Tulsa Preview

BY JAKE WEINSTOCK Good gracious, doesn't this feel like an important one?

Tulane (4-4, 2-2) has a chance to start a new home winning streak at Yulman Stadium, tomorrow, when the Tulsa Golden Hurricane (4-4, 1-3) visit under second year head coach Tre Lamb. The Green Wave have won 2 of 3 under true freshman starting quarterback Trace Johnson, but as a team, have not won consecutive games since defeating Charlotte and North Texas (in the conference championship game) last season. Four times this season they have slipped to a game below .500, and four times have they won the following week to get back to .500. They have yet to get over that hump and go on the start of what could be a run. Perhaps tomorrow is the day...

Tulsa's eight-game start to the 2026 season has been one of the more curious and difficult to figure out in the FBS. On the one hand, the Golden Hurricane are 1-3 in American Conference play, and yet they have a positive point differential (+9) in those four games, as they lost to North Texas by 1 (45-44), Navy by 8 (34-26), and Army by 3 (38-35) while beating Rice 38-17. I mentioned on X this week that Group of Six (the American, MAC, C-USA, Sun Belt, "Pac 12" and Mountain West) are 3-76 against the Power Four, this season. Well, Tulsa holds one of those three wins, over Oklahoma State, who is 5-3 and was ranked in the AP Poll until this past weekend. The Golden Hurricane enters having lost four of their last five, but as a 1.5 point favorite over our Green Wave, as of the most recent odds that I checked.

As noted by the Advocate's Guerry Smith this week, Tulsa lost 45-44 to North Texas at home despite winning the turnover battle 3-0, and then lost in Annapolis 34-26 despite winning the turnover battle 4-0. The Golden Hurricane have to be kicking themselves for being just 1-3 in conference play while simultaneously ranking 5^th out of the 138 teams in the FBS in turnover margin per game (+1.4).

So what to make of the Golden Hurricane? Let’s start with the offense. They operate out of shotgun and pistol, almost always have at least 3 receivers on the field, and use some wide splits to space the defense that creates boxes of 5 or 6, which obviously then makes run fits more complex for opposing defenses. Example below of a 5-man box that their spacing created (apologies for the grainy images -- blame YouTube):  

And here of a six-man box created by a similar formation, with the defense being an in-line tight end:

While they have called a designed run just 47% of the time, this season, which ranks as the 104th most out of 138 FBS teams, they have been exceptionally explosive when they've gotten a defense into one of these fronts with a numbers advantage or an equal number, i.e. five offensive lineman and five defenders in the box (top image), and forced a single missed tackle at the second level. We have talked ad nauseam this season about how feast or famine the Tulane running game has been, in that for the most part (at least, prior to Charlotte) it was a handful of explosive runs sprinkled amidst a large number of unsuccessful runs. Well, the Tulsa splits are even more extreme. Out of those same 138 FBS teams, they rank 18th in expected points added per carry but 118th in success rate per carry. In other words, they don't always run the ball well out of these sets, but are usually good for an explosive or three when the defense has any sort of lapse in run fits.

Damari Alston, a transfer from Auburn, has enjoyed the majority of the carries for the Golden Hurricane, this season, as he has totaled 103 carries through 8 games, going for 431 yards (4.2 yards per attempt) and 6 touchdowns. As an offense, 12.5% of their carries have gone for over 10 yards. Alston's running mate and complimentary piece is Trequan Jones, a transfer from Old Dominion, who has run for 384 yards on 60 carries (6.4 yards per attempt) with 4 touchdowns. Both are averaging over 3 yards per carry after contact, which highlights the importance of making that first tackle attempt, an area where Tulane frankly has not excelled this season.

Starting quarterback Baylor Hayes returns from 2025, and he has taken a noticeably different approach to playing the position in 2026 under new offensive coordinator Kevin Barbay (if that name sounds familiar it's because he was Willie Fritz's first offensive coordinator at Houston in 2024, before being relieved of duties following that season). Note that while Barbay is the offensive coordiantor, second-year head coach Tre Lamb is heavily involved in the offensive game-planning and has a ton of input on play-calling. Like Tulane, Tulsa plays relatively fast, averaging 24.4 seconds between snaps, which is the 22nd fastest average in the country (Tulane sits at 25th fastest at 24.6 seconds between snaps, on average).

It's clear to me, and the data reflects this, that Hayes is valuing completions and being safe and secure with the ball moreso than he did in 2025, and there is a clear emphasis on "putting the ball in play." Completions and positive yardage are obviously being emphasized in their offensive meetings. Here's where the data shows it:

In 2025, Hayes had an average depth of target of 10.3 yards beyond the line of scrimmage, this year that number is down to 9.3. As a result, his adjusted completion percentage (once drops are charted as completions) has risen to 77.0% up from last year's still impressive 70.2%, while his turnover-worthy play percentage cratered from 4.9% to a sparkling 1.9%, with the obvious tradeoff of not putting the ball in harm's way as much being that his "big time throw rate" has dropped from 3.7% to 2.6%. Even still, the Golden Hurricane passing attack has been good, but not phenomenal. They rank 51st in expected points added per pass, 82nd in the country in passing success rate, but 101st in yards per attempt (6.6). Hayes loves tossing it out to Oran Singleton, Jr., in particular, who paces the team in targets (58) and receptions (43), both of which are 15+ higher totals than the next highest pass catcher on the team. He is averaging 12.3 yards per reception with 4 touchdowns, and 2.21 yards per route run (you want to be above 2.0). They do a good job of moving him around, as he lines up in the slot 33.5% of the time, and out wide 2/3 of the time.

One last note on Hayes and the Tulsa passing game; against Charlotte, Tulane struggled mightily to get pressure without blitzing after the first two 49er possessions. Hayes has only been pressured on 20% of his dropbacks, but when pressured, he's 9/30 (30%) and averaging 3.9 yards per attempt. He has not been effective against the blitz, either, which likely will give Tayler Polk confidence to keep sending them if he's not getting there with four, as he did last week. When blitzed, Hayes is completing just 57.3% of his passes for 6.0 yards per attempt.

The Tulsa defense has left a bit to be desired in most areas besides forcing turnovers, where they rank 8th nationally in forcing 2.0 turnovers per game. It's hard not to be concerned about the combination of that, together with Tulane ranking 117th in fewest giveaways per game, at 1.6 per. As mentioned, Tulsa has lost two conference games despite being +3 and +4 in turnovers, while Tulane just won on the road while being -2, but that would hardly be a recipe for success, tomorrow. The Golden Hurricane has been better against the rush than the pass, so it'll be interesting to see how much Will Hall, in his second game as playcaller, continues to lean into Trace Johnson and the passing game as the driver of the offense.

Tulsa ranks 67th in expected points added per rush against, but 42nd in rushing success against (so it would be reasonable to expect mediocre down-in-and-down-out success from the Tulane rushing attack but an explosive or two. What else is new?), while they rank 91st in expected points added per pass against, and 90th in passing success rate against. More traditionally, they rank 79th in yards per play against, 96th in 3rd down conversion percentage against, 91st in yards per carry against, 92nd in yards per pass attempt against, 80th in passer rating against, 62nd in points per play against and 82nd in points per game against.

The Golden Hurricane have averaged 11.75 pressures per game and a little over 2 sacks a game, defensively. Kyran Duhon, an edge rusher and transfer from Oklahoma State, leads the team in both pressures (18) and sacks (7). In the Tulsa secondary, the player to avoid is cornerback Tyson Williams, as opposing quarterbacks are averaging a passer rating of 49.9, while the overall team passer rating is 90.4 against.

Prediction: Tulane 31-28