Head Coach: Mike Bloomgren is entering his 7th year as the head coach of the Rice Owls with a 22-46 record. It’s been a bit of a long build for Bloomgren and he’s yet to have a winning record but they’ve been steadily improving since 2020. Last year was his best work yet they improved to 6-7 despite moving up to a tougher conference.
Program Outlook: This is a year to monitor for Rice. They’ve been very patient letting Bloomgren build this up his way. More on this in a moment but this might be the season he’s been building toward. If so, Rice will soon emerge as a player in the new look AAC.
How does the 2024 Roster look?: The headliner here is that Rice is one of the top 5 teams in the nation in returning production, leading the AAC. They have a couple losses on the offensive end with JT Daniels being forced to retire partway through last season and Luke McCaffrey off to the NFL. Fortunately Rice brought in a ringer, it was Owl on Owl crime as Rice managed to grab EJ Warner (Kurt Warner’s son) from Temple. Warner was a ton of fun to watch at Temple but the supporting cast around him struggled, it’s going to be a lot of fun to see him at Rice because…the supporting cast will be a lot better. There isn’t an obvious replacement for McCaffrey but even without him this is a very solid group of receivers, a big play threat emerging would be massive. Rice will be better up front as well with 4 starters back on the Oline and former Georgia Olineman Chad Lindberg is a great option to fill the other spot. Possibly the strangest thing about Bloomgren in Texas was him coming here from Stanford where their primary style was the power run game, they were almost the opposite of that last season, and now they can stand to get the run game going, at least as a compliment to the pass game. Rice has 9 starters back on defense so watch for this unit to get even better. They were already pretty strong last season against similar teams. This unit is just a straight up rock they seldom make mistakes. The questions surround how impactful they can be, can they come up with more turnovers and 3rd down stops. Last season Rice either gave up 21 points or less, or they gave up 30+ points. There’s no coincidence about the list of teams who put up 30+ Texas, Houston, USF, UConn, Tulane, SMU, UTSA & Texas State. All teams who had better athletes and/or could bully the Owls up front. There seems to be a glass ceiling over the Owls, turnover margin is going to be the biggest way they can overcome that. I hinted at it earlier with their defense but their offense didn’t force enough turnovers and their offense loved to give it away. Rice was 3rd to last in the whole nation with a -14 turnover margin, turning that around is how they can take the next step.
Screenshot from fbschedules.com1
2024 Schedule Thoughts: I absolutely love the regionality of Rice’s early schedule they open with 3 teams that are all in Houston or the surrounding area. Sam Houston is very similar to Rice with a lot of experience returning but the Bearkats struggled more last season than the Owls did. Texas Southern went 3-8 last season and the Owls played them last season, a 59-7 win for Rice. Houston is of course the Bayou Bucket Classic where Rice beat them in a thrilling battle last season that’ll be a huge game. Rice also plays UConn once again, the Huskies were a matchup problem for them last season so that could be a tough game for Rice. What could prevent Rice from showing much improvement in terms of wins and losses is the conference schedule. It’s absolutely brutal the Owls must play the big 4, along with a road game at Army. There’s really not a much worse draw than that.
Vegas Projection: Rice’s win total is set at 6.5 with the odds geared toward the over. Vegas once again sees a one win improvement on the way.
2024 Best Case: Warner is ready to tear it up and Rice completely flips the turnover margin from last year. The Owls open 2-0 with ease before once again taking down Houston for the Bayou Bucket and in city superiority. They win a battle with Army to open conference play along with taking down Charlotte the next week. The Owls undefeated run eventually comes to an end against Tulane but they finish the regular season strong only losing to Memphis and finishing 10-2. The Owls earn a shot against SMU in their bowl game, it turns out to be one of the thrillers of bowl season with EJ Warner throwing a late TD pass for the win. The future looks great for Rice football.
2024 Worst Case: The turnovers get worse not better, and an experienced roster just doesn’t improve as expected. It’s immediate disappointment in the opener as Warner throws a pick 6 on the opener drive and they dig an early hole they can’t get out of against Sam Houston. It gets worse 2 weeks later when Rice is blown out by Houston, and their run defense is carved up by Army the following week. There’s no break against Charlotte either as the 49ers portal heavy roster hits and Rice drops another. Suddenly Rice is 1-4 and they haven’t even hit the meat of their schedule. The Owls find themselves 1-11 by seasons end and really wondering why this didn’t work out. Sam Houston and Houston both end up winning 9 games making it even worse.
Welcome to Updog Sports Talk 
Leave a comment