There were several ingredients in place for Rice to upset Navy football going into Saturday’s game.

The Owls, off to a disappointing start, were playing for pride after seeing their head coach fired the previous weekend.

Rice also had an X factor in its favor in quarterback E.J. Warner, who picked apart the Navy pass defense last season while playing at Temple.

Things got worse for the Midshipmen on game day. Kickoff, originally scheduled for 3 p.m. local time and 4 p.m. Eastern Daylight Time, was delayed by 2 1/2 hours. After the game finally got underway, there were two more lengthy delays because of thunderstorms with lots of lightning in the Houston area.

There wound up being a total of 5 hours and 6 minutes worth of delays, only 21 minutes shy of the college football record that was set last season. The longest weather delay in college football history came a year ago when the Purdue at Virginia Tech game was suspended for 5 hours and 27 minutes.

By the time play resumed at Rice Stadium, the stands were completely empty — turning it into a bring-your-own-energy type of game. Navy could not do that early on and found itself facing a big early deficit it was unable to overcome.

Warner completed 28 of 40 passes for 239 yards and a touchdown, while tailback Dean Connors rushed for 102 yards and a score as Rice (3-6, 2-3 American Athletic Conference) upset Navy, 24-10.

Wide receiver Matt Sykes caught eight passes for 93 yards and a touchdown for the Owls, who raced out to a 17-0 lead and were never threatened. Linebacker Andrew Awe spearheaded a Rice defense that limited Navy to a season-low 260 total yards.

Quarterback Blake Horvath completed 10 of 19 passes for 120 yards and rushed for 64 yards on 16 carries to lead Navy (6-2, 4-1), which was dealt a blow to its hopes of playing in the American Athletic Conference championship game.

“I thought we did a really poor job of executing. I thought we were poor with our fundamentals and our technique and our ability to tackle,” Navy coach Brian Newberry said. “It was the second week in a row that we didn’t play consistently well in all three phases. We’ve got to get it fixed moving forward.”

Rice got the ball first to start the game and picked up one first down before having to punt. There was a television timeout and by the time the ESPN2 broadcast resumed the game had been suspended due to a lightning strike.

That second delay lasted just over an hour and led to almost all the fans heading for the exits. All the concession stands at Rice Stadium closed at that time even though there was more than 10 minutes remaining on the clock in the first quarter.

Newberry was asked afterward how the Navy coaching staff handled the three lengthy delays.

“You try to keep them engaged. Every half hour or so you walk them back through the game plan. You’re going around and talking to individual players. During the two delays we had some film to look at, some things to talk through,” Newberry said. “I’ve never been in a delay like that. I thought we handled it as well as we could have. It’s a balance between letting them relax a little bit and keeping them engaged at the same time.”

Newberry was not about to blame the three weather delays for Navy’s poor play. “[Rice] had the same issue and obviously dealt with it much better than we did,” he said. “You’ve got to have some success and some momentum to get the juice going. On a night like this you have to bring your own energy and your own juice and we didn’t have enough of it.”

Things could not have started any worse for the Midshipmen once play resumed. Quarterback Blake Horvath tossed an interception on Navy’s first offensive play of the game coming out of the in-game delay.

Cronic took a deep shot on first down and it backfired with linebacker Tyson Flowers picking off the pass and returning the ball to the Navy 45-yard line.

Warner, the son of Hall of Fame quarterback Kurt Warner, completed passes of 17 and 21 yards to Sykes as Rice quickly drove to the Navy 4-yard line. The Owls were facing second-and-goal when lightning caused the contest to be delayed yet again.

Play resumed for a second time at 8:25 local time (9:25 EST) and tailback Dean Connors promptly scored a touchdown on a 4-yard run to give Rice a 7-0 lead at the 9:30 mark of the opening period.

Navy went three-and-out on its second offensive possession and a 30-yard punt return by Tyson Thompson gave Rice good field position again. Warner threw a 17-yard touchdown pass to Sykes, who out-jumped a Navy defender to snag the ball then fell into the end zone, giving Rice a 14-0 lead with 2:41 remaining in the first quarter.

Navy finally got going offensively on its fourth possession with Horvath directing an eight-play, 75-yard touchdown drive. Horvath raced untouched from 9 yards out to cut the deficit to 17-7 at the 8:52 mark of the second quarter.

That possession proved a rare bright spot for Navy, which punted the last two times it had the ball in the first half and the first time it did in the second half. Fortunately, the defense stepped up and slowed down Warner and Rice, which had three punts and an interception on three straight possessions.

Facing fourth-and-2 from the Rice 19-yard line, Navy handed the ball off to snipe Eli Heidenreich on a sweep play that looked like it would pick up a first down. However, Heidenreich slipped on the soggy field and it was a turnover on downs.

Rice then delivered the dagger with Warner directing an 11-play, 80-yard touchdown that proved decisive. Connors ran 9 yards for the score as the Owls increased their lead to 24-7 with two minutes remaining in the third quarter.

Navy sealed its own fate when it drove 71 yards in 18 plays and took nearly 8 1/2 minutes off the clock only to settle for a 21-yard field goal by Nathan Kirkwood that cut the deficit to 24-10 with 8:34 remaining in the game.

“We just couldn’t get into a rhythm. We didn’t execute things well at times. We put the ball on the ground a few times. It’s a rhythmic offense and we have to be in sync,” Newberry said. “I just felt like we couldn’t gain any momentum. We would have a positive play then have a negative play. We have to stay on track. We can’t get behind the sticks. We have to be able to run the football and we couldn’t do that on a consistent basis tonight.”

Contact Bill Wagner at bwagner@capgaznews.com, 443-534-0102 and x.com/@BWagner_CapGaz.