{"id":428247,"date":"2025-12-06T06:59:13","date_gmt":"2025-12-06T06:59:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/428247\/"},"modified":"2025-12-06T06:59:13","modified_gmt":"2025-12-06T06:59:13","slug":"kennesaw-state-wins-conference-usa-title-def-jacksonville-state-19-15","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/428247\/","title":{"rendered":"Kennesaw State wins Conference USA title, def. Jacksonville State 19-15"},"content":{"rendered":"

JACKSONVILLE, Ala. — Amari Odom<\/a> threw an 11-yard touchdown pass to Navelle Dean<\/a> in the final minute after Kennesaw State<\/a> let a 12-point fourth-quarter lead slip away, and the Owls rallied to beat regular-season champion Jacksonville State<\/a> 19-15<\/a> in the Conference USA championship game Friday night.<\/p>\n

Kennesaw State first-year coach Jerry Mack led his team to the title after the Owls finished 2-10 last season.<\/p>\n

Odom and the Owls (10-3) took over at their own 25-yard line after fourth-quarter touchdown runs by Caden Creel<\/a> and Cam Cook<\/a> had given the Gamecocks a 15-12 lead with 4:04 left to play.<\/p>\n

Odom hit Christian Moss<\/a> for a 26-yard gain on third-and-27 before Coleman Bennett<\/a> picked up the first down with a 3-yard run with two minutes left. Odom ran 14 yards on a fourth-and-14 keeper, and a late-hit penalty gave Kennesaw State the ball at the Gamecocks’ 11 with 63 seconds left.<\/p>\n

Dean, a sophomore, caught the go-ahead pass from Odom on the next play for his first collegiate touchdown. Dean finished with two catches for 19 yards after entering with two receptions this season.<\/p>\n

Kennesaw State used Bennett’s 3-yard touchdown run in the second quarter and Britton Williams<\/a>‘ 38-yard field goal in the third to take a 10-0 lead.<\/p>\n

Momentum swung Jacksonville State’s way after Davis Bryson<\/a> fumbled on a free kick after a safety with 12:39 remaining. Cook, the leading rusher in the FBS with 1,581 yards entering play, turned the miscue into a 1-yard scoring run to cut it to 12-7.<\/p>\n

Creel’s 19-yard touchdown run and his conversion pass to Deondre Johnson<\/a> gave the Gamecocks a brief lead.<\/p>\n

Odum completed 26 of 32 passes for 246 yards. Bennett carried 17 times for 82 yards.<\/p>\n

Creel totaled 96 yards on 12-for-21 passing with an interception. He rushed for 112 yards on 18 carries. Cook totaled 78 yards on 19 rushes.<\/p>\n

The Owls avenged a 35-26 road loss to the Gamecocks on Nov. 15.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"JACKSONVILLE, Ala. — Amari Odom threw an 11-yard touchdown pass to Navelle Dean in the final minute after…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":428248,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5136],"tags":[5229,3188,723,7310,67,586,132,5230,68,2969],"class_list":{"0":"post-428247","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jacksonville","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-fl","10":"tag-florida","11":"tag-jacksonville","12":"tag-united-states","13":"tag-united-states-of-america","14":"tag-unitedstates","15":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","16":"tag-us","17":"tag-usa"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115671332532936373","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428247","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=428247"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/428247\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/428248"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=428247"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=428247"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=428247"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}