HOUSTON – The Rice Owls were heavy underdogs against the Texas Longhorns in their first game of the 2010 season. But, what many thought would be a rout, turned into something they could build on for the future. "You play the game to win, but we gave it a great effort," said head coach David Bailiff. "I was really proud of the passion and the effort our players played with, but in the end they came up a little short." "It was kind of good to play at Reliant and in front of that crowd," said OL Scott Mitchell. "It was really loud in there and it was good to get that out of the way and be able to work on our communication." Rice lost the opener 34-17 in front of a sold out crowd at Reliant Stadium on Saturday. But while the stands were full, most of the fans wore burnt orange, another reason why the Owls "never say die" effort throughout the game was even more impressive. "You look at some of the things they did accomplish in that game, starting it off with a 15 play drive with a red-shirt freshman quarterback; I was pleased to see that." Taylor McHargue is the man Bailiff is talking about. McHargue was picked to start the game right before kick-off and was impressive through the first quarter. In ran into some problems, turning the ball over twice, both of which led to Texas touchdowns. McHargue finished 6-11 with 90 yards, 1 touchdown and 1 interception. "He is able to make plays with his feet," said Bailiff. "We knew he was going to make some freshman mistakes, but he has already started to correct some of the things he needs to work on such as being able to step up in the pocket." Nick Fanuzzi and Taylor Smith also got playing time on Saturday and Bailiff has not ruled out using them again this week against North Texas, a game which the players know they can definitely pull out, given the way they played against the fifth ranked team in the nation. "We didn’t get a win last week and we are still hungry for it," said LB Taylor Bradshaw. "We did get a taste of how good we could be and we are going to go out there with more fight and more determination and we are going to get that win."
