by Malcolm Butler
These Bulldogs are truly an underdog.
Louisiana Tech (5-7) will head into Saturday night’s match-up against the No. 22-ranked Army Black Knights (11-2) as a two touchdown underdog as kickoff for the 2024 Radiance Technologies Independence Bowl is set for 8:15 p.m. at Independence Stadium in Shreveport.
Heck, just two weeks ago, the Bulldog players had cleaned out their lockers and were preparing for off-season workouts … that is until the 11th hour announcement on December 14th that Tech would replace Marshall in the postseason game.
It’s Tech first bowl appearance since the 2020 New Orleans Bowl.
Despite taking the road-less-traveled into the game, Tech head coach Sonny Cumbie said his team is excited and is embracing the opportunity for a 13th game.
“It is unconventional a little bit on how it worked out for us and for our football team,” said Cumbie. “However, in terms of the bowl system, bowl games, and the impact they have on student athletes, I wish you could have heard the excitement and joy, in particular the 16 seniors that chose to come back and play in this game when given the opportunity to come back and play together. They were ecstatic and very excited, and we are grateful to be here.”
The appearance will be Tech’s sixth in Independence Bowl history, and its first since defeating Miami 14-0 in 2019.
Tech (5-7) had a roller coaster season that saw the Bulldogs fall short in heartbreaking fashion far too many times. However, each and every week, the Dogs came back and played with the same level of intensity and effort despite what was on the line or who the opponent was or what the outcome was the previous week.
It’s that mentality and closeness in the Bulldogs locker room that senior linebacker Zach Zimos pointed to during Friday’s press conference.
“I’ve never been on a more close-knit team,” said Zimos. “So, it has been a fantastic opportunity, I’m super grateful. But the main thing is to win. We’re not here to play an extra game and get the extra practices. The plan is to win and obviously play really well.”
Winning will not be easy for Tech. The Bulldogs face an Army team that has lost just two games all year and that won the American Athletic Conference. It’s been a historic season for Army who hopes to put an exclamation mark on it with a bowl victory.
“(Jeff) Monken has done a great job everywhere he has been,” said Cumbie.” In terms of coaching football, when you watch teams play, that’s all you need to do is watch teams play. You don’t need to listen to commentators, you don’t need to listen anything that goes on in terms of tv, just watch teams play and see how hard, violent, and cohesive Coach Monken’s team plays. You see that for the 12-13 games that we have studied this year.”
Although Monken knows that Tech will be minus a number of key components from its regular season two-deep due to injury or the transfer portal, the Black Knights coach isn’t taking the Bulldogs for granted despite being a 14-point favorite.
“It was mentioned, three overtime games and five games by one score or less, they’ve got a tremendous football team and it’s going to be a tremendous challenge for us,” said Monken. “So, very athletic football team, very big football team, very fast football team we’re going to face, so we’ve been preparing as well as we can over the last couple of weeks with limited practices.”
As a team, Army averages almost 300 yards per game on the ground (298.9), but will have to try to run against one of the top run defenses in the country. Louisiana Tech allowed just two opponents this season (Jacksonville State – 191, Arkansas – 233) to eclipse the 175-yard mark rushing as the Bulldogs give up just 120 yards per game.
“They (Tech) are very unique,” said Monken. “They are salty. Physical, play hard, tough, well coached and a unique scheme. As much as everyone talks about us having a unique offensive scheme, they’re very unique defensively and poses a unique challenge for us.
“A lot of times you go into football games as an offense having no idea what we’re going to see from the opposing defense because we are different and unique and align differently and have different schemes. We often see a defense the opposing team hasn’t played all year. So, we don’t know. I tried to ask coach Cumbie what they were going to line up in but he wouldn’t say.”
The contest can be heard on the LA Tech Sports Network on 107.5 FM with Malcolm Butler, Teddy Allen and Jerry Byrd providing the call of the game. The pregame show will begin at 6:45 p.m.
It will be Louisiana Tech’s 12th bowl game since joining the Football Bowl Subdivision (FBS) ranks in 1988, including its fourth appearance in Shreveport during that time. Tech also played in the Independence Bowl in 1977 and 1978. Tech is 3-1-1 all-time at the Independence Bowl.
Tech FBS Bowl History
1990 Independence Bowl – T, 34-34 vs. Maryland
2001 Humanitarian Bowl – L, 49-24 vs. Clemson
2008 Independence Bowl – W, 17-10 vs. Northern Illinois
2011 Poinsettia Bowl – L, 31-24 vs. TCU
2014 Heart of Dallas Bowl – W, 35-18 vs. Illinois
2015 New Orleans Bowl – W, 47-28 vs. Arkansas State
2016 Armed Forces Bowl – W, 48-45 vs. Navy
2017 Frisco Bowl – W, 51-10 vs. SMU
2018 Hawaii Bowl – W, 31-14 vs. Hawaii
2019 Independence Bowl – W, 14-0 vs. Miami (Fla).
2020 New Orleans Bowl – L, 38-3 vs. Georgia Southern
2024 Independence Bowl – vs. Army
