If preparing for a trip to No. 15 Oklahoma was not hard enough, the Tulane football team is doing it in the specter of an approaching storm.
Coach Jon Sumrall moved Tuesday morning’s practice to the Saints' indoor facility — needlessly, as it turned out, when the predicted lightning never arrived — but every other change he made appeared very necessary with Hurricane Francine headed for a Wednesday landfall on the Louisiana coast.
The Green Wave (1-1) planned to hunker down on Wednesday and Thursday in the hotel it normally uses the night before home games, then take its regular charter flight to Oklahoma (2-0) on Friday. Any Wednesday workout will hinge on the weather conditions.
“We got a normal Tuesday practice in for the most part,” Sumrall said. “We had to cut a few things just for the time with the travel over (to the Saints' facility) and travel back. Tonight we’ll stay together because our team hotel has generators to keep things online for our guys, hopefully. I’ve told them to pack like you’re going on a couple-day road trip.”
The disruption of the normal routine is not ideal as Tulane gets ready for its second consecutive ranked opponent after a heartbreaking 34-27 home loss to No. 17 Kansas State, but at least the two most important practices of the week are out of the way. Sumrall’s typical schedule calls for a 75-minute session on Wednesday and a walk-through on Thursday after full-scale workouts on Monday and Tuesday.
The Saints’ facility, the Caesars Superdome and Yulman Stadium are options depending on Francine’s status.
“Practice isn’t the No. 1 focus,” Sumrall said. “Health and safety are, but we’d like to try to find a location. We’re working through logistics. I don’t mind practicing in the rain. I would have practice here (on campus) today if I’d have known it was just going to rain.
"We’ll try to go about an hour tomorrow if we can. We’ll try to make sure we’re all in place a couple hours ahead of time (when Francine passes in full force).”
Tulane is a two-touchdown underdog to Oklahoma, which has not lost a nonconference game since 2016 (Ohio State) and last fell to an unranked nonleague foe in 2005 (TCU and UCLA).
The Sooners appeared quite vulnerable, though, Saturday when beating Houston and former Wave coach Willie Fritz 16-12 while being outgained 318-249. The Cougars had dumped their opener 27-7 to UNLV, getting the seven with one minute left.
An upset victory would give Tulane a leg up on other teams hoping to be the top-ranked Group of Five conference champion and garner the college football playoff berth that comes with it. How Francine affects the Wave’s focus remains to be seen, but defensive end Adin Huntington, a Virginia native, professed little concern.
“This is my first time (dealing with a hurricane),” he said. “It’s funny because when I was at Kent State (in 2022), before we played Oklahoma (a 33-3 loss), we had a little 10-day road trip (playing at Washington a week earlier).
"I approach it as stuff happens. I can’t control it. I control what I can control. You just have to adapt well. I don’t have to think about much when we have a great support staff that does it for us.”
Sumrall dealt with Hurricane Ike before his first game as a Tulane assistant in 2012 under then-coach Curtis Johnson, but Ike arrived earlier, allowing the Wave to evacuate to Birmingham, Alabama, and return to New Orleans for the opener against Rutgers.
Francine ratcheted up quickly in the middle of game week.
“I didn’t get much sleep last night and probably won’t get much the next couple of nights,” Sumrall said. “We’re trying to do as much as we can to help keep things going for our guys while being safe.
"There were three or four different options talked through with our administration. I told them first and foremost health and safety, and then what makes the most sense for the well-being of our team. As we evaluated things, we felt like this (the team hotel) was probably the best decision.”