HAMPDEN-SYDNEY, Va. -- Conrad Singh, I feel your pain. Ditto for
you J.D. Ricca, Jeff Inman, C.W. Clemmons and the rest of your
Hampden-Sydney teammates.
Every Division III football player knows what it’s like to
lose a game, even if the guys at Mount Union have to conjure up
memories from their high school days. But the way Hampden-Sydney
lost on Saturday, to a Bridgewater team they had beat, reminds me
of the most painful losses in my own playing career.
The Tigers not only built a 21-0 first-half lead, but they thought
they had stopped the Eagles 3 yards short of a first down, sitting
on a 28-24 lead with 1:36 left.
Regardless of how it happened, Brian Awkard got separation from Carlos Martinez before catching this game-winning touchdown pass. ODAC photo by Stacy Weston |
Then a penalty flag came out.
Much like what happened to Miami (Fla.) against Ohio State in last
season’s Division I national championship, a few seconds of
Tiger elation later ended in a devastating loss.
“The feeling of fourth down, fourth-and-10, stopping them,
feeling we’ve got the ODAC championship pretty much in our
hands, then to see a flag,” said Singh, “…
that’s five seconds I’ll always remember. It’s
gut-wrenching. It just hurts.”
Singh, who caught 11 passes for 121 yards, made it clear he
didn’t think the defense lost the game for them. And while
some H-SC supporters undoubtedly thought the officials helped them
lose it, excuses don’t ease the pain.
“There has to be a very good reason why that just
happened,” said sophomore quarterback Ricca, who threw for
202 yards, 143 in the first half. “Maybe we’ll go 9-1
and make the playoffs. Maybe we needed that … it’s
tough.”
“We’ve got a fairly spiritual team and coaching
staff,” said fourth-year Hampden-Sydney coach Marty Favret.
“I told the guys after the game, [with] God, sometimes
it’s just not in the cards. But he’s our guy,
we’ve got to stick with him.”
As a player, some close losses will have you questioning
everything you believe in, and everything you’ve worked for.
That’s how some of Hampden-Sydney’s players reacted on
Saturday, and I can remember staring at a scoreboard or two in
disbelief thinking ‘how did we lose that game?’ during
my own career.
I played from 1994-97 at Randolph-Macon, and there are some great
memories, from both on and off the field, that I’d never
trade for anything. Though I’m over wanting to play football
and satisfied with what was accomplished, I still remember the
toughest losses vividly. Allow me to recite from memory:
Like it was between Bridgewater and H-SC on Saturday, the ODAC
title was pretty much on the line whenever we played Emory &
Henry in the mid-1990s. Though it was always the sixth of 10
scheduled games, it might as well have been the grand finale in our
minds.
In my sophomore year, Emory & Henry booted a field goal to
beat us 17-14 as time ran out. The next year we took a 20-0 lead in
the first quarter down at their place. Then the Wasps completed a
deep pass to set up first-and-goal, but we made a goal-line stand.
Our head coach at the time, Joe Riccio, got so fired up that he was
out at the numbers high-fiving defensive players as we came off the
field.
Riccio got so fired up, however, that his heart rate ran above 200
and the team doctor recommended he go to the hospital. Riccio was a
coach who would call out “28 sweep” from the sidelines
as he saw the E&H formations, and sure enough they’d run
a sweep right into our defense.
Without our defensive mastermind, we played base the whole second
half. E&H didn’t roll over. They jumped right back into
the game, drawing to 20-17 late. Though our offense had gone stale,
we were gold as long as we didn’t give up any more
points.
Playing cornerback in a Cover 2, I failed to jam a wide receiver
on a vertical pattern. He ran a fly, which went for about 60 yards
because the strong safety didn’t have time to get over. That
was the big play on what turned out to be Emory & Henry’s
game-winning drive. They scored with less than 90 seconds left to
win 24-20, completing a phenomenal comeback.
That was the longest bus ride home. Six hours it took, but if you
couldn’t fall asleep, it must have felt like forever. I
probably blamed myself for days, since a half-decent tap on the
shoulder pads would have slowed the receiver down enough for our
rover, Joe Seetoo, to make a play.
We were so bummed over losing that game and an ODAC championship
we felt should have been ours, that we played horribly next week
and squeaked out a win at Davidson.
The next year, however, we hosted Emory & Henry in the rain
and trailed them at the half. The game was tied at 20 late, and
they had the ball when a receiver streaked down the field. I was
playing free safety by then, and Seetoo was a corner, but neither
of us covered the guy very well. The pass overshot him by about 5
yards, and Seetoo and I exchanged a knowing glance, figuring we
almost blew it again.
