What Scares Us About Southeastern? They Keep Finding a Different Way to Hurt You.

Here’s what scares me about Southeastern: they don’t seem married to one way of winning.

They started 0–2, then found three completely different ways to get right.

Against North Alabama, Southeastern trailed by 11 before ripping off 23 straight points and winning 30–25. Then the Lions went to ULM and walked out with a 38–35 win — their first over an FBS opponent since the program returned in 2003. A week later, they flipped the whole script and ran for 300 yards while hanging 52 on Northwestern State. (SLU Athletics)

Three wins. Three different flavors.

That’s the part that gets me.

This isn’t a team where you circle one dude, one concept, one tendency and say, “Cool, shut that down and we’re good.” Southeastern has already shown it can live in different kinds of games.

That’s where this matchup starts getting a little grimy.

What Scares Me: QB Kyle Lowe Doesn’t Need to Be Superman

QB Kyle Lowe isn’t out there trying to make every throw look like a Sunday audition.

He’s playing the kind of quarterback that gets under your skin because he keeps the offense on schedule, protects the football and usually doesn’t hand you anything cheap.

Through five games, Lowe has thrown for 883 yards, 10 touchdowns and only three interceptions while completing 60.8 percent of his passes. Southeastern has allowed only four sacks all year. (SLU Athletics)

That’s clean football.

The ball is getting out. The protection is holding up. Lowe usually knows where he wants to go with it, and he’s not creating chaos just because he feels like freelancing.

Now add the part UTRGV already knows.

Last year against the Vaqueros, Lowe ran nine times for 92 yards and a touchdown while Southeastern piled up 540 total yards in a 45–31 win. RB Deantre Jackson added 121 on the ground. (SLU Athletics)

And this week, Southeastern’s own people have already talked about Lowe getting involved in the run game again when they get to UTRGV.

That’s the part that makes me look up.

Lowe doesn’t have to run it 15 times. He just has to make UTRGV account for him.

One bad edge, one linebacker stepping into the wrong gap, one defender getting too thirsty trying to make a play, and now the math gets funky.

What Scares Me More: The Run Game Has Layers

The backfield is where Southeastern starts getting annoying.

RB Chad Elzy is averaging 6.1 yards per carry. RB Deantre Jackson is at 6.3. Against Northwestern State, Elzy went for 101 yards and three touchdowns on only seven carries while Jackson added 104 on six. Southeastern finished with 300 rushing yards. (SLU Athletics)

That’s not one back getting force-fed 25 times and carrying the whole thing.

There are layers to it.

They can rotate backs. They can stay patient. And if Lowe becomes part of the run equation again, everybody in UTRGV’s front seven has to play clean football.

If the middle gets soft, Southeastern can lean on it. If the edges get sloppy, Lowe can pull it and make you pay. If safeties start creeping downhill, the picture behind them starts opening up.

That’s where this run game gets grimy.

One dude guesses wrong and Southeastern can turn a normal fit into six yards before anybody even gets good hands on the ball.

What Scares Me Right Now: Special Teams Meets the Exact Wrong Dude

This one hits a little different after Commerce.

Special teams hurt UTRGV last week.

The punt that hit Sweeney inside the 10 handed East Texas A&M a short field, and the Vaqueros spent too much of the night making life harder on themselves.

Now here comes WR/PR Dkhai Joseph.

And this dude is exactly the wrong guy to see when your punt unit is coming off a rough night.

Joseph took a punt back 78 yards for a touchdown against ULM. Through five games, Southeastern has two punt-return touchdowns, and Joseph has already established himself as one of the most dangerous return threats in the league. He’s also Southeastern’s leading receiver. (SLU Athletics)

So this isn’t some return specialist who disappears when the offense comes out.

They want the ball in his hands.

That is about as bad a matchup as you could draw one week after special teams already put stress on UTRGV.

One bad punt. One missed lane. One dude overrunning the play.

Now the whole game tilts.

Special teams doesn’t have to win this game for UTRGV.

But it damn sure can’t be the reason this thing gets sideways again.

What Scares Me on Defense: They Fly Downhill

The Southeastern defense isn’t scary because the stat sheet is spotless.

It isn’t.

The Lions are allowing over 400 yards per game, and opponents have found success through the air and on third down. Their own people have talked about needing to clean up explosive passes and mistakes in the secondary. (SLU Athletics)

But the way they play gets my attention.

LB Carter Hanberry has been one of their most active defenders, while S Carter Byrd and S Kenneth Ford Jr. give them safeties who are willing to trigger downhill and get involved around the line of scrimmage. (SLU Athletics)

They don’t sit back there admiring the view.

They come forward.

That aggression is what UTRGV has to mess with.

If those safeties start flying downhill to choke off the run, WR Kyron Lee (KDot) and WR Jaydon Smith (JC) have to make them regret it behind them.

Make them turn around. Make them defend grass.

Southeastern comes downhill with bad intentions, but they’re not airtight.

There’s grass behind that aggression.

UTRGV has to make them pay rent for it.

What Scares Me Underneath It All: They’ve Already Been in Different Kinds of Fights

This might be the part I respect most about what Southeastern has done during this run.

They’ve already had weird.

They’ve had to come back. They’ve gone on the road and beaten an FBS team. Then they turned around and won by 31 while running for 300. (SLU Athletics)

A team that only knows how to win one way can get real uncomfortable when the game changes shape.

Southeastern has already been forced to change shape.

And now they get a bye.

Time to heal. Time to self-scout. Time to clean up the stuff they don’t like. Time to bring back things they haven’t had to lean on lately.

This doesn’t feel like a team still searching for an identity.

It feels like a team that started 0–2, caught a couple shots to the mouth, and started figuring out what works.

That’s a dangerous time to catch a team.

What Scares Me Most: There Isn’t One Thing to Take Away

That’s really the whole deal.

Southeastern can run for 300. It can come from behind. It can flip the scoreboard on special teams. It can play aggressive defense and make you uncomfortable.

And now it gets extra time before coming to Edinburg.

That’s what scares me most.

Not because Southeastern is unbeatable.

They’re not.

It’s because this isn’t one of those games where UTRGV can say, “Stop the run and we’re good,” or “Take away the quarterback and the rest falls apart.”

This one feels like four quarters of grown-man ball.

Fit the run. Hold the edge. Get off the field on third down. Don’t give Dkhai Joseph daylight. Don’t hand over free possessions. And please, for the love of everything orange, don’t let special teams be the thing we’re talking about afterward again.

Southeastern has already shown it can win a bunch of different ways.

UTRGV has to show it can handle all of them.