Liberty Loses Back-To-Back Games After Falling To Jacksonville State (10-30-24)

By: Ty Tracy

All Photo Credit: Brynne Smith-LMS Network 

Lynchburg, Virginia—Jacksonville St Gamecocks has slayed Head Coach Jamey Chadwell and the Liberty Flames 12 game home winning streak Wednesday night from a 31 to 21 victory at Williams Stadium (Lynchburg, VA), giving the Flames their second loss of the season after suffering an upset against Kennesaw St last week 27 to 24 ending their 17-game regular-season then ended the nation’s fifth-longest active home win streak at 12 games. While the Gamecocks are on a five-game winning streak (5-3) since they started conference play. 

The Flames started strong scoring the first touchdown of the game, but they didn’t have any answers for Jax St running back Tre Stewart the whole night. Stewart was a workhorse Wednesday night finishing the game with 27 carries, 232 rushing yards, and 4 rushing TDs making his fourth game rushing over 100 yards, but the second game rushing over 200 yards in the last two games. Tre Stewart rushed for 192 yards in the first half but 40 yards in the second half along with QB Tyler Huff played a big part in the Gamecocks rushing attack running for 130 yards from 20 rushing attempts and throwing only 95 yards completing 60% of his passes. The Flames defense had a handful trying to stop the Gamecocks rushing attack, but they didn’t have an answer the entire night on stopping the run. The Gamecocks were averaging 256.3 yards per contest coming into the night, finishing the game with 363 rushing yards. Liberty’s LB Joseph Carter and DE CJ Bazile, Jr., tied for team-high tackling honors.

Jamey Chadwell’s offense didn’t look explosive especially the pass game having all three of their starting WRs out for the game, and had to go with inexperienced receivers who haven’t seen that many actions or not being on the same page with Salter on a certain down distance. Kaidon Salter still managed to throw for a TD pass, but it was enough to get the job done completing 48% of his passes and finishing with 215 total yards. The run was still efficient, but it didn’t make a huge impact. The Flames had their third-best rushing performance of 2024, finishing the game with 273 yards on the ground. Quinton Cooley recorded his 12th career 100-yard game. He rushed for 133 yards from 27 carries, but the Jax St front seven made him work from them yards whenever he touched the ball. Coach Chadwell gave credit to Jax St’s defense saying that they were giving them a lot of different looks on the defensive up front the entire night and limited their red zone scoring two out of four. 

With the Flames receiving their second loss of the season, now they fall to 5-2 and 3-2 in conference play dropping down behind Sam Houston in Conference standing. While Jacksonville State improved to 5-3 winning their fifth game in a row and 4-0 in conference play now tying up with Western Kentucky who is also 4-0 in conference play. Next week, the Flames will be back playing their games on the weekends when they have to Murfreesboro, Tennessee to play Middle Tennessee on November 9th.