Golden Eagles soar in Hawaii Bowl

HONOLULU — Austin Davis made the plays when it counted to send Southern Mississippi coach Larry Fedora out a winner.

Davis threw two touchdowns, including a 4-yarder late in the game, and No. 22 Southern Miss earned a school-record 12th victory by holding off Nevada 24-17 in the Hawaii Bowl on Saturday night.

"It wasn't his best game, but he did enough to help us win this football game," said Fedora, who is leaving after four seasons to take over at North Carolina.

Davis overcame a shaky game for the Conference USA-champion Golden Eagles (12-2), and the defense in the second half managed to shut down Nevada's potent pistol attack led by Lampford Mark.

"I thought we struggled the entire game offensively. We made a few big plays at the end, but really the defense, these guys were special and they've done that all year," Davis said. "We made a play or two on offense when we needed to."

Davis was off most of the night but made it count on the game-winning drive. On third-and-goal, he scrambled right and found Kelvin Bolden for the 4-yard score, capping a seven-play, 68-yard drive. He had just 59 yard passing at halftime and finished 18 of 41 for 165 yards.

On the winning drive, Davis was 3 of 4 for 66 yards, including a 43-yard completion to Dominique Sullivan down the right sideline and a 19-yarder to a crossing William Spight. Sullivan had five catches for 75 yards.

With Davis held in check, the Golden Eagles relied on their defense, stopping Mark on fourth-and-1 at midfield with 3:56 left. Mark had 183 yards rushing for the Wolf Pack (7-6) but was held to just 21 yards in the second half.

"Our offense in the second half — our offensive front just didn't get it done at all and I was really disappointed in that aspect of it. We got stopped on two fourth-and-1s," Wolf Pack coach Chris Ault said.

Nevada was without its top receiver, Rishard Matthews, who has 91 receptions for 1,364 yards and eight TDs.

The game featured a Hawaii Bowl-record 17 punts, and the 41 combined points was the fewest in bowl history.

Cody Fajardo was 8 of 19 for 60 yards for Nevada. He also was held to just 14 yards rushing on nine carries before being replaced by Tyler Lantrip.

The Golden Eagles got another big win after capturing their fifth C-USA title by upsetting previously unbeaten Houston 49-28 in the conference championship game. This was the first 10-win season for Southern Miss since 1988.

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