Rutgers leads the Big East
The Scarlet Knights improved to 8-1 on the season with their 28-7 victory over Army yesterday. This was a 7-7 game until 8:49 left in the fourth quarter when Brandon Coleman caught a 31-yard touchdown pass from Gary Nova. Louisville lost to Syracuse yesterday so Rutgers is not at the top of the Big East Conference with three games to go.
Rutgers needs to fix the slow starts by the offense. There is no excuse for this game to be as tight as it was for so long against a two win Army team. Rutgers has not scored a first quarter touchdown since the Syracuse game on October 13th. The team has only scored 23 points in the first quarter this season while their opponents have scored 37.
You could make the argument that Army lost this game more than Rutgers won it. Army had great field position all day but lost two turnovers in the red zone and had two field goals blocked. Army’s special teams’ basically gave the game in the way in the fourth quarter when the Army punter (Chris Boldt) had a nine-yard punt giving Rutgers the ball at the Army 45-yard line.
Rutgers would take the lead on the touchdown pass to Brandon Coleman.
The special teams failed Army again on the next possession when a bad snap went over the head of the punter and Rutgers got the ball at the Army one-yard line. Savon Huggins would take it in to give Rutgers a 21-7 lead.
The defense played very well in this game. It seemed like there were a lot of missed tackles but they were in poor field position all day long. Army rushed for 282 yards on 68 attempts which was well under their season average. The defense forced two turnovers in the red zone and closed out the game with Duron Harmon returning a fumble 73 yards for the final score.
Photo: By Nelson Chenault, US Presswire
You could make the argument that Army lost this game more than Rutgers won it. Army had great field position all day but lost two turnovers in the red zone and had two field goals blocked. Army’s special teams’ basically gave the game in the way in the fourth quarter when the Army punter (Chris Boldt) had a nine-yard punt giving Rutgers the ball at the Army 45-yard line.
Rutgers would take the lead on the touchdown pass to Brandon Coleman.
The special teams failed Army again on the next possession when a bad snap went over the head of the punter and Rutgers got the ball at the Army one-yard line. Savon Huggins would take it in to give Rutgers a 21-7 lead.
The defense played very well in this game. It seemed like there were a lot of missed tackles but they were in poor field position all day long. Army rushed for 282 yards on 68 attempts which was well under their season average. The defense forced two turnovers in the red zone and closed out the game with Duron Harmon returning a fumble 73 yards for the final score.
