Back in Frisco, UTSA looks for that elusive bowl victory against Marshall

The UTSA Roadrunners will close out their 2023 season in the Scooter’s Coffee Frisco Bowl on Tuesday night looking to do something no Roadrunner team has done before: win a bowl game.

Quarterback Frank Harris, safety Rashad Wisdom and wide receiver Joshua Cephus are among the UTSA players who have two conference championships but have yet to experience a bowl victory. In the Roadrunners’ fifth bowl appearance in the program’s history, they have one final chance.

“We have a group of seniors that are going out and it’s very important” to win this game, UTSA Head Coach Jeff Traylor said. “They could leave here as two-time conference champion plus the first group to ever win a bowl game at this school. That would be a nice little cherry on top.”

The Roadrunners (8-4) will face a somewhat familiar team in the bowl game: the Marshall Thundering Herd (6-6). UTSA and Marshall were once members of Conference USA and met three times before the Herd moved to the Sun Belt Conference last year and UTSA moved to the American Athletic Conference. 

The Thundering Herd leads the series 2-1, but UTSA won the only game the two ever played in the state of Texas. That was back in 2017 when UTSA beat Marshall 9-7 on three field goals from kicker Jared Sackett. UTSA and Marshall last played each other in 2018 in West Virginia.

“Their record doesn’t display how great they really are,” Harris said. “It will be a great test for us. We are excited to go out there and be able to play in a bowl game.”

The Thundering Herd will be without their starting quarterback Cam Fancher, who entered the transfer portal earlier this month. Cole Pennington, son of former NFL quarterback Chad Pennington, will be the Thundering Herd quarterback in the bowl game. 

UTSA will also be without a key player in the bowl thanks to the transfer portal. Linebacker Trey Moore, the American Athletic Conference’s defensive player of the year, entered the transfer portal earlier this month.

“You definitely would have loved to see him here but at the end of the day everyone makes their own decisions. I support Trey regardless of what he does,” Wisdom said. “He’s one of my best friends on this team. The day he went into the transfer portal we went out to eat like normal. It’s not any bad blood or anything. It’s just the way of the world now. I wish the best for him.”

Despite playing an unranked team in a bowl game for the first time since the 2016 New Mexico Bowl, the Roadrunners are not taking the Thundering Herd lightly. 

“They’re pretty good,” UTSA offensive lineman Ernesto Almaraz said. “They’re very physical. They do a lot up front and we’re excited to get after it.”

In trying to write a new chapter in the program’s bowl history, UTSA will be making its second appearance at the Frisco Bowl, where the 2021 Roadrunners held an early 14-7 lead over San Diego State before falling 38-24.

Last year UTSA opened the Cure Bowl in Orlando with a 12-0 lead before Troy scored 18 unanswered points to win by six. UTSA’s other two bowl losses were by one possession, 31-24 against Louisiana in the 2020 First Responder Bowl and 23-20 to New Mexico in the 2016 New Mexico Bowl. 

Now the Roadrunners are hoping for better fortunes in Frisco.

“We’ve done the rings. We’ve got two rings,” UTSA wide receiver Joshua Cephus said. “The only thing we haven’t done on our list is win a bowl game. That’s the biggest [goal] of the season right now.”