G5 Football Daily

Shula Bowl: Empty Trophy Case Providing FIU Motivation

The Panthers will look to snap a six-game losing streak to Florida Atlantic on Saturday

Kevin Barral

FIU Athletics
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MIAMI, FL - Inside the R. Kirk Landon Football Fieldhouse at FIU lies an empty trophy case with the name "Shula Bowl." It's a new addition to the facility, placed there to provide every single player motivation knowing that it's been six years since the trophy has resided in Miami.

"When I was at Colorado, we played Colorado State every year for a trophy like this and we had a trophy case for it," said head coach Mike MacIntyre. "There wasn't a trophy case here. I guess we didn't need one for a long time. I'm hoping to show that we can hopefully put a trophy in there one day. That's our goal."

RELATED: FIU Football: QB Keyone Jenkins Named Conference USA Offensive Player Of The Week

The last time the Panthers defeated the Florida Atlantic Owls was in 2016 by a final score of 33-31. The last time FIU won in Boca Raton was in 2012, over ten years ago now. After what seemed like it would be a close game between these in-state rivals in 2022, the Owls blew MacIntyre's ballclub out of the water by a final score of 52-7.

"I know when we played them here two years ago, they had their way with us," MacIntyre said. "They've pretty much dominated it and for a rivalry to be a rivalry, we need to play better and see what we can do. We're working hard to do that, but they're very athletic. Very tough football team and they've played two good teams so far."

Dean Patterson was a member of the 2021 Panthers, which was the last FIU team to head into Boca Raton, the site of the 22nd edition of the Shula Bowl, but fell by a final score of 58-21. He remembers it clearly.

"It was my freshman year with a great group of guys, great group of receivers," said Patterson. "That game obviously didn't go our way. Coming into FIU, learning about FAU, kind of developing that rivalry, that's a get-back game for us and that's something that we obviously pride ourselves on."

Just like all of his other teammates, Patterson spoke on what the empty trophy means to them, as they walk past it every single day. "We all walk by it every morning," said Patterson. "Coming into team meetings and we see an empty trophy case. What's the point of having it if it's empty? That's definitely a goal of ours, to be able to fill that trophy case and be able to put something in there and say that 'we went and did that. We went and earned that.'"

Last Saturday, sophomore quarterback Keyone Jenkins felt the FIU/FAU rivalry isn't a thing anymore. Patterson spoke to Jenkins' comments when asked on Tuesday.

RELATED: Shula Bowl: FIU QB Jenkins Doesn't See Florida Atlantic As A Rival

"I see his point," said Patterson. "I feel like you have to approach this as another game because I feel like you try to blow it up, emotions get high and people tend to lose their cool in the game, especially in the atmosphere of a rivalry game, then it kind of knocks you off your game a little bit. Obviously it is a rivalry game, point blank and simple, but you have to be able to be like, 'okay, I'm approaching this the same way I approach every other game.'"

The 22nd edition of this competition will take place on Saturday, September 14 at 6:00 PM in Boca Raton, Florida. The game can be streamed on ESPN+ and you can tune into the fiusports.com with Steve Goldstein and Kim Bokamper.

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Kevin Barral
KEVIN BARRAL

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