LAFAYETTE — Pat Brennan and Kelcy Dotson were supposed to knock the ball down.

With less than seven minutes to go in the game, No. 25 Texas A&M clung to a 22-21 lead over Southwestern Louisiana (now Louisiana-Lafayette) and had the ball at their own 30-yard line. The Aggies were looking to put together a long clock-eating drive they hoped would help them hold off the Ragin’ Cajuns and let them escape the muggy conditions of Cajun Field with a victory. 

Texas A&M may have done just that if USL’s linebacking duo of Brennan and Dotson had made the play they were hoping to make. 

“We rushed the quarterback and jumped up in the air to knock down his pass,” Brennan recalled. “There is a picture somewhere of us jumping in the air and the ball going right between us. Thank God we didn’t knock the ball down because if we knock the ball down then we don’t intercept the ball and score. I don’t know what would have happened if we had knocked the ball down.”

“We were trying to blitz to get to the QB and stop the bleeding,” Dotson said. “We were playing good but we had some setbacks and they were known for running the ball down your throat. So when he passed it we were trying to knock it down to stop the drive. Thank God we didn’t.”

For Brennan and Dotson, the pass from Texas A&M quarterback Brannon Stewart thankfully sailed through their outstretched arms, which allowed defensive back Britt Jackson to intercept it and run it back for what proved to be the final touchdown in the Cajuns’ historic 29-22 upset over the Aggies. That contest on Saturday, September 14, 1996, remains the Cajuns’ only victory over a Top 25-ranked opponent, and only win over a team that currently plays in the Southeastern Conference.

The Aggies are coming

USL entered the 1996 season with high expectations.

Despite leaving the Big West Conference (where the team won titles in 1993 and 1994), and being forced to play as an independent, that year’s Cajuns team was loaded on both sides of the ball.

Jake Delhomme was returning for his fourth season as the team’s prolific starting quarterback. Delhomme was joined by senior all-conference running back Kenyon Cotton, senior wide receiver Donald Richard and sophomore wide receiver Brandon Stokley who was coming off a record-shattering freshman season.

The Cajuns’ defense was stacked as well, returning eight starters, including Brennan, Jackson and Damon Mason, each of whom had earned conference honors the year before.

In fact, of the eight jerseys that have been retired in program history, three of them were worn by starters (Delhomme, Mason and Stokley) in that Texas A&M game.

But the schedule that season was brutal.

In addition to Texas A&M, USL faced eventual national champion Florida on the road; both Southern Miss and Houston, who shared the Conference USA title with the Cougars earning the bowl berth; Texas Tech, which played in the Alamo Bowl; and Virginia Tech, which won 10 games and played in the Orange Bowl. 

The season started off with a 55-21 loss to the Gators and eventual Heisman Trophy winner Danny Wuerffel but the Cajuns played well in the opening defeat. 

“I was telling somebody that not long ago about the confidence we got from that game,” starting right guard Marty Cannon said. “I remember walking off the field there and feeling pretty good about our team and that just carried over through the bye week and into the game week. We believed that we could beat them.”

“We were told that was the only football game that Steve Spurrier didn’t give out a game ball,” said Brennan, who was a star at Catholic High in New Iberia. “We knocked Danny Wuerffel out of the game and we had a couple of interceptions. That built our confidence up for the A&M game.”

The buzz about the home opener against A&M had been building all summer, and subsequently so did the smack talk.

“We ran into Brandon Mitchell (Texas A&M defensive end) and bunch of his guys at a club in Lafayette that summer,” Mason said. “He was from Abbeville and he was home for the summer I guess and was out partying and stuff. We told him right to his face that we were going to kick their butt come September. I know a lot of people embellish their memories but to be honest, we just felt like we could flat-out play with them.”

Not even Texas A&M falling 41-37 in its opener to BYU, which Mason and Jackson watched carefully on TV, could quell the excitement. 

USL had played plenty of national programs over the years, including SEC programs Tennessee, Auburn, and Alabama, who had actually came to Cajun Field in 1990, but this game was different. Many of the players on USL’s roster hailed from Texas, Aggies head coach R.C. Slocum was a Louisiana native who played tight end in the late 1960s at one of USL’s old rivals, McNeese State, and A&M had recently whipped USL in 1990 and 1991 by the combined score of 97 to 21. 

“Everybody knew it was going to be the largest crowd,” said Delhomme, who remembered talk of tearing down the goal posts began weeks earlier. “No one ever sat on the grass behind the end zones. That was never done but people were planning on sitting there for the game. That was all anyone was talking about around campus. A&M was coming to Cajun Field.”

“I can remember the pep rally the night before,” Mason said. “You felt the buzz in the air. I remember saying that I don’t care if we win or lose, but we are going to fly around for four quarters.” 

A then-record crowd of 38,783 fans filled Cajun Field that night.

Texas-sized turnovers

The game couldn’t have started off worse for USL as A&M’s famed “Wrecking Crew” defense made a statement on the very first play.

Delhomme rolled out to his right and tried to throw a corner route to Stokley but the pass was intercepted by Donovan Greer, who returned it near the goal line to set up a one-yard touchdown run by D’Andre Hardeman. The Cajuns though were unfazed by the pick six.

“They were legendary for sure,” Cannon said. “The Wrecking Crew had a reputation and we had to respect that but we had a good offensive line and we had a gutsy QB. We had Stokley and Cotton. 

“We knew we had to fight and claw all night against that defense but our offense could take some chances because our defense was nasty and gritty too.”

