BOCA RATON – For Kalib Woods, the only surprising aspect with regards to his breakout 2016 season is that it didn’t happen last year.
During his first two years at FAU, Woods impressed as a scout team player by making acrobatic highlight-tape catches almost as regularly as he caught quick slants.
While his 27 catches for 330 yards last season didn’t scream “bust”, they didn’t offer much in the way of foreshadowing for this season, either.
“I thought the same thing about last year, that the plays like that were going to be made, that I would show people that I can transition from practice to the game, so it’s a good feeling when it happens,” Woods said.
A 6-foot-3, 195-pound redshirt junior, Woods far and away leads the Owls with 41 catches for 596 yards. He also ranks in Conference USA’s Top 10 in both categories.
Woods showcased his playmaking ability late in the second half against Marshall with a leaping, one-handed catch between two defenders that put FAU inside the Thundering Herd red zone on the Owls’ closing drive.
At the time, Woods didn’t realize his left hand didn’t noticeably help with the catch.
“Really, I just remember looking the ball in but I didn’t know that I caught it with one hand,” said Woods, noting that it wasn’t until his mom called him after the game that he understood what happened.
“I was so focused on catching the ball,” Woods said. “It wasn’t really catching it with one hand or two hands. It was just, find a way to catch it.”
Woods followed what might have been the best play of career with one of his worst moments a few plays later.
Facing a fourth-and-3 at the Marshall 10, Jason Driskel fired a catchable, albeit a little low, pass that slid through Woods’ hands and fell incomplete. The Owls never got the ball back.
“It’s a play that we ran all spring, all camp. It’s a routine play. I just felt like, really, no matter if the ball is low or high, if it touches my hands I should have caught it,” Woods said.
“It sucked. The coaches told me it was OK or whatever because we played as hard as we could. No matter what anybody says, from what you expect out of yourself you expect to catch any ball that even comes close. That is a catchable ball. …It wasn’t keeping my feet in bounds or anything, I wasn’t worried about any DBs or nothing. It just got away from me.”
That Driskel looked to Woods so often on the final drive isn’t surprising. All other FAU wide receivers combined have only two more catches this season than Woods. On the play prior to Karmin Solomon’s Hail Mary catch, then replay reversal, the week prior against Charlotte, officials appeared to miss a pass interference call in the end zone by the defender covering Woods. A catch there would have given Woods a dozen on the afternoon.
Driskel isn’t the only one targeting Woods. Four of Daniel Parr’s eight completions have been to Woods.
Though he’s clearly out-performing all other FAU receivers, Woods said that’s not by design.
“It’s kind of a coincidence that most of the time when the ball is about to go to (other receivers) that something happens with the line,” Woods said. “(Opponents) blitz, they roll into a look that doesn’t look good for the play, period. But whenever they have a chance they’ll make the play.”
Without the emergence of another receiving threat, expect opposing secondaries to key on Woods in the season’s remaining five games.
“I would like for a breakthrough season to have more wins for sure, but from a personal standpoint it is fun,” Woods said.
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