History was made on Saturday night. Sadly, there was no storybook ending.
In the first ever night game at John P. Papp stadium, the Fighting Scots lost to rival Case Western Reserve University 53-32, allowing the Spartans to take home the Baird Brothers Trophy for the third straight year.
Over 4,500 fans showed up to support the Scots in the first game after the Ed and Edie Andrew Turf Field had been officially dedicated.
The telling story of the evening was the way the Case Western Reserve offense was seemingly unstoppable over the course of the four quarters.
Case Western Reserve, ranked No. 10 by D3football.com, came out firing all night long, scoring on nine of their first 12 possessions before running out the clock in garbage time.† Senior quarterback Dan Whalen, a 2008 finalist for the Gagliardi Trophy, given to the nations best Div. III player, continued to show why he is viewed as one of the top quarterbacks in the country, completing 26 of 37 passes for 396 yards, four touchdowns, and only one interception. The way he was able to spread the ball around the field, completing passes to seven different receivers made the passing attack explosive.
On the other side of the ball, the Scots kept it close for the first three quarters of play.† After being down 24-9 at the start of the second quarter, the Scots were able to bounce back in the closing minutes of the half, scoring nine unanswered points on a safety and Austin Holter í10 pass to Cameron Daniels í12, including a timely interception of Whalen by Bryan Albani í10 inside the red zone to prevent the Spartans from scoring before the half.
Starting the second half with the ball, Holter (23-42, 221 yards, three scores and one interception), led the Scots on a 12 play, 75-yard drive for a touchdown, capped by an eight-yard toss to Mike Francescangeli í10 for the touchdown.† This score gave the Scots their first lead of the contest, 25-24.
After another disheartening drive by the Spartans, which gave them back the lead 31-25, the Scots needed a spark to get back into the game.† They didnít have to wait long as Albani returned the ensuing kickoff 93 yards for a touchdown, his second kickoff return of the season.† This 93-yard return also marked the longest return in Wooster history.
Following a three-and-out in Case Western Reserveís next offensive series, the Scots appeared to be in good shape to add on to their 32-31 lead.† However, the Spartan defense didnít allow a score for the rest of the game, holding the Scots offense to just 30 yards on 16 plays over the course of their next five possessions.† The Scots were zero of five on third down conversions, with only one first down in the final 21 minutes of play.
Essential to the Scotsí scoring drives and overall offensive game plan was Robert Flagg í12, who totaled 12 rushes for 68 yards, second to only Holterís 88 yards, and led all receivers with 8 receptions for 61 yards.† His 20 combined touches along with four incomplete passes made him the target of exactly one third of the Scotsí offensive plays.
The defense for the Scots was apparently not ready for prime time.† They allowed 557 total offensive yards, while only hurrying and sacking the quarterback a combined three times.† While credit must be given to the Spartansí offensive line, the overall performance left something to be desired.† The 557 total yards was the largest amount of yardage allowed this season, and the most since September 2007, when the Scots allowed 633 to the Wittenberg University Tigers in a 58-7 loss.
The silver lining for this game is that Case Western Reserve is part of the University Athletic Association.† This game had no bearing on the Scotsí quest to win the NCAC crown, where they are one of three teams tied for first with a 3-0 record, the other two being Wittenberg and Wabash University, which play each other this Saturday.
The Scots look to bounce back from this loss tomorrow as they travel to St. Louis to take on Washington University at 1 p.m.† In last seasonís match-up between these two teams, the Fighting Scots were victorious, defeating the Bears 38-13 at John P. Papp stadium.