SMU’s fans, media pushers and coach June Jones like to preach of a Mustang resurgence, and indeed the record would appear to reflect the same, at least to a degree.

Last season, the Mustangs won the C-USA western division crown before falling to Central Florida in the league championship game. Their consolation prize was a berth in the locally-held Armed Forces Bowl in which the Ponies fell to Army, 16-14, thus ending the season at 7-7. The year before, the Mustangs went bowling as well, winning their game in Hawaii over Nevada, to finish the season at 8-5.

That's their resurgence. But the two seasons before, SMU won one game each year.

Meanwhile, just how did the Owls fare against the Mustangs during those two years of  whiz-bang success? Well, in ‘09, a 3-9 Rice team took SMU to the wire in Dallas, losing 31-28, a loss that was primarily occasioned by a couple of blocked kicks by SMU’s Lithuanian Lightning-Bolt, 6-8 DL Margus Hunt. No blocks, no SMU win.

Last year in Rice Stadium, SMU pulled away at the end to win 42-31 – but it was a game in which the Owls outperformed the Mustangs, and lost only because of self-inflicted wounds.

And in the prior three years? The Owls won each time out.

So when SMU preps talk about ‘utter domination’ and ‘never losing to Rice in anything,’ that’s just a bunch of frat-boy smoke  – or so says the stat sheet. The moral: no reason for the Owls to enter Saturday’s game in a defensive posture. They’ve outplayed SMU in each of the past five years, and won three of those contests.  In none of those tilts were the Owls at all outmanned.

One could argue that the Rice offense this season is lacking in any particular identifiable dimensions at all, but it is for sure that the Ponies’ loss of C-USA's leading rusher Zach Line to injury after the Navy game has rendered their offense   much more one-dimensional than June Jones would like it to be.

Zach had led, and for that matter still leads, the team and league in rushing with 1,224 yards and 17 touchdowns. His backup? A 5-9, 195-pound true freshman from Bradenton , Fla., one Mr. Jared Williams, whose season tally so far includes  60 rushing yards on 20 carries.

Wait a minute; what’s this with the ‘Jared Williams’? Don’t the Owls have the copyright on that name?

With Zach Line unavailable, the weight of the world appears to fall upon the back of Pony senior quarterback J.J. McDermott, who’s been mercurial for the most part this season. More specifcally, his stock has fallen as the Ponies have lost four out of their last five after starting the season 5-1, including a 40-33 overtime win over TCU at Amon Carter Stadium.

When McDermott is cooking, it’s primarily because his offensive blocking scheme is being effective, and because two of his go-to receivers are having big days. That’d be, first, Cole Beasley, who leads the team with 896 yards and 72 receptions. Then there’s Darius Johnson, who’s accounted for 875 yards on 64 receptions plus a team-best six touchdown catches.  Both receivers have tormented the Rice defensive secondary in recent years when the Owl defensive coaches tried to cover them man-to-man.

The Pony defense has been led by the aforementioned Lithuanian presence, Margus Hunt, and also by sixth-year (or is it eighth year)  Chris Banjo, a 5-11, 192-pound monster man DB from Sugar Land Kempner.

"They are an older football team," Rice head coach David Bailiff commented earlier this week. "Banjo, it seems he has been in the league for six years. They are a senior ball club who has stayed together. They are playing extremely well. Their linebackers run well. Their secondary runs well. And that defensive line is big and physical and has got a lot of push on people's offensive line."

The Owls managed to beat a reeling Tulane team last Saturday while compiling a grand total of 237 yards total offense. That won’t win you many games. It certainly won’t win one for the Owls over SMU Saturday.

"That's the crazy thing about Conference USA," DB said. " You look at three weeks ago and we had 677 yards of offense. It's just almost how they unfold. If we need to grind it out, you'd like to think if we had to pound the rock we could. We've tried to throw the ball down the field a couple more times but haven't completed them. We haven't got the kind of plays we have been looking for since the UTEP game. I think we are working on a good game plan right now but SMU is probably the most solid defense right now in Conference USA."

So what will it take for the Owls to pull out a win Saturday and thus prevent the Ponies from having a winning season ? (Memo to Rice coaching staff from  the A&M coaching staff: 6-6 is not a winning season.)

Well, perhaps we could pull a few out of Coach Bailiff’s grab bag of football coaching cliches. Ah, here’s a good one -- number 17. "We can’t let Rice beat Rice."

Another apt one, number 23: "We've got to play solid in all phases." And a timely riposte, number 31: "We have to protect the quarterback better this week than we did last week."

From Owl fans’ perspective, going into the offseason on the push of a couple straight season-ending victories would be no small thing  -- both for recruiting and general Owl fan dauber level.  So in that regard, it’s appropriate to dust off a phrase coined by the late Al Davis  (don’t know what number it is).

"Just win, baby."

-- P.T.H.