If ever there was a way to pull a team together heading into a game with a conference championship on the line, UL may have defined it Saturday.

Because if the Ragin’ Cajuns’ emotional 36-35 come-from-behind victory over UL Monroe that left several seniors in tears doesn’t strengthen the bond of an already decidedly unified football team, it’s likely nothing would.

But this, make no mistake, did.

"It just shows how much we invested into the program, you know?" tight end Ladarius Green asked after scoring two touchdowns and pulling in 13 catches, most ever by a Cajun at Cajun Field. "To see everybody get that excited about it," added Green, one of those crying seniors, "you know everybody cares, and everybody’s just close on the team — how much we love each other."

In the UL locker room after the memorable victory, and before turning attention to Saturday’s Sun Belt Conference-impacting visit to league-leader Arkansas State, Cajun players tugged on the rope — an actual rope — they’ve been pulling throughout what to date is an 8-2 season with eight wins in their last nine games.

"We’ve got a special group of young men here at the University of Louisiana," head coach Mark Hudspeth said. "They believe in themselves, they believe in one another, they believe in our team and they believe in our concept.

"Our concept is ‘never let go of the rope’ — and if there’s ever been an example of that in the history of college football, I think you saw it (Saturday). I just could not be more proud of this group of guys finding a way, once again, to get it done."

Hudspeth, whose Cajuns also beat Florida Atlantic with a game-ending Brett Baer field goal earlier this season, rallied from 11 points down with just more than two minutes remaining to beat the Warhawks behind Blaine Gautier’s 16-yard touchdown pass to Darryl Surgent, a Baer onsides kick recovered by Green, and Alonzo Harris’ 3-yard touchdown run with just more than a minute left.

Linebacker Devon Lewis-Buchanan called the comeback "a miracle" inspired by perseverance.

"I can’t even explain "» the feeling," he said. "Just never losing faith in what was gonna happen. That was the greatest game I ever played in. It was just amazing.

"It’s the mindset of this team. It’s just believing," Lewis-Buchanan added. "I remember coming to the sideline looking at players, and I (saw) the looks on their faces. "» We couldn’t go out like that. I feel like it (a loss) just wasn’t supposed to happen. I don’t know. It’s a miracle."

The Cajuns will need some more help if they are to win an outright conference championship.

Arkansas State is undefeated in Sun Belt play, 5-0. UL is 6-1 in conference, its lone loss to Western Kentucky. WKU is 5-1 in conference games, with a loss to Arkansas State.

To win outright, UL must not only win Saturday at ASU, but also have the Redhawks lose at least one of their last two, Nov. 19 at Middle Tennessee and Dec. 3 against Troy, and have the Hilltoppers lose at least one of their last two, Nov. 19 at North Texas and Nov. 26 against Troy.

But the Cajuns can only control so much now, so they’re concerned only about focusing on what they can.

"We know we have to come out throughout practice "» and just continue to play football like we’ve been playing all this year," Gautier said.

"It’s gonna be a big game," Green added. "We’ve just got to come out and work hard like we always do, and go out and execute, and perform like we usually do."

Or better. 

"We have to come out and play," Lewis-Buchanan said, memory of Monroe’s 14-0 first-quarter lead and late 35-24 advantage still fresh in his mind. "We can’t start off slow like we did."

Finishing in similar fashion, however, would not be a bad thing.

Not that Hudspeth necessarily wants it to come to that.

He’ll merely take a win Saturday — it would be UL’s first nine-win season since the Cajuns went 9-2 under coach Augie Tammariello, only to later have two of those victories forfeited for using an ineligible player — any way he can.

"We accomplished our first goal (of going 5-0 at home)," Hudspeth said, "and like I told the guys in the locker room, ‘We’ve gone too far now to turn back.’ ‘