The Owls have had extra time to prepare for what could be there most important home contest for the 2025 cycle. And with American Conference play set to begin, it will come with the challenge of seeking an upset over a surging Memphis Tiger squad that is basking over an upset of their own last weekend against SEC foe Arkansas.
Details and cleaning up execution issues have been the focus of the past week, and while the team has already improved offensive numbers of last season by over four points per game, they will face a stiff challenge softening a Memphis defense that is allowing just 16 point per outing and nearly eight last than they did in 2024.
It’s also a new season by Kittley’ standards and time to turn focus solely a goal that is still achievable – winning an AAC title.
NEW SEASON STARTS NOW #FAU Coach @ZKittley is placing empahsis on the past beign the past and the present being the present as the Owls open #TheAmerican play vs #Memphis Saturday. pic.twitter.com/MBk9SKHQbB
— FAU Owls Nest (@FAU_Owls_Nest) September 23, 2025
Back on Tuesday in the Flagler Credit Union Stadium media room was Head Coach Zach Kittley, who offered an update on how his unit has fared the last week and what he hopes to accomplish this Saturday when the freshly painted surface of Schnellenberger Field appears before a prime time audience on ESPN.
Below are our select excerpts from the session.
What the Team Worked on During the Bye Week
“We did a little bit of both (us and them), fifty percent worked on some Memphis stuff, started diving into their schematics on all three phases of the game, but then also looking at where are we and what do we have to make sure we’re focusing on as far as looking at ourselves in the mirror and finding out we’ve got to get better here.”
Younger Players Getting Work in During the Bye
“Had a little bit of a young guys scrimmage if you will. Not full speed, not full contact but got some young guys just going and getting them moving around a little bit more…keep developing this roster because we feel like we’ve got some young guys that aren’t playing a ton of snaps yet on Saturdays for us, but we think that are going look up a year from now and who knows, maybe even by the end of the season they’re going to be playing for us.”
Some Keys to Beating Memphis
“Protecting the football is number one. I told our guys this morning, I challenged our offense. Guys, if we look up Saturday night at 10:00 or 10:30 p.m. and we have zero turnovers on the stat book, let’s look out to what’s going to happen. If we continue on the trend that we are averaging three turnovers a game it’s not rocket science we are going to struggle.”
“And then, conversely, talk about the defense, they got to do their part, too. And when you talk about turnover margin, it’s a team stat. It’s not an offensive stat. So, we’ve got to get the ball back. We’ve only taken the ball away once. We’ve got to take the ball away on defense and special teams as well.”
On Attacking Memphis’ Defense
“Schematically they cause chaos. They are everywhere. They do a tremendous job. From my studies of looking at it their defensive coordinator almost has a philosophy similar to me at the quarterback position where they give those guys some leeway to do some stuff on their own as long as they get to where they’re supposed to be.”
“They’ve got the ability that fast to drop eight on you in the pass game. When they want to drop eight in the pass game, clearly you got to run the football. I feel really good about where we’re at with our run pass balance. I think when you look at game one and game three, us getting behind in the game has really skewed that stat line on exactly where we want to be. Clearly we’re behind to where I’m going to throw the football because we’re running out of clock. But I feel good with where we’re at the run game.”
On The Tiger’s Offense
“First and foremost, they want to run the football. They want to control the clock. They want to run the quarterback. So it starts with your eye discipline because they will quick motion you and then try to run your split zone. They’ll try to bluff. They’ll try to do everything. They’re not extremely multiple when it comes to that, but they’re really good at what they do. And so, we got to have great eye discipline. We have got to be able to get knockback… they’ve got a super explosive running back and he’s a one cut runner, and if he hits a seam he’s probably out of there.”
The Injury Report
“We’ve got a couple guys banged up. I don’t want to say too much. We’ll release the injury report on Saturday. We do have some guys banged up. But we are hoping that we can get all those guys back for Saturday. We’ll see.”
A Team Positive During the Bye Week
“We haven’t quit yet. I’ve said this multiple times. I’m not naive to the fact of the rivalry that we had two weeks ago. We lost that trophy for the first time in however many years been…and there was a lot of frustration from that. And I felt that frustration that Sunday coming in the building, as we should have, and I was frustrated as well.
“But when your guys come in the building and they and they come in there and they’re excited, they’re smiling when they’re in the building and they understand that we have exactly what we’re what we’re still trying to obtain is still ahead of us again going into a zero and zero American Conference play. We’re fired up to get the opportunity to play Saturday night.”
Florida Atlantic will in fact get that chance when they host the Tigers, who received votes in this week’s AP Top 25 poll. Kick-off is slated at 7:00 PM.