Not long after, defensive tackle Chuck Davis sacked the
quarterback and caused a fumble, which we recovered. We took over
with 59 seconds left and scored on a Sidney Chappell-to-Sean Eaton
TD pass with 13 seconds left. Down 27-20, Emory & Henry threw a
Hail Mary, which I intercepted.
As I slid to the ground with the clock nearing 0:00, half the team
was already at midfield. I ended up on the bottom of a 50-person
pile, which sucks unless you just won a championship. We actually
had three conference games left after that, but we knew we won the
title. And we did.
I may have never played in a Stagg Bowl, but that is one of my
most cherished memories and plenty good enough for me. I can
remember sitting on R-MC’s brick wall saying “You gotta
believe” with teammates during the final drive. I remember
posing for pictures in front of the scoreboard, which still read
27-20 long after the game.
In the Bristol paper the next day, an E&H linebacker said
something about how we didn’t do anything special, how they
blew it and we shouldn’t have won. It didn’t matter
much to me though, as I knew he made those comments before an
agonizing six-hour bus ride of his own.
How fitting it turned out to be. That day was made so much sweeter
knowing that we’d been burned the two previous years against
Emory & Henry. Maybe those losses had made us focus harder,
desire it more and ultimately win the game.
Whatever it was, J.D. Ricca took me back to that moment when he
said “There has to be a very good reason why that just
happened.”
I’m sure there was. The strangest part is, despite the
similarities between two teams trying to get over the hump in the
ODAC, there’s no guarantee the H-SC story will end up like
ours. And for Singh, a senior, the meaning he’ll take from
the loss may not match how Ricca, a sophomore, digests it. Maybe
Ricca will win an ODAC title some year and look back to
Saturday’s game-that-should-have-been as his inspiration.
Players will come to terms with the loss in different ways, and
hold on to that day’s events for a long time.
What I really enjoy is knowing that players for both Bridgewater
and Hampden-Sydney will remember this game long after they forget
Saturday’s statistics and such. The Tigers will remember
other details, like how they recorded their own warm-up song using
a familiar hip-hop instrumental. Maybe someone there will remember
the national anthem singer not making it to the press box on time,
leaving the crowd of 5,104 scattered across the bowl of grass at
“Death Valley” to sing an impromptu anthem.
I’m sure players from John Carroll to Pacific Lutheran to
Amherst back to Wittenberg can relate. So can former players now in
their 30s, 40s, 50s and beyond. We all have great stories and vivid
memories.
Me? I can recount scores of moments in mid-90s R-MC lore. I
remember running 100 100-yard sprints, one up-and-back for each
point the defense gave up in a 50-50 tie against Catholic. Some
weren’t even runs, we did duck walks and bear crawls and
wheelbarrows. And we never gave up anything close to 50 again.
I can even identify with H-SC’s probable anger with the
officials. In the old “Double Robbery” game at Franklin
& Marshall in 1995, our kicker booted what would have been a
47-yard, last-minute, game-winning field goal — over the
uprights! It looked good from where I stood, and I think I remember
celebration on our sideline. The story goes that one official even
began to raise his arms as if to signal good, before looking over
and then concurring with the other official. We lost 28-27.
One of our senior captains threw his helmet after the kick, which
was totally out of character but still cost us 15 yards. Not only
had the visiting locker room been broken into at halftime, leaving
our bags emptied and non-valuables strewn all over the locker room
floor, but we felt we’d been robbed on the field too. It took
me a long time to acknowledge that we went 6-3-1 that year. I told
a lot of people we were 7-2-1.
More from
Eagles-Tigers
There are hundreds of great games across Division III each year,
many punctuated by wild finishes. But I have never seen such a
crazy finish followed by such an honest press conference. Which, at
Hampden-Sydney, is done in what looks like it was once a classroom
in a very old brick building. No microphones or cameras. The number
of writers is equal to the number of players being interviewed.
Anyway.
A quick review. The Tigers dominated the first half, using a
blocked punt recovery to surge to a 21-3 lead. Bridgewater, which
in its comeback recovered a kick that wasn’t fielded near the
Tiger 20, went up 24-21. Hampden-Sydney then straightened up and
went the length of the field for a 28-24 lead, which is how the
fourth quarter began and nearly ended.
The Tigers used their second of three timeouts trying to get the
Eagles to jump offside, then punted with 2:28 left. Midway through
the drive, there was the fourth-and-10 roughing the passer call.
Later, there was a non-call on an offensive pushoff during the
game-winning touchdown. Then there was another non-call on a
possible pass interference as H-SC tried to get about half of the
65 yards it needed while trailing in the final 34 seconds.
To be fair, officials are only human and miss calls all the time.
Sometimes they appear to miss calls to the untrained eye, but are
actually applying the game’s rules as written. Also to be
fair, the Eagles had been penalized 10 times for 91 yards before
the roughing call, compared with just five for 34 for
Hampden-Sydney.
