Preston Stone, RJ Maryland talk SMU win over Nevada

As expected, Preston Stone was SMU‘s starting quarterback in the Mustangs’ nail-biting 29-24 victory over Nevada on Saturday. However, after Stone’s first two drives ended in an interception and a punt, SMU head coach Rhett Lashlee replaced in QB2 Kevin Jennings.

After a turnover on downs on his first drive, Jennings recovered to lead the Mustangs to the end zone on his second series behind center. Unfortunately, Jennings didn’t get another chance to score.

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After Jennings led SMU down the field, Lashlee took him out and gave Stone another chance. Stone stayed in the game the rest of the way and led SMU to victory. After the game, Lashlee pulled back the curtain on his decision and dove into SMU’s balance at QB.

“Preston won the starting position. He’s our starter, but both guys are going to play and they deserve to play,” Lashlee said. “Our plan all along, I know we haven’t shared it with you, was that Kevin would play series three and four. That’s fair to him.

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“Let Preston start the game and then Kevin can see it, those two drives and get a feel for what the defense is doing. Then Preston can come off and see the defense a little bit and Kevin can come in and not have one drive, he has two, because sometimes as a quarterback, ‘I have one drive,’ you press and try to do more than you have to do.

“Then we’d put Preston back on the fifth series and see how the game went from there. If you asked me, I definitely think we would have played Kevin more. He had our only touchdown drive in the first half, did a great job and he’s going to keep playing.”

In Jennings’ limited time on the field, he completed 4 of his 5 pass attempts for 54 total yards. By comparison, Stone completed 17 of his 30 pass attempts for 254 yards, one touchdown and one interception.

When Stone returned to the game for SMU’s fifth offensive series, Nevada held a 10-7 lead. The Wolf Pack eventually extended their lead to 24-13 before the Mustangs scored 16 unanswered points. Rhett Lashlee was seemingly pleased with Stone’s performance in the final period.

“You’ve got to go with someone and like I said, he deserved the starting position,” Lashlee said. “He’s got the experience, so we stuck with him and it worked out, but it had nothing to do with us not fully believing in Kevin. You’re going to see more of Kevin.

“The game was definitely going in a direction that made it difficult. When you have limited options, and you’re going back and forth, you’re not letting either player get into a rhythm, it can be challenging. Like I said, Preston went down at the beginning of the second half. I think we started looking a little bit like SMU football. We were getting points and we started moving the ball, and we just didn’t want to go back and forth as time was running out.”