With so many unknowns entering the first game of the season, established playmakers needed to make plays, and that's what the SMU football team got.
Three plays into the 42-13 victory, Romello Brinson caught a Kevin Jennings pass in stride, made a defender miss and flipped into the end zone for a 63-yard touchdown. The flip, which was flagged for unsportsmanlike conduct and addressed by both head coach Rhett Lashlee and Brinson himself postgame, notwithstanding it was the type of play the Mustangs needed early in the game.
"We felt like that formation was going to get us a one-on-one, and felt good with the matchup," Lashlee said of the play call. "Kevin and Romello have been good, so to execute that was great. The first three plays, other than Jordan (Hudson) getting hurt, went really. … I think you see what Romelo and Kevin could do in one-on-one situations."
Hudson left the game after the first play, a 7-yard catch, with an arm injury. That left a receiving corps made up of Brinson and a lot of young and new faces. The veteran delivered with seven catches for 121 yards — both career highs — and the touchdown.
Brinson has been on the other side of injuries, missing almost all of last season. Now he is making the most of his opportunities this year.
"Really just seize the moment for the rest of the year," Brinson said. "Really just solidify my name and show who I am and show what I can do. We're going to treat every team like they're a household name. Whoever steps foot in our house, we're going to attack with everything we've got."
The experienced defense got involved, too.
SMU's second touchdown of the game came as Cameron Robertson got his hands on a pass and deflected it to Alex Kilgore, who caught it and went 10 yards into the end zone.
Then, early in the second half, Ahmaad Moses stepped in front of a pass at the 5-yard line, intercepted it in stride and was off to the races. He never slowed down until he was in the clear and eased in for the 95-yard score.
It ties for the fourth-longest interception return for a touchdown in SMU history, was Moses' second career Pick 6 and was the first time SMU had two interceptions returned for touchdowns in the same game since the 2016 season.
"Basically, I had to watch my side of the field, and as soon as I saw the slot go out, I knew he was going to come back in," Moses said. "As soon as I saw his hip turn back in, I broke in on it, and the QB threw it right to me. … I said, 'I just have to beat the quarterback,' and I knew the wide receiver, No. 3, had speed on him, so I had to make sure he couldn't get a good angle on me."
Moses was involved the last time the Mustangs had two defensive touchdowns in the same game, returning an interception for a touchdown against TCU last year while Brandon Crossley returned a fumble for a score.
Robertson got involved in another turnover late in the game. He beat the left tackle with a speed rush and hit the quarterback from behind, knocking the ball loose. Isaiah Smith, another veteran, picked it up.
The play ended East Texas A&M's fourth trip into the red zone with just three points, including Moses' interception and Robertson's strip sack.
"Just knowing, even when there's an explosive play or something like that, we always tell each other, 'Keep the pressure,'" Moses said. "You never know what could happen the next play. A lot of times they would get an explosive play and might get another play after that, but whenever it came to goal line, we knew that if we trusted our guys next to us and trusted he was going to do his job and I was going to do my job and whoever else was on the field was going to do the job, we knew together we can end up making a stop, and we did it a few times (Saturday)."
Many of the playmakers were veterans like Jennings, Brinson, Moses, Kilgore, Robertson and others. There were also some new faces who got into the mix, like true freshman Jalen Cooper catching his first career touchdown and Terry Webb, who had three tackles and a sack.
Now they all have a game under their belts to build from together.
"This was Game 1 for this team. This team has never played together until tonight. This was Game 1, and so we were always going to learn a lot about ourselves," Lashlee said. "We're going to learn a lot about how we respond, good and bad. We've got a lot of work to do in terms of not just the score or how it looks, but just coming together and playing together. And you can only do that by playing, so we have to play through that, and we have to find ways to keep winning as we do that."
