Wave is 7-0 in conference play for the second straight year and the third time overall (2024, 2023 and 1934).

- The victory was the ninth for Tulane in the team's first 11 games. It marks the first time since 2022 that Tulane has won exactly nine of the first 11 games, but the third time in as many seasons that Tulane is 9-2 or better. Overall, Tulane is 9-2 or better for the 8th time in school history.

- The win was the first time that Jon Sumrall has won his first seven conference games in three years as a head coach. It was his 12th straight regular season conference victory dating back to the Sun Belt Conference game he lost to James Madison while at Troy last season (9/16/23).

- The win improved Coach Sumrall to 10-0 all-time against current AAC teams.

- The victory made Tulane 8-0 this season when outrushing the opponent.

- The win was Tulane's 17th straight in AAC regular season play dating back to the 2022 season (11/17/22 vs. SMU - Present) and ties the conference record set by UCF (9/30/2017 – 9/28/19) and Cincinnati (10/2/20 – 10/29/22). Tulane's 17 straight conference wins is the longest active streak in the country.

- The win improved Tulane to 13-12-1 all-time against Navy…This was the first time the schools have played against each other since 2020 when the Navy defeated the Tulane 27-24 in New Orleans...Navy had won the last two games of the series and six of the last seven dating back to 2005 before today's victory…The win in Annapolis was the first for the program since the 2001 season when the team defeated the Naval Academy 42-28…Tulane came into the game 4-9 all-time against Navy in Annapolis

- Coach Sumrall improved his all-time record to 32-6 (.842). He entered the week with the fourth-highest winning percentage among current FBS head coaches behind Ohio State's Ryan Day (.877 - 64-9), Oregon's Dan Lanning (.865 – 32-5) and Georgia's Kirby Smart (.849 – 101-18).

- Since the start of the 2022 season, Tulane is now 32-7 including a mark of 27-3 (.896) when scoring first…Of the team's seven losses since the start of the 2022 season, six have come to teams that are currently in the Power 4 (UCF in 2022 – Big 12, Ole Miss in 2023 – SEC, SMU in 2023 – ACC, Virginia Tech in 2023 – ACC, Kansas State in 2024 – Big 12 and Oklahoma in 2024 – SEC)

- With multiple turnovers forced against Navy, Tulane has now won 27 of the last 31 games when forcing an opponent turnover.

- Tulane has now outrushed the opposition in 29 of the last 37 games (including 23 of the last 27). In such contests, Tulane holds a 27-2 record (losses in 2022 vs. Southern Miss and 2023 vs. Ole Miss).

- Since the beginning of the 2016 season, Tulane is 51-7 (.879) when leading at the half and 53-9 (.855) when leading or tied after three quarters.

- Coach Sumrall improved his own record to 25-0 in his coaching career when outrushing the opponent.

- Tulane has now won 22 AAC games over the last three seasons (7-1 in 2022, 8-0 in 2023 and 7-0 in 2024). The program only won a total of 19 AAC games since joining the league in 2014 through the 2021 season (2 – 2014, 1 – 2015, 1 – 2016, 3 – 2017, 5 – 2018, 3 – 2019, 3 – 2020 and 1 – 2021).

- Makhi Hughes' with two rushing touchdowns today now has seven career multi touchdown games including six this season…He also has now scored a touchdown in 11 straight games…This was only the third time in 15 career conference games that Hughes has been held below 100 yards rushing.

- Hughes has run for 100+ yards in 12 out of 15 career AAC games (Only three without against FAU – 11/18/23, USF – 9/28/24 and Navy – 11/16/24). In his career he has run for 1868 yards on 339 carries with 18 rushing touchdowns and an average of 5.52 yards per carry against league opponents. He has averaged 127.53 yards per game when playing an AAC team.

- Tulane has 176 shutouts in school history…The team's last conference shutout was against Vanderbilt during the 1960 season by a 20-0 score (a span for 283 conference games before today since the last shutout)…Tulane now has 29 conference shutouts in school history…The last time that Tulane had multiple shutouts in the same season was in 1997.|

- The 113 yards allowed was a season low.

- The 35-0 road conference victory over Navy for Tulane was the largest conference road victory since beating LSU 46-0 in 1948 at Tiger Stadium.

- In the last three games, Tulane has outscored the conference opposition 121-9.

- Sam Howard's five fumble recoveries this season are also a team record breaking the mark of four set by Tony Hannah (1985) and Curt Baham (1985)

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