East Carolina lives – and possibly dies – by the “Boom,” or lack thereof

I didn’t catch the ECU vs. Southern Miss game down in Hattiesburg last weekend, but I did happen to catch a bit of the box score when I was doing the research for our latest Riveting Realities post.  It was, well, intriguing, to say the least. At first glance one simply sees a nice road win for the Pirates. 44-43 at Southern Miss – while perhaps not remarkable in and of itself – is pretty sweet for a program that had only won 9 of 35 games in the series’ history.  What is remarkable, however, is a second glance – specifically at the team stats columns. ECU rushed 24 times for 33 yards? Only completed 50% of its passes for 305 yards, getting picked off 3 times in the process?  Lost a fumble as well? Forced zero Southern Miss turnovers, and lost the time of possession battle by a whopping 15 minutes?  I mean, just how in the hell did they manage to win this game – let alone score 44 points along the way? Well, scenes like those seen after the jump probably had something to do with it...