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Resilient Rice sinks East Carolina, 18-17, on last-second field goal
Owls score nine points in the final 2:37 to pull out their sixth win
CUSA-fans.com has a new staff of team correspondents this fall to help bring you, the fan, more detailed Conference USA football coverage. Today, our ECU Correspondent Thomas "Bubba" Rosenbaum recaps the East Carolina Pirates 18-17 loss at Rice on Saturday.
Skip Holtz and his Pirates traveled to Houston on Saturday with one goal—defeat Rice and lock up the CUSA East Division title. With a win, East Carolina would have ensured that it would return to Houston on December 1 st to face the Cougars in the league’s championship game.
However, in Houston, the Pirates had a problem. The problem was they were playing Todd Graham’s upstart Rice Owls, who won for the sixth time in their last seven games. Sure, East Carolina did not have its best game, but Rice definitely had a lot to do with that. The turnaround that Graham and company have executed has been remarkable.
The Owls, who accumulated 458 yards of total offense in the game, found themselves trailing 17-9 with just less than three minutes to play. Despite moving the ball up and down the field on the Pirate defense, they had not been able to convert their opportunities into points. However, East Carolina was not been able to put the gritty Owls away. Leading 17-9 after three-quarters, the Pirates’ offense was non-existent in the final quarter. It did not produce a single first down on its three fourth-quarter possessions and that proved to be very costly.
Rice did what good teams do; they took advantage of their opportunities and found a way to win. They made the plays when they had to and the Pirates didn’t. With less than a minute to play, the Owls faced a critical fourth and ten play from their own 24-yard line. With the game on the line, reserve quarterback John Shepherd came through with a huge effort. He threw the ball deep in Jarett Dillard’s direction and the Owls’ playmaker showed why he is one of the nation’s top receivers. Dillard went up for the ball against the Pirates’ Pierre Parker, who had already intercepted one jump ball in the end zone just a few minutes earlier. This time Dillard won the fight for the ball and kept the Owls’ chances very much alive, as they now had the ball on the East Carolina 36-yard line with 31 seconds to play. Needing a few more yards to get into field range, Rice stayed on the offensive. After throwing incomplete on first down, Shepherd hooked up with Dillard on a crossing route and the speedy wide receiver raced across the field to get out of bounds. He was able to do so at the Pirates’ 25-yard line while giving the Owls another first down. |
Rice’s Clark Fangmeier had a long field goal of 37 yards on the season, thus Todd Graham elected to try and get closer. Quinton Smith carried for three yards on first down and then Shepherd threw incomplete on second.
Faced with third and seven at the Pirates’ 22-yard line, Todd Graham opted to kick the field goal in case anything went awry and it got blocked. The Owls would then be able to attempt it again on fourth down if they recovered the blocked try.
This would be a moot point. Following two East Carolina timeouts, which were primarily used as attempts to ice the Owls’ kicker, Clark Fangmeier split the uprights on a career-long 40-yard field goal.
The Pirates’ attempt to emulate “The Play” from the 1982 California-Stanford game failed at the ECU 46-yard line after probably ten backward passes. The result? The Owls won their fifth consecutive game and gained bowl eligibility. The Rice students poured onto the field from right behind the Pirates’ bench and the celebration was on.
East Carolina led for the majority of the game, but it was unable to put the Owls away. The loss was a costly one for the Pirates, as now they must rely on Marshall to defeat Southern Miss if they are going to win the CUSA East.
Despite ECU’s success this season, the offense had failed to take care of business at times and that came to a head on Saturday. ECU was facing one of the worst defenses in the nation, but could only muster 301 yards in the game, which included 95 in the second half.
Brandon Fractious, who rushed for 83 yards on ten carries in the opening half, did not touch the ball in the second half. This appeared to be a coaches’ decision, which was perhaps due to the staff being satisfied with Fractious’ pass protection.
James Pinkney and the Pirate passing game struggled mightily on the day. The Pirate senior signal-caller had a day much like the Tulsa game, throwing for only 83 yards on a 10-of-17 performance. He also threw two interceptions.
Aundrae Allison did record six receptions, but was limited to 39 yards. The Rice defense did a tremendous job of preventing big plays through the air.
East Carolina rushed for 218 yards in the loss, which included a 43-yard sprint for a touchdown by Chris Johnson in the third quarter that gave ECU a 17-9 lead. However, the Pirates were unable to run the ball at the end when it counted.
ECU must have short memory, though, as they must bounce back for a game in Raleigh against NC State. It is a game in which the Pirates have an opportunity to decide their bowl fate.Rice is now bowl eligible and will attempt to win their sixth straight vs. SMU next Saturday at Rice Stadium. Todd Graham and company have something special cooking in Houston.
by Thomas "Bubba" Rosenbaum - |
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