Losing conference football games has become a rarity for Troy University; however Losing two Sun Belt conference games in a row has only happened once in the schools seven seasons as members of the conference. Despite the moral blow to the Trojans who are seeking their sixth straight conference title they are by no means done.

“We’ve been here before, we were here last year,” said head coach Larry Blakeney. “We’ve won the championship with one loss before. You’re not out of it until you’re out of it. So you’ve got to keep preparing and I think we’ve got some good people on our team and it’ll take coaching. Hopefully we’ll do an even better job getting them ready to go this week.”

The Trojans (2-3, 1-1) struggled last week with injuries and penalties in their loss to Louisiana-Lafayette, but both coaches and players are determined to improve on each as they prepare to host Louisiana Monroe (1-4, 01) on Saturday.

“I think it basically starts up front with the offensive line and all our penalties,” said offensive lineman Kyle Wilborn. “Our defense is holding us in there, but our offense is dropping the ball. I think [the loss] was a good thing, a blessing in disguise really because it was more of a wake-up call for us. The season is not over by any stretch. It’s an unpredictable league and everyone is evenly matched this year. There are a lot of good teams in our conference.”

Last week’s performance has established mid-season motivation for the Trojans who are still looking for that sixth consecutive title.

“A good thing about college football is that you do play week to week,” said Trojans quarterback Corey Robinson. “What happened on Saturday, everybody has already forgotten about it. The young guys are going to be challenged this week. The only motivation we need right now is pretty much knowing that if we lose another conference game, our chances are a lot less of winning the conference.”

Despite Troy’s conference success throughout each season Louisiana Monroe has always posed a threat to the Trojans beating them three different times in Troy’s seven Sun Belt season history. Troy will be looking for their home crowd to help them turn things back around and onto a winning track.

“We’ll have our hands full with Louisiana-Monroe,” said Blakeney. ”So hopefully we’ll have a good crowd. A good home crowd is always good medicine for a football team.”

The Trojans will kick off against the Warhawks on Saturday at 6 pm on Larry Blakeney field where the Trojans remain 1-0. The game can be seen on CSS/CST as the Sun Belt Network Game of the Week.