Last Saturday’s 31-30 road loss to the University of Louisiana-Monroe came down to one statistic for Troy Trojans’ head coach Larry Blakeney.

“It was a punch-counter punch game, but it boiled down to third downs on both sides of the ball,” Blakeney said. “We didn’t convert enough when we had the ball and we didn’t stop them enough when they had the ball.”

The Trojans did have a chance to win the game up until the final seconds and at the Monday Trojan press conference at Country’s Barbecue Blakeney said he was proud of how his team stayed in the game all night.

And the Trojans were less than a foot from talking about a win, as placekicker Sam Glusman had his field goal attempt bounce off the crossbar to end the game.

“I didn’t know if Glus could make it that far, but I was off eight inches,” Blakeney said. “What a win that would have been.”

But the past is the past and Blakeney said the Trojans are now focused on the future and three-of-four games at home to close out the regular season. The Trojans host Western Kentucky University for Homecoming this Saturday and host the University of Louisiana-Lafayette and Arkansas State after hitting the road for LSU the next three Saturdays.

“There is nothing we can do positively living in La.-Monroe,” Blakeney said. “We have three of the next four at home and we ought to be excited about that. Losing is a fact of life in college football, but you have to be prepared to lose and know how to handle it.”

Blakeney said he is not worried about his team bouncing back from the loss.

“You have to get that bad taste out of you mouth, your gut or wherever it is and move on,” Blakeney said. “I know it is all over my body. But I was sitting in on some position meetings yesterday and it is amazing how resilient our players are. They are looking forward to moving on. And we have good leadership on this team to help us move on.”