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Troy Ready For Central Michigan in GMAC Bowl

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Two of the nation's best college quarterbacks square off in the 11th annual GMAC Bowl as Troy 's Levi Brown goes up against Central Michigan's Dan LeFevour on January 6th in Mobile , Alabama.

Led by record setting senior quarterback Levi Brown, the Trojans will look to score early and often. The Troy play caller was the Sun Belt Conference Player of the Year as well as the league's Offensive Player of the Year for the 2009 season. Brown set SBC records for passing yards and total offense in a season and also set a new league mark by being named SBC Offensive Player of the Week six times during the year. His seven career SBC weekly awards are the most by any offensive player in league history.

Brown needs just 132 passing yards in the Trojans GMAC Bowl game to become the 40th player in FBS history, and the first at Troy or in the SBC history, to pass for more than 4,000 yards in a season.

Brown has thrown for 3,868 yards and 22 touchdowns. His favorite target this season has been wide receiver and return specialist Jerrel Jernigan who is 47 yards from a 1,000 yard season and becoming the fourth Troy receiver to reach that milestone. Tebiarus Gill leads the receiving core with six touchdowns. DuJuan Harris and SBC freshman of the year Shawn Southward have carried the load in the backfield for the Trojans.

The Trojan defense is led by the "Killer B's" Bear Woods, Boris Lee, Brandon Lang, and Bryan Willis. Lang ranks third on the team in total tackles with 69, which includes 10.5 tackles for loss and a team-leading 7.5 sacks. He also has a team-high 31 quarterback hurries on the year. Lee, who has started 46 consecutive games, has 122 total tackles this year and ranks third all-time in career tackles at Troy with 391. Woods is the heart of the Trojans defense and leads the team with 138 total tackles. Willis finished as the team's fourth-leading tackler with 66 total stops and led the squad with four interceptions and 10 pass breakups on the year. These four defensive stoppers will look to cause turnovers and prevent LeFevour and the Chippewa offense from getting into the end zone.

As good as Brown has been for Troy CMU's LeFevour has been equally as impressive. LeFevour was the 2009 MAC Offensive Player of the Year and an All-MAC first team selection. The Illinois native currently holds Mid American Conference records for career completions, attempts, passing yards, passing touchdowns, total touchdowns, and total offensive yards. LeFevour is the only player in NCAA history with over 12,000 passing yards and 2,500 rushing yards and currently sits 3rd all time in total offensive yards. This season he has thrown for 3,043 yards and 26 touchdowns and rushed for 800 yards and 14 touchdowns.

One way to stop LeFevour is to lock down receiver and return specialist Antonio Brown. Brown has had 97 receptions for 1,020 yards this season and nine touchdowns. The Trojans special teams will also need to key on Brown, who has returned two punt returns for touchdowns and averages 20.4 yards per kick return. Brown earned All-MAC first team honors as both a receiver and punt returner in 2009, was the MAC Special Teams Player of the Year for the second consecutive season and was named to Sporting News' All-America first team as a punt returner.

Nick Bellore and Matt Berning have combined for 218 tackles, forced three fumbles and had six sacks this season for Central Michigan defense who gave up 17.2 points per game this season.

The GMAC Bowl is one of five bowl games pitting outright conference champions against one another. Both teams have had very impressive 2009 campaigns as Troy has won nine of its past 10 games and CMU has won 11 of its past 12.


GAME NOTES

The GMAC bowl is the only non-BCS bowl game featuring a pair of conference champions.

The Chippewas will make their fourth straight bowl appearance.

Troy is the first Alabama school to play in the GMAC Bowl or any Alabama hosted bowl game.

Four consecutive Sun Belt Conference Championships for Troy , including back-to-back outright league championships.

This year is CMU's first unbeaten and untied MAC regular season and the Chippewa's are ranked 25th in the Associated Press poll.

Troy (9-3) had its best season since joining the ranks of Division I-A.

Will be televised to a national audience on ESPN, and it is the only bowl game played that day.

NFL quarterback's Ben Roethlisberger, Byron Leftwich, Bruce Gradkowski, and David Garrard have all played in the GMAC bowl.

Source: Sun Belt Media Relations
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Re: Troy Ready For Central Michigan in GMAC Bowl

This really should be one good football game…

Hate saying it but….Go Trojans!

Teambeer is the most knowledgeable FAU sports fan I know, way smarter than me.
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Re: Troy Ready For Central Michigan in GMAC Bowl

walty12 said

This really should be one good football game…

Hate saying it but….Go Trojans!

No need to hate it, we need the Trojans to win.

True it will give them a leg up in recruting (Not that they dont already have that on us) but overall it will push the confrence image (and FAU) higher.

If we as confrence mates WIN our bowl games, AND start beating OOC teams it will give us more leverage and prestige in regads contracts and recruits.

I have come here to chew bubble gum and kick @$$ and I'm out of bubble gum.

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Re: Troy Ready For Central Michigan in GMAC Bowl

Troy Ready For Central Michigan in GMAC Bowl

Yeah!
I hope Troy beats the chips.
I have been looking at conference bowl records on ESPN and they always leave out the SUNBELT, C-USA and the MAC.
I find that disrespectful. These are D. 1 conferences. what the hell?
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