‘One last ride’ for Tops at New Orleans Bowl
Published 11:00 am Sunday, December 21, 2025
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Western Kentucky running back Marvis Parrish (21) runs against LSU linebacker Davhon Keys during the first half of an NCAA college football game on Saturday, Nov. 22, 2025, in Baton Rouge, La. (AP Photo/Matthew Hinton)
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Western Kentucky redshirt freshman quarterback Rodney Tisdale Jr. (16) runs the ball for a touchdown in the Hilltoppers’ 42-26 win over the Middle Tennessee State Blue Raiders in WKU’s final home game of the regular season at Houchens-Smith Stadium on Saturday, Nov. 15, 2025.
GRACE MCDOWELL / BOWLING GREEN DAILY NEWS
The holiday tradition is about to continue for Western Kentucky’s football team.
The Hilltoppers are in Louisiana for Tuesday’s New Orleans Bowl to face Southern Miss. The game marks the seventh consecutive bowl bid for the Tops under head coach Tyson Helton, who is in his seventh season as head coach. Game time is 4:30 p.m. with ESPN airing the nationally-televised contest at Caesars Superdome in New Orleans.
It’s a return trip to the Big Easy for WKU (8-4), which won the 2022 R+L Carriers New Orleans Bowl with a 44-23 victory against South Alabama.
“Excited about going to New Orleans and playing in the New Orleans Bowl against a great opponent in Southern Miss,” WKU coach Tyson Helton said. “Went down there in 2022 and had a great bowl experience. Looking forward to getting back. The bowl committee does a fantastic job. It’s going to be a great event and way to celebrate the end of the season. Bowls are very important and I know our guys are very excited to go compete with Southern Miss and try to go win that trophy. Looking forward to it.”
The Tops will be one of just two non-Power Conference teams – out of eight overall – to play in a bowl game or College Football Playoff every season since 2019. WKU is 4-2 in bowl games under Helton and had a three-game winning streak in bowls snapped with last year’s 27-17 loss to James Madison in the Boca Raton Bowl.
Helton, who described bowl games as “one last ride with your brothers and your teammates,” said playing and winning in bowls is extremely important at WKU.
“I think bowl games are extremely special,” Helton said. “I think they’re magical in some ways because I’ve seen a lot of special things happen in bowl games that changes a player’s stars. I’ve seen players that haven’t played hardly any and then all of a sudden they get thrust into a bowl game and they ball out and then become a superstar. I’ve seen the guys that they might have been on an NFL draft board, maybe they were going to be an undrafted free agent, and then they ball out and next thing you know they’re a top-three round draft pick.
“I think bowl games are magical to begin with. I love going to bowl games. I think they’re very special. I think they have a championship environment to them. There’s nothing better than standing on a podium, lifting that bowl-game trophy. That is a great feeling. It’s the one part of college football that I think is the best part of college football.”
WKU is 4-0 all-time against Southern Miss (7-5), which was a fellow Conference USA member until shifting to the Sun Belt Conference in 2022. The Tops beat the Golden Eagles 10-7 at Houchens-Smith Stadium the last time the two programs met in 2020.
Southern Miss had a change in leadership following the regular season. Head coach Charles Huff left to take the same job at Memphis, with Golden Eagles offensive coordinator Blake Anderson elevated to head coach on Dec. 11. Anderson was previously a head coach at Arkansas State (2014-20) and Utah State (2021-23).
“Anytime you’re at a place and then the head coach leaves and then you get to be the guy, that says a lot about who you are,” Helton said. “He’s been a very, very good coach – very successful coach. So In my eyes you’re just preparing for a really good Southern Miss team that’s led by a really good staff. I don’t see anything different in that way. Now bowl games take on their own shape. Everybody has a lot more time to prepare and overthink things and look at new things and all that. So generally you have to think about what might they change or what might they do differently, but you have more time too to prepare for those things.”
Southern Miss features the top passing offense in the Sun Belt, averaging 266.8 yards per game, with quarterback Braylon Braxton second in the league with 2,796 passing yards and 23 touchdowns this season. WKU ranks third in CUSA in passing with 272.6 yards per game, setting up a potential shootout.
“They’re an explosive offense,” Helton said. “Again, statistically, we’re about the same. We’re scoring about the same amount of points, giving up about the same amount of points, giving up about the same amount of yards. But they’re an explosive team that can score very quickly. They want to go fast. They’ve got good skill players. They’ve got a good quarterback – he’s a big, physical quarterback too that has a good arm, but he’s hard to tackle.”
The Golden Eagles have lost three straight games heading into the bowl matchup. The Hilltoppers are on a two-game skid after losing a tough 13-10 decision at LSU before dropping a 37-34 road decision at Jacksonville State that denied WKU a return appearance in the CUSA Championship.
Helton said his team has moved on from that last loss to Jax State and is focused on Tuesday’s opponent.
“We always turn the page, no matter what happens,” Helton said. “We all get about 24 hours to be in our feelings and then we’ve got a job to do. So that’s in the past. That’s history. We’re going to have a championship mentality going into this game and try to go out there and go win it and have a big win to ride off into the sunset for the 2025 season.”
The Tops have had the added benefit of utilizing the school’s new indoor facility for practices during the week before heading to New Orleans on Friday. While the facility is not yet complete, Helton was glad to have the indoor field available as the team prepared to play in the Superdome.
“We’re excited,” Helton said. “We’ve had a couple practices in there and it’s fantastic. To my eyes, it’s one of the best indoor facilities in the country.”
About Jeff Nations
Sports Editor, Bowling Green Daily News
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