Caleb Hawkins ran for 198 yards and two touchdowns on 30 carries and caught a pass for another score as No. 25 North Texas outlasted short-handed San Diego State 49-47 on Saturday in the New Mexico Bowl in Albuquerque.
The Mean Green (12-2) won a dozen games in a season for the first time while snapping a streak of seven straight bowl losses.
“It’s always about the players,” said North Texas interim coach Drew Svoboda, who took over after former coach Eric Morris left for Oklahoma State. “These seniors in this group stuck together. They had every opportunity to go their separate ways before this game, but they didn’t. They pulled together. It just feels good that you can finish what you start, you know, that that’s still alive in this current landscape. So just proud of all those kids.”
Record-setting quarterback Drew Mestemaker passed for 250 yards with three touchdowns and two interceptions for North Texas, who racked up 618 yards of total offense. Ashton Gray added 152 yards and two TDs on 16 totes as the Mean Green totaled 368 on the ground.
San Diego State quarterback Bert Emanuel Jr. rushed for 170 yards and two touchdowns in a quarter and a half before suffering a left shoulder injury. His backup, Kyle Crum, passed for 169 yards and a score and ran for two other TDs for the Aztecs (9-4), who had 532 yards of total offense including 326 rushing.
Down by 22 heading into the fourth quarter, San Diego State scored two touchdowns in a minute and 22 seconds, with the second coming on a 63-yard punt return by Nathan Acevedo that culled the Aztecs’ deficit to 42-34.
After a 31-yard TD pass from Mestemaker to Cameron Dormer with 6:08 to play pushed the North Texas lead back to 15, Christian Washington ran 11 yards for a TD a minute and a half later to make it 49-40 and give San Diego State a modicum of hope.
A final Crum 1-yard keeper for TD with 1 second left was mere window dressing.
“These are my guys,” Mestemaker said. ‘You live and die with them every second of the day. I wouldn’t change or trade this for the world. And I’m just so thankful to play with these guys.
“I don’t play football for all the headlines, all the extra attention. I play for my brothers, my teammates and because I love it. And you know when that’s how you feel about it, it’s easy to just keep going.”
Hawkins’ 9-yard TD run on the game’s opening possession gave the Mean Green the early lead. San Diego State pulled to 7-6 on Emanuel’s 8-yard scoring run with 6:57 to play in the first quarter.
Gray’s 17-yard scoring run at the 3:18 mark of the first quarter — five plays after he gained 34 yards on a fake punt — put North Texas up 14-6. Mestemaker’s 23-yard touchdown pass to Hawkins with 10 seconds left in the quarter propelled the Mean Green to a 15-point advantage.
The Aztecs swung back, with Emanuel getting loose for a 72-yard TD run on the first play of the second quarter. Gray reeled off a 51-yard scoring run to rebuild North Texas’ lead before Crum connected with Jackson Ford with a 3-yard TD pass that made it 28-20 at halftime.
Hawkins produced his second rushing TD — this one from 3 yards away — with 6:34 to play in the third quarter. Mestemaker then hit Dormer on a 1-yard scoring pass to stoke North Texas’ lead to 42-20 just before the end of the third.
Crum answered with an 11-yard run three minutes into the fourth quarter for the Aztecs to spark their late comeback.
–Field Level Media
