Toledo: Tulane hoping for respectable showing vs. LSU

• By LES EAST
• Special to The Advocate
• Published: Oct 28, 2009 - Page: 1C

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NEW ORLEANS — The last thing Tulane needs to be doing right now is going to Tiger Stadium to play LSU on Saturday night.

The ninth-ranked Tigers are 6-1 and coming off an impressive 31-10 rout of Auburn. The Green Wave is 2-5 and losers of three games in a row.

At Tulane’s weekly news luncheon Tuesday, Bob Toledo sounded like a coach who just wants his team to survive Halloween night in good enough shape to compete in its remaining four games.

“We have a big, difficult game coming up — there’s no question about it,” Toledo said. “I just want to play good, I want to be competitive, I want to not embarrass ourselves, I want to play until the end and play hard. And then we have four league games that we feel we can compete against.

“We want to show some improvements and then hopefully we can continue down that road for the last whole month of the season. It’s a tough time to be playing these guys. They are an outstanding football team. They have some great athletes. They’re well coached.”

Despite the apparent mismatch against a team that’s favored by nearly five touchdowns, Toledo said in one sense he’s sorry Tulane and LSU are meeting for the last time for the foreseeable future.

“It’s the oldest rivalry in the school history,” he said. “It’s the 98th time we’re going to play them. It’s unfortunate that it’s going to be the last time — at least for a long time. I know it’s a very difficult game for us to play, but I think it’s great from an in-state rivalry point and for that, I’ll be sorry to be honest with you.

“I’d rather be playing them than Ole Miss or Alabama or somebody out of state. If we’re going to go play them, then let’s go play LSU. But that’s not my choice.”

Even though the Green Wave’s season is beginning to resemble last season’s 2-10 debacle that ended with eight straight losses, Toledo has a couple of motivational pitches for his players for this game.

“I told them we didn’t recruit their guys and they didn’t recruit any of our guys,” he said. “So, they didn’t recruit any of you. So why don’t you go show them that you’re a good football player. That’s one of the things.

“The other thing is, hey, we need to improve this week, and we need to get better so we can finish strong. We don’t want to be embarrassed. We want to play good and be competitive and play with those people.”

Tulane has not been competitive in its losses, falling by margins of 24, 51, 21, 28, and 37 points. But Toledo said his players are continuing to play hard and what’s confounding  him most is they practice hard and well, and it doesn’t translate into games.

“We need to do a better job of coaching and we need to do a better job of playing,” he said. “We’re not doing either right now, and we don’t play the game like we practice. We constantly talk to our players about you practice good so you can play good. You are going to play like you practice, and that hasn’t happened.”