Rice head coach Mike Bloomgren enters his fifth season in charge of the Owls with what he believes is the deepest and most talented roster of his tenure. Bloomgren, who took over the program prior to the 2018 season, is 11-31 through four seasons. His Owls were two overtime losses away from reaching bowl eligibility in 2021, but their four wins were the most during Bloomgren’s four seasons.
“We’ve made steady progress year after year,” Bloomgren said. “We’ve been the perfect illustration of a stone cutter, and we’re going to keeping chipping away, but we’re so ready for that rock to break.”
Rice hasn’t lacked evidence of its slow climb up the Conference USA mountain. The Owls knocked off a nationally ranked Marshall squad during the pandemic-shortened 2020 season and upset UAB on the road in 2021. Rice is no longer lacking in talent. Bloomgren feels the 2022 roster is his most complete with every player on the two-deep capable of playing winning football in C-USA. The program simply needs to be more consistent on a week-to-week basis.
“Competition is everything and we finally have that within our roster,” Bloomgren said. “It’s not just the competition with yourself to get better. You better produce or someone is coming to take your job. That’s a magical thing that we haven’t had here.”
The goal for the 2022 version of the Rice Owls is to reach a bowl game and be the next team to make a steep rise towards the top of the C-USA standings. UTEP managed that feat in 2021 when it reached bowl eligibility for the first time since 2014 thanks to a seven-win season. Coincidentally, Rice’s last bowl game was also in 2014. The Owls are 20-58 since the end of that 2014 season. The program feels capable of making a run in the West Division.
“For most of the Conference USA teams, there isn’t a huge gap between the best and the worst teams,” defensive lineman Ikenna Enechukwu said. “It is a very competitive league, and it is always up for grabs for anyone who wants to get it.”
The cause of that optimism is due to the amount of returning talent on both sides of the ball, as well as Rice’s ability to add potential impact players through the transfer portal. The Owls’ pool in the portal, just like on the recruiting trail, is limited due to the academic standards required for acceptance into Rice, but that hasn’t stopped Bloomgren’s staff from adding talented prospects from the Ivy League ranks, as well as Stanford and Vanderbilt.
That depth won’t matter if Rice continues to catch the injury bug. The Owls played four different quarterbacks during the 2021 season. The perfect illustration of the issue arose in an out-of-conference game against Texas early in the season. Rice lost its starting quarterback to a migraine after 12 plays. Its backup was knocked out of the game later in the first quarter, causing the Owls to play their third quarterback of the game by the end of the first 15 minutes. And the bad luck wasn’t limited to the offensive side of the football.
“I randomly found the depth chart from spring ball during the season last year and noted that we were without seven of our 11 projected starters on defense by the eighth game of the season,” Bloomgren said. “It will help us in 2022, but it wasn’t fun in 2021.”
Coaches tend to be optimistic during spring ball. The players can be better barometers of the belief inside a particular locker room. Rice is clearly confident that the 2022 season can be a breakout campaign, especially if a quarterback emerges before Week 1. The Owls return a talented backfield led by Ari Broussard to run the ball behind an experienced offensive line. The defense has a chance to be special despite losing all-conference defensive tackle Elijah Garcia to the NFL.
“Everyone wants to be better for themselves and each other,” Broussard said. “We have a lot of guys on this team that want to get to the next level. That competition and energy keeps us going.”
The Ceiling
Rice manages to put away close games and reach the six-win threshold needed to qualify for bowl eligibility.
The Floor
More inconsistency at quarterback and on defense cause the Owls to miss out on a bowl game for the eighth consecutive season.
Game of the Year
Rice at North Texas — November 1
Rice was two overtime losses away from six wins and bowl eligibility in 2021. One of those tough defeats was at home to North Texas, a future dance partner with the Owls in the AAC. The goal for Rice is to reach a bowl in 2022, and that requires winning close games against opponents such as the Mean Green.