That grit was shown on the Aggies’ next possession. Mason intercepted Tennessee transfer Brandon Stewart’s errant throw and return it for a 42-yard score.

“We really didn’t care what the offense did,” said Mason, who had two picks and one forced fumble in the game. “If the offense struggled then it was more plays for us to make on defense. If it was a turnover then it was go time for us to go out there and make more plays.”

A&M’s defense may have had the national reputation but it was the Cajuns’ defense that made more big plays that night as USL forced eight turnovers, including four interceptions by Stewart, and scored three defensive touchdowns. A fourth touchdown by Dotson was called back due to holding.

“They were big and strong on offense but one thing we knew is that we had really good defensive backs that could hang with their wide receivers,” Brennan said. “Their quarterback was a good runner but we knew if we could get him in passing situations that we could probably beat him with our speed and force him to turn over the ball.”

“Let’s be honest,” added Delhomme. “Their quarterback really struggled that night. He had a bad night. There is no other way around it. A&M’s defense was difficult to throw and run against to say the least but our defense stepped up for us.”

USL’s defense gave the Cajuns the lead with 4:43 left in the first when Charles Johnson recovered a Sirr Parker fumble and returned it 18 yards for the score. A one-yard touchdown pass from Delhomme to tight end Cody Romero midway through the second period gave the Cajuns a 21-7 lead but the Aggies responded with a 39-yard touchdown by Hardeman. The extra point was no good.

At the break, USL held a 21-13 lead.

“I remember saying ‘We are going in there at halftime to regroup and hydrate and come out in the second half and get after them,’” Delhomme said. “We are are going to win this game. We are going to shock the world.”

A&M regrouped and took the lead in the third quarter as Stewart used his legs to score on a 46-yard option run and Kyle Bryant kicked a 48-yard field goal to give the Aggies a 22-21 lead.

Then in the fourth quarter, Jackson scored the Cajuns’ third and final defensive touchdown of the night. Delhomme hit Stokley for the 2-point conversion and the Cajuns held a 29-22 lead with 6:23 to go.

No place like Cajun Field

The Aggies still had plenty of time to take a lead and had proved they could move the ball — A&M outgained USL 399-248. The Cajuns had one bi advantage on their side — the sweltering Louisiana humidity.

“It was so hot and muggy that night,” Brennan said. “It felt that the heat was right on top of you the whole time but I think we were more accustomed to it than they were.”

Plus, the Cajuns had a few tricks up their sleeves when it came to dealing with the onset of cramps.

“We had this 17-play drive which was the longest drive I had ever been on in my life,” Cannon said. “It was a pounding and grinding drive. It was also wearing us down. I was out there sucking air. 

“Mark Buford then caught a pass across the middle and he got crushed by the defensive backs,” Cannon added. “I knew he was hurting and I was gassed but I didn’t want to waste a timeout. He started to slowly get up off the ground and I said get down. He fell back down and the refs called a timeout and a trainer.”

USL needed one final stop by its defense to seal the victory.

With the ball inside the Cajuns’ 30-yard line and 37 seconds on the clock, A&M’s Stewart was forced out of the pocket and threw off of his back foot down the right sideline. In a crowd of five players, Jackson tipped the ball in the air and Mason dove to catch it at the 14-yard-line. Mason himself cramped up and had to be helped off the field. 

“I have said it for years, pound for pound Damon is one of the best players I have ever played with in my entire career college and pro,” Delhomme said. “Damon would want to break his face into anyone he was going to tackle. Damon made play after play and did so that night.”

“We felt like one of the boxers that went 13 rounds and in that last round you feel like you are about to lose it,” Dotson said. “Or kind of like when Hulk Hogan used to start shaking his finger before getting back up off the mat he would say ‘not yet’. That’s how we felt late in that game.”

Delhomme took a knee and then ran down the field with his helmet in one hand as thousands of Cajun fans stormed the field. 

“The first thing I thought about where was my family,” Cannon said. “As soon as we snapped the ball. I wanted to stand at the 50-yard-line and have my hands as high in the air as possible. I wanted my parents and fiancé’ to see me, but I had no clue of the pandemonium about to break out. Waves of people just came flowing out onto the field. I think I got beat up more by the fans after the game than by A&M’s defensive line.” 

“I happened to be in the middle of the field,” Brennan said. “I was so tired and so shocked. You know Jake was out there running around like a wild man but I was dead tired. I couldn’t celebrate like I wanted to.”

Those loud whispers during the week of taking the goal posts came to fruition as students tore down the south-end goal post, carried up the slopes of the stadium, managed to have it cross over the top of the fence surrounding the stadium and took it to the parking lot.

“There were so many people on the field you didn’t know what was going on,” said Dotson, whose son and current Cajun offensive lineman Kevin Dotson was born four days after the game. “You see someone jumping up down, and then the goal post was coming down and next thing you know it was going out of the stadium. We had no idea where it went. The next day we heard that it went so many miles down the street. it was crazy.”

For those Cajuns who were there the night the goal posts were torn down, the memory remains one of the most prized of their careers.

“That game is my favorite moment playing there,” said Delhomme who later quarterbacked the Carolina Panthers to the Super Bowl. “That game ranks as one the Top 5 of the sporting events I have ever been part of.”

“It was great,” Mason said. “Throughout the years, it always comes up and I had a lot of older gentlemen of how proud they were of us of what we accomplished for the team and university. It was my favorite game I ever played as a Cajun.”