BOCA RATON — With a 2-6 record and four games remaining, Florida Atlantic head football coach Tom Herman says his team now plays a “one-game season.”

This sentiment isn’t exactly hyperbolic. Following last week’s 44-21 loss to South Floridathe Owls must now win all of their remaining games to be bowl eligible at the end of the season.

“We put ourselves here,” Herman said. “We have no one to blame but ourselves, but the fight is not over.”

More: FAU football coach Tom Herman angrily confronts USF’s Alex Golesh after the Bulls’ 44-21 rout.

Although they face a steep climb, which begins Thursday night at American Athletic Conference foe East Carolina, Herman and the Owls aren’t quite ready to push the button of panic.

“I think they know what’s at stake,” Herman said. “I’m actually somewhat proud of the 1-0 mentality they’ve adopted.”

Quarterback Cam Fancher acknowledged the team’s tendency to make costly mistakes. “There’s no panic,” Fancher said. “We just have to correct the mistakes and not let them happen again. »

Running back CJ Campbell Jr., who has emerged as a dual threat for the Owls in recent weeks, reiterated that sentiment.

“We know what we have to do,” Campbell said. “But there have never been times where we go to the locker room and everyone is just depressed or frustrated or anything like that.

“Everyone’s mood is always the same. We come to work every day and we know we can turn the tide.

Owls’ second-half mistakes contributed to their struggles

FAU’s struggles this season can largely be attributed to mistakes in the second half. FAU was outscored 136-83 in the third and fourth quarters, and in each of their last three losses, the Owls held a lead or were tied at halftime.

Herman said he and his coaching staff addressed the difficulties of the second half “ad nauseam” and tried to change routines after halftime to try to resolve the difficulties.

“We just have to understand why our execution level continues to decline in the second half,” Herman said. “I changed my approach in terms of tone. At halftime, we brought our guys out early to warm them up and make them more flexible. So we try to discover every stone imaginable.

Campbell added that the Owls can’t get complacent at halftime, no matter if the score is in their favor.

“Just keep your foot on the gas,” Campbell said. “Just keep doing the things we need to do to win, and don’t think a team is just going to give up because they’re down.”

FAU will not play a team with a winning record in the last four games

Herman says the short week allowed his team to eliminate any negativity stemming from last week’s loss to the Bulls and focus solely on ECU.

“(It’s) probably a good thing,” Herman said. “Knowing that you have to get over it extremely quickly…we didn’t have time to wallow.”

Besides East Carolina (4-4, 2-2), the Owls, who rank last in the AAC with an 0-4 conference record, will have matchups at Temple (2-6, 1- 3), at home against Charlotte (3-6, 2-3) and at Tulsa (3-6, 1-4) to end the season. If FAU hopes to be eligible for its first bowl game since 2020, the turnaround needs to happen now.

“We’re in the area,” Herman said. “We got out there putting up a really bad fight for the first few rounds. We have four rounds left and we’re going to learn a lot about our guys in terms of their willingness to do whatever it takes to fight to get out of this corner.

More: Tom Herman: It will be ‘scary’ when Power 4 teams receive 20 more NCAA scholarships | D’Angelo

Thursday’s match

Florida Atlantic (2-6) at East Carolina (4-4)

8 p.m.; ESPN2 and subscription streaming on Fubo, Sling and YouTube

This article was originally published on the Palm Beach Post: Florida Atlantic plays East Carolina trying to get out of the AAC basement