Rice quarterback Gael Ochoa carried 12 times for 259 yards and four touchdowns Saturday at Florida Atlantic. Every one of those scoring runs went for 50-plus: 55, 52, 74 and 69 yards. Rice lost, 51-49.

That’s 21.6 yards a carry. He only threw five passes, but one of them was a 71-yard touchdown to Braylen Walker with 2:51 left that pulled Rice within two.

How Rice lost anyway

Florida Atlantic’s Easton Messer happened. With 3:37 left, Messer took a punt back 82 yards for a touchdown. That made it 51-42, which is why Walker’s score only got Rice to 51-49. Rice got the ball back one more time and drove into range, but Tommy Bauchiero’s 55-yard field goal try was no good with 45 seconds left. Florida Atlantic knelt it out.

Messer finished with 12 catches for 162 yards and scored five touchdowns three different ways: two receiving, two rushing and the punt return. Caden Veltkamp threw for 339 yards and three scores. Florida Atlantic is 5-2. Rice is 1-7.

Our take: The best individual performance of the weekend came from a quarterback on a 1-7 team, in a game most of you didn’t watch. Our pick for player of the game is Messer, though. Five touchdowns and a win beats four touchdowns and a loss.

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Jeremy Durham is a sports columnist for TriStar Daily and the founder of Five and a Fade.