And as any coach worth his weight in clichés will tell you,
one play doesn’t lose a football game. Nor does a call.
“You want to talk about questionable calls,” asked
Bridgewater linebacker Gary Nelson. “There were questionable
calls all day. You can’t just say that last call was
questionable. I just always want the players to do it. I
don’t want the referees to decide who wins and who
loses.”
That’s honest moment No. 1.
No. 2: “I’m just glad we won,” Nelson added.
No. 3: “In the course of a game, there are touch calls
either way,” said Bridgewater coach Mike Clark. “Over
time, I’d like to think they even out.”
It should be noted that after the roughing the passer call,
Bridgewater drew a grounding penalty that set them up with
first-and-25. Brandon Wakefield, the Eagle quarterback who had an
up and down game, completed a 23-yard pass to Nicholas Lehto. He
completed three more passes consecutively, the last to Brian Awkard
for the 22-yard game-winner.
On that play, Awkard admitted it was a push off. Hey, that’s
a reality between defensive backs and wide receivers. It rarely
gets called on offensive players. Defenders have to live with it
and/or fight through it.
But thanks, Brian, for honest moment No. 4.
“I had to get a little separation,” Awkard said.
“He was holding me a little bit, so I just gave him a little
nudge off me, and caught the ball.”
On the roughing call, so important because H-SC thought it won the
game and the ODAC more or less until they saw the flag, no one
could really say it was roughing.
“I don’t really know,” said Wakefield, who was
7-for-11 in leading the Eagles 80 yards in 1:54 to win it. “I
got hit, and soon afterwards I got up to shake hands with him. I
got up, told him good hit, and I saw the flag. I guess the ref
thought it was a late hit.”
Thanks for honest moment No. 5.
“I was like ‘thank you,’ Wakefield said.
“I guess it was a little bit late, but did I say ‘great
call?’ No.”
That’s No. 6.
And Clark hit on No. 7 when he said: “That’s a tough
game for anybody to lose, but I’ll never apologize for
winning.”
“I have a lot of respect for Hampden-Sydney,” Clark
said. “When we made our move three or four years ago, they
said ‘we’re going to chase you.’ There’s no
question they’ve caught up. I’m proud to play in a
conference where there are two playoff-caliber teams. I told Marty
after that game that I want to see them in the playoffs. I want to
play them again.”
The Eagles needed the win after losing to Christopher Newport, who
Clark and many others believe is a “Rowan in
training.”
Said Lehto: “Since we dropped that game to Christopher
Newport, this was kind of desperation for us … At halftime,
especially the seniors, we had that sense of urgency, because this
could be our last shot.”
Way to go Nick, for No. 8.
On the officiating, for No. 9, Favret said: “I know the
officials do the best they can. It’s just hard to look at [my
players] and tell ‘em life’s not always fair. I know
it’s a long game, 60 minutes. I’m sure there were calls
we got. I’ve been around a lot of football.”
And finally, No. 10 and the fantastic finish itself.
Favret alluded to Bridgewater’s win over Rowan in the 2001
semifinals, and likely other Eagle comebacks such as their rally
from a 28-3 halftime deficit for a 59-42 win over Washington &
Jefferson in the 2000 playoffs.
“Mike Clark’s had some wins like that, a few miracles.
He got another one today.”
Two’s
news
A few weeks back, ATN decided it was boring to see the breakdown
of No. 1 votes in the D3football.com Top 25. There’s going to
be a 25 next to Mount Union for a long time, it seems. But
who’s coming in at No. 2? Now that’s interesting.
It’s a question we’ve been asking since the
preseason.
Here’s the breakdown of teams who received No. 2 votes in
this week’s poll and how many: St. John’s 17, UW-La
Crosse 4, Baldwin-Wallace 1, Brockport State 1,
Linfield 1, Wheaton 1.
Poll
positions
Of course there’s only one authority on the matter (Sorry, I
couldn’t resist), but it’s fun to compare the polls in
Division III. Since polls and rankings by nature are inexact
sciences, there’s no harm in acknowledging us, the
coaches’ poll and the Football Gazette Top 40. Here
are a few interesting tidbits about this week’s polls:
With so many Top 25 losers this week, these polls had to get
jumbled. In fact, only Mount Union (1) and St. John’s (2)
hold the same spot in all three. Only Linfield (3), Bethel (21) and
Capital (24) held the same spot in two of them. Most were in about
the same place throughout, but the three polls could be confusing
to be a UW-Stout fan. Are the Blue Devils 25th, 31st or not good
enough to receive a single vote? What about RPI, which is either
15th, 36th or 38th (counting “also receiving votes” as
a spot in the rankings)?
