Western Kentucky’s 11 Floridians would like to put one more good showing in front of local family and friends Friday at Florida International.

Last week’s Middle Tennessee win showed signs they might have the momentum to do that.

Coming off a 485-yard passing and five-touchdown performance that earned him Conference USA’s Offensive Player of the Week honor, quarterback Mike White will play his last guaranteed college football game about 25 minutes from his native Pembroke Pines, Fla.

Senior nickelback Leverick Johnson will practically play in his backyard in Miami when WKU (6-5 overall, 4-3 C-USA) kicks off against FIU (6-4, 4-3) at Riccardo Silva Stadium at 6 p.m. CT Friday.

“It’s pretty cool,” White said after Tuesday’s practice. “I get to end my senior year back home about 25 minutes from where I live. It’ll be nice to see a lot of people and I’m looking forward to it.”

On top of Friday being potentially the last game for 11 Hilltoppers in Florida – a bowl game could land WKU back in the Sunshine State – WKU wants a big game from a recruiting standpoint against a conference foe. The Toppers currently have five commits from Florida for the Class of 2018.

“There’s a lot at stake for those Florida players,” WKU coach Mike Sanford said at his weekly Monday news luncheon. “We’re making some serious in-roads back in recruiting Florida. This class we’re bringing in is peppered with a lot of talent from Florida. It’s important for us to get a great performance and get a victory against a recruiting competitor in Florida.”

WKU is looking forward to carrying over some offensive firepower from a 41-38 triple overtime win over MTSU. For a game with bowl eligibility on the line for both teams, WKU had its second-highest production in terms of points (41) and total offense (538 yards). Only on a 45-14 win over a 1-10 Charlotte team on Oct. 14 did the Hilltoppers have a better day offensively.

White completed five touchdown passes to five receivers and senior Nacarius Fant hauled in a career-high 14 receptions.

WKU’s explosive game moved them up five spots (-1.4) in SB Nation’s S&P+ rankings.

“You spread the ball around, you get playmakers the ball and I think that’s what this offense is really good at,” White said. “I think it makes it harder for defenses to game plan against that. I’d say we’re clicking. By no means are we there yet or we’ve arrived. There’s still points left on the field for multiple games. That’s what we’ve been looking at and continuing to improve upon.”

By comparison of how the season has gone, WKU ran the ball better with DeAndre Ferby getting 64 yards on 21 carries. Of his 14 receptions, getting the ball to Fant on bubble screens offered an extension of the run game WKU plans to utilize moving forward.

For an offensive line that’s struggled and gave up five sacks to MTSU – the second highest total this season – Sanford said they still did a good job picking up blitzes and pointing out blocking assignments when the Blue Raiders would put seven players on the line of scrimmage.

“For the test of the offensive line to be the hardest looks we’ve had all year, I think they did a nice job and played one of their better games,” Sanford said.

They’ll have the chance to roll over a big game against an FIU team that’s been exposed the last two weeks against Old Dominion and Florida Atlantic. The Panthers gave up 37 points in a loss to a Monarchs team that only averages 21 points per game, then allowed 333 rushing yards to C-USA leader FAU in a 52-24 loss.

FIU (-3.5) dropped seven spots in the S&P+ rankings.

“We still think there’s a lot of improvement to be done,” White said. “We want to go out there and not only win, but play our best game possible. We still feel there’s a lot better offense out there we can put on tape and that’s our goal going into it.”{&end}