The Tulane Green Wave have as many eyeballs on them as ever as the current top-ranked Group of Five team in the College Football Playoff rankings. As they headed to Philadelphia to play the Temple Owls, there was fair question whether the outside noise would rear its ugly head again.

It certainly did for the Memphis Tigers, who weren’t technically ranked in the first CFP rankings, but were slotted in as the presumed fifth conference champion. Then the Green Wave came into their house and beat them. The South Florida Bulls took the CFP slot the following week at No. 22 and lost their following game to the Navy Midshipmen.

Then the Green Wave came in No. 24 in the CFP rankings and faced an Owls squad that was better than their record indicated, were one win away from bowl eligibility, and had only turned the ball over twice all season. They lost to that same Midshipmen team and the Army Black Knights by one point each.

Tulane showed last season that they weren’t impenetrable to outside noise. The American conference started a pattern that put the Green Wave in place to be the next one in a trap. Instead, their 37-13 road win was the most complete performance in all three phases all season.

The defense found a new gear that has seemed to settle in since Memphis. Quietly, they’ve gone from middle of the pack in the American to the No. 5 scoring defense, No. 3 rushing defense, No. 4 in interceptions, and No.3 in total sacks. Of the team’s 26 total sacks, 11 have been in the last three games, with four on Temple. The Owls had 20 carries for 20 rush yards on Saturday.

There really hasn’t been a game this season for Tulane since the season opener against the Northwestern Wildcats where it felt like they were in control the entire game – until Saturday. And it feels like a lot of season-long questions and things that needed to click have been answered.

The offense finally has a balanced attack with chemistry between Jake Retzlaff and his receivers, and a potential monstrous RB1 in Jamauri McClure in his first 100-yard plus career performance. It’s the first time a running back has hit that mark this season. Patrick Durkin is the school’s best kicker since Cairo Santos. He hit a career-long 52 yarder to cap off a perfect night on all five kicks.

Without those 18 points, the Green Wave would have still won the contest. But in a game that didn’t need style points, as the team controls their destiny with the CFP ranking tiebreaker, they finally had a win that looked pretty in the points column. 19-13 is an ugly final score that would have made the victory feel quite different. Instead, Durkin was stone cold on considerable distances from 50-yards, 36-yards, 38-yards, 42-yards, and on his final 52-yarder on a cold, windy evening.

The win wasn’t perfect. Chasing an elusive perfect win might just be a fruitless endeavor. This team has shown blemishes all season, but they’ve turned them into valuable scars.