Image courtesy of Michael Aimsworth/AP

Given the week BC unexpectedly had, things could have been a lot worse in Texas on Saturday.

The Eagles lost to 14th-ranked SMU 38-28 in a game where BC had the ball and a chance to tie or take the lead with two minutes remaining.

In the end, there are no moral victories and the Eagles are now 5-5 with two home games against North Carolina and Pitt remaining. They’re winnable, but nothing is certain with BC right now. The Eagles will need to win one of those two to be bowl eligible.

Making his first start since being named the permanent starter on Sunday, Grayson James wasn’t perfect, but he helped keep the Eagles in the game. James finished with 237 yards, a touchdown and an interception while also adding seven carries for five yards and a touchdown. Reed Harris was the biggest benefactor of Tommy Castellanos, catching four passes for 78 yards. Jeremiah Franklin had four for 42 and Kamari Morales had four for 34 and a touchdown.

Defensively, BC struggled to contain SMU’s speed, but the secondary also took two more blows with Bryquice Brown and Max Tucker both leaving the game with injuries. The Mustangs had 438 yards of offense while BC put up 417.

BC ran the ball well too, with Kye Robichaux churning out 90 yards and two touchdowns on 20 carries. Jordan McDonald added 11 for 63.  Unfortunately, the same could be said for Brashard Smith, who had 18 carries for 120 yards and a touchdown for SMU. Quarterback Kevin Jennings was also impressive, making multiple off-script throws. He finished with 298 yards, three touchdowns and an interception.

“Once again, don’t play for 60 minutes,” said Bill O’Brien. “Give SMU a lot of credit. They did a good job today. They’ve got a good football team.”

Without a consistent punter or kicker still, BC converted three of six fourth down attempts while going 6-15 on third down. O’Brien said going for it on fourth down – unless it was an outrageous yardage – was the game plan all along.

“I felt like we were in manageable fourth downs,” he said. “We had to outscore them. We were really struggling to stop them. I don’t think we really stopped them at all, you know what I mean? They probably stopped themselves. So, I felt like we needed 40 points to win the game, which, I was right about that.

“Unless it was 4th-&-9, 4th-&-10, but all of the fourth downs were manageable, 4th-&-5 or less. So, we went for it. I think there was one 4th-&-7 maybe, but as long as it was manageable we were going for it. We had to score touchdowns.”

Trailing 31-28 with two minutes left, McDonald picked up a 4th-&-2 at the Eagles’ 29 and the storybook ending for James was within reach. But, three straight sacks on first, third and fourth down inside the 15 allowed SMU to tack on one more late TD in the closing seconds for the 10-point win.

To get to that point, James led a 10-play, 74-yard drive that ended with a three-yard Robichaux TD with 5:52 to go.

“I wouldn’t say I was rattled at all early on,” said James, who was playing back home in Texas with (at last count) 33 or 34 family and friends in attendance. “It was kind of just finding a groove with how the game wanted to go and how they were going to play defense against us, especially coming off the bye week. Kind of expecting we’d get something different.

“It wasn’t anything too crazy. I felt like we were able to move the ball like we wanted to, we just weren’t able to execute in crucial times like we needed to.”

“He did a good job, very proud of Grayson,” added O’Brien. “Stepping into that situation…we’ve got a lot of confidence in Grayson. Grayson did a good job, we just didn’t do enough.”

BC trailed 20-14 at the half after another instance where the Eagles seemingly grabbed momentum heading into the locker room, but then gave it away. With 1:03 left in the second, James found Morales for a 13-yard touchdown to cap a 12-play, 75-yard drive and cut it to 17-14. Carter Davis came up with a pick one play later and BC suddenly had the ball at the Mustangs’ 15, but James was intercepted in the end zone looking for Morales. In the blink of an eye, a 45-yard run for Smith soon led to a 41-yard field goal as the clock hit zeros.

“Interception at the end of the half led to a field goal after like a 50-yard run, which was terrible,” said O’Brien. “That was a terrible sequence of plays.”

The Eagles took a 21-20 lead just under five minutes into the third quarter on James’ touchdown run.

BC trailed 10-0 after one until Robichaux scored from two yards out to finish off a 13-play, 75-yard march. Smith scored from nine yards out on the ensuing SMU drive before the Morales touchdown.

The way BC handled this past week should be commended and speaks to the respect this staff commands and has earned, but the results on the field are the results and it hasn’t been pretty.

There’s no denying that there’s some pressure on the Eagles now in front of the home fans for the final two games of the season. 6-6 and a bowl is tolerable, 7-5 and a bowl is best case scenario and 5-7 will have the BC faithful demanding changes.

“We fight, we’ve got a tough team, we have a tough football team,” O’Brien added. “We’re not there yet. Like I said, give SMU credit. They’ve got a good team. They’re a potential playoff team. We fight, but if you’re going to win a game like that you have to make plays in critical moments and we weren’t able to do that.

“Gotta coach it better, No. 1. Myself, it starts with me. I’ve got to do a better job coaching and we’ll show up next week.”