The SMU football team's path to the ACC championship game got a big boost on Saturday night, about seven hours after beating Louisville 38-6.
Now, the Mustangs control their own destiny, and a win against Cal on Saturday in Berkeley will send them to their third straight conference title game.
"This is the third year we've been in it," SMU head coach Rhett Lashlee said. "The last year in the American, we had to go undefeated in the league. Last year we pretty much had to go undefeated. The month of November was a must-win. This year we've been coming from behind and needed some help, so it was obviously must-win. This Saturday's no different. The hardest thing to do in sports is clinch or close. Both us and Virginia have that opportunity this week. Pitt's still in it, Miami, Duke, there's a lot of people still in it. But us and Virginia know that if you can win, you don't need any help, and that's hard."
SMU has now won three straight games and six of its last seven, with the last two wins coming by a combined 64 points. But the Mustangs have to take the right approach and right mentality into Saturday's trip to Cal.
"We've been playing good football lately, but that doesn't guarantee we will Saturday," Lashlee said. "We've got to keep the same mindset, the same intensity. Our guys know what we're playing for. At the same time, you've got to play loose and confident. You can't get uptight because of what's on the line. We've got to play like we've been playing and go earn it."
The three-game winning streak came on the heels of a last-second loss at Wake Forest. That was a wake-up call for the Mustangs. The next week, they came out and upset No. 10 Miami for the first win against a Top 10 team in over 40 years.
Kevin Jennings has thrown for over 300 yards in each of the three games during the current winning streak. He's thrown for three touchdowns in each of the last two games and has totaled nine total touchdowns — seven passing, two rushing — during the win streak.
Now SMU is one win away from reaching one of its preseason goals.
"It's a big opportunity for us to showcase what we've been doing, what we've been practicing all year round," Jennings said. "It's an opportunity to go to the ACC championship, which is what our end goal was. That's what we wanted at the beginning of the year, and that's all that's in play for us."
This year's SMU roster looks plenty different from last year's roster and certainly from the roster that won the American two years ago. But there are enough players who have that experience to come into play this week.
"We do have a lot of championship experience, whether that be two years ago at the AAC championship or the ACC championship last year," offensive lineman Logan Parr said. "It didn't go our way last year, but having all those guys will definitely help. But all that matters right now is Cal."
It took a little bit of time for the Mustangs to find their identity. There were injuries and close losses early in the season.
When the calendar turned to November, everything seemed to click.
"We're playing with a ton of confidence, but it's really just that we're playing with everything that we know how we can play," linebacker Alex Kilgore said. "We're playing how we can play. It's not trying to prove other people wrong. It's proving that we can do it. We know we can do it, and it's really just a matter of stepping on the field and doing it."
Even with the holiday, the coaching staff tried to keep this week's schedule as normal as possible. The team did a Thanksgiving meal together on Wednesday after practice, and then players and coaches went to South Oak Cliff High School to give out turkeys and meals. On Thursday, local players and coaches hosted out-of-town players for Thanksgiving.
The team then flew to California on Friday and will take the field Saturday night against a tough Cal opponent with a spot in the ACC championship game on the line.
"Always good to be playing football on Thanksgiving week in games that are important," Lashlee said. "Just got done with a good Tuesday and got a lot to play for against a team that is already bowl eligible and defensively has been excellent against the pass. I thought last year when we played them, it was probably the best defense we played in the conference season all year. Obviously, it's the same scheme and some of the same guys. Man, their quarterback's a stud. We know him. We recruited him. Probably the best freshman quarterback in the country, honestly, with what he's done. We've got our hands full. We've got to find a way to go earn it."
