Western Kentucky beats Southern Miss to win Conference USA

The Western Kentucky Hilltoppers are the champions of Conference USA after knocking off the Southern Miss Golden Eagles.

They’ve been the best team from start to finish and on Saturday, the Western Kentucky Hilltoppers finished what they started with a dominant performance against the Southern Miss Golden Eagles with a 45-28 win in the Conference USA Championship Game.

This is the first Conference USA title for Western Kentucky.

Quarterback Brandon Doughty was sensational as he’s been all year. Doughty finishes with 410 passing yards and three touchdowns on 34 of 52 passing and even added a rushing score as he looks to finish his illustrious career with a strong performance in the team’s bowl game before trying to make an NFL roster.

His favorite target today was Taywan Taylor who had eight catches for 165 yards and a pair of scores while running back D’Andre Ferby scored two touchdowns on 21 carries for 57 yards.

Defensively, the Hilltoppers picked off Southern Miss quarterback Nick Mullens three times, recovered a fumble and held USM to 1-2 on fourth downs. Southern Miss just couldn’t get the offense going today and were outgained 340-521 and only converted 5-13 third downs and that can’t happen against the nation’s No. 3 scoring offense.

Still, it was a monumental turnaround for head coach Todd Monken who has helped erase the memories of the Ellis Johnson disastrous era from the hearts and minds of USM fans, until I just reminded them, that is.

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Western Kentucky head coach Jeff Brohm did a masterful job with this roster and this program that he could be a potential candidate for a new job with a few vacancies still open, should he be interested in pursuing other opportunities.