Springfield is as high as 10th and as low as 29th.
Interesting.
There are 225 Division III teams eligible for our poll, compared
to 117 eligible for the AP’s Division I poll. That means only
11% of Division III teams make the Top 25, and 17 percent make the
Top 40. In Division I, 21% of the teams — one in five instead
of one in 10 — are ranked. A Division III Top 40 ranks a
better percentage of teams than a Top 25, but 47 teams received
votes in the coaches poll and 52 in the D3football.com poll, for
what that’s worth.
Pool C
glance
This is by no means as official as the Pool B power rankings that
we’ll see on the site as we approach the playoffs, but
barring upsets, here are a few teams from automatic qualifier
conferences that could find themselves hoping for one of three Pool
C (runner-up) bids in late November.
Baldwin-Wallace/Capital: The OAC runner-up is
usually a lock. It will be especially if it is Mount Union.
Bethel: Finishing second to St. John’s will
look awful good to the committee. And there’s no guarantee
they won’t beat the Johnnies on Nov. 8. The 5-0 Royals have
great out-of-conference wins over Whitworth and UW-Eau Claire.
Wittenberg/Wooster/Wabash: The NCAC sent two last
season, and with three strong teams, it could happen again. One of
these teams will have at least two losses, and another will have at
least one, so there could be a clear pecking order.
Mary Hardin-Baylor: If they win out but lose to
Hardin-Simmons, the Crusaders are a good bet for a berth. The
Cowboys and Howard Payne don’t look good with early-season
out-of-conference losses. East Texas Baptist may factor in as
well.
Hampden-Sydney: Probably about fifth on the list,
depending on what happens in Iowa and in the Freedom. The close
loss to Bridgewater says something, since the Eagles could finish
9-1 with a loss to a playoff probable in Christopher Newport.
Loras/Simpson/Wartburg: Eight IIAC opponents and
former conference member Upper Iowa on each schedule left just one
out-of-conference opening. All three won, Simpson over Washington
U., Wartburg over NAIA Peru State and Loras over Monmouth.
It’d be hard to ignore the Knights if Loras or Simpson wins.
Situation is same as NCAC as none of three contenders have played
one another.
Western Connecticut/Springfield/Kings Point: The
Freedom could end in a three-way tie. Lots left to sort out, but
Springfield’s non-conference wins over Montclair State and
Ithaca are good news. Western Connecticut’s loss to Rowan is
what it is.
Lycoming/Delaware Valley loser: MAC runner-up
will have a shot, but we’re getting ahead of ourselves here.
The conference race looks like it could be a scrum to the finish,
as seven of the 11 are .500 or better. Lyco’s nine-game
schedule never helps.
WIAC runner-up: Always a possibility. La Crosse
had the best non-conference results, though Oshkosh is also
unbeaten, but against a weaker group. Whitewater’s only loss
is to Mount Union, and Stout’s loss to Division II Augustana
(S.D.) doesn’t hurt them as much as beating Hardin-Simmons
helps them.
Johns Hopkins: McDaniel and Muhlenberg need the
Centennial’s AQ, and Johns Hopkins probably does too. The
Blue Jays non-conference schedule isn’t overwhelming, but
they outscored four opponents 108-16.
Everyone else: Some teams probably got left out,
but we’re only halfway through and there’s lots to sort
out still. We’ll keep an eye on things. Remember, the NJAC
and Northwest are among the Pool B conferences that may have two
contenders within.
Stat of the
Week
Averett’s Gentry Parker blocked three punts and intercepted
a two-point conversion pass, yet the Cougars lost 27-9. Tell
that to your special teams coach!
National game of the
Week
No. 14 Springfield at Western Connecticut: This
Freedom clash could have an effect on the final FFC championship
race, plus the polls and Pool C pursuit.
Honorable mentions: No. 8 UW-Stevens Point at No.
25 UW-Stout in what’s pretty much a WIAC title elimination
game. Wabash at Wittenberg was the game of the year last season, a
46-43 Little Giants win in OT. The Tigers are ranked 10th coming
in. Also, Loras at No. 6 Wartburg in the IIAC, No. 8
Baldwin-Wallace at Ohio Northern in the OAC, Howard Payne at No. 21
Hardin-Simmons in the ASC, No. 12 Brockport State at St. John
Fisher, Union at RPI, Redlands at Occidental, Westfield State at
Mass. Maritime. Keep an eye on Lycoming against FDU-Florham, which
upset the Warriors in a shocker last season.
Hindsight game of the
Week
I think I’ve made it abundantly clear how crazy the
Bridgewater-Hampden-Sydney game was. I’m sure there were
great ones all over the country, but I don’t know if any
would have topped this one.
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feedback
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