WASHINGTON, Pa. -- The No. 16/18 Washington & Jefferson football team earned a 34-24 win over Case Western Reserve on Homecoming 2014 at Cameron Stadium.
With the win, the Presidents, ranked 16th in the American Football Coaches Association poll and 18th in the D3football.com poll, remain undefeated during the 2014 campaign at 7-0 and 5-0 in the Presidents' Athletic Conference. The Spartans, in their first year as an affiliate member of the PAC, move to 3-4 both in the conference and overall.
The match-up was the first time the two teams met since 1985, a 20-13 win for W&J.
After Case Western Reserve won the coin toss and deferred to the second half, the Presidents went on a 20-play, 59-yard drive that took more than six minutes off the clock and ended with a blocked 30-yard field-goal attempt by Blake Davis.
CWRU's first possession ended with a fumble forced by Jared Pratt and recovered by Anthony Tutino at the Case 40 yard line.
Both teams went three-and-out and Ryan Ruffing capped the six-play, 50-yard drive with a four-yard TD run. The big plays of the drive were 18-yard and 23-yard receptions by Jesse Zubik and Max Creighan, respectively. Davis' PAT was blocked and returned 100 yards by CWRU's Aaron Weisberg for two points and a 6-2 W&J lead with just over a minute to play in the first quarter.
The W&J defense forced another three-and-out, but on the first play from scrimmage Pete Coughlin was intercepted which led to a 17-play, 59-yard touchdown drive that gave the guests a 9-7 lead mid-way through the second quarter.
W&J turned the ball over on downs with 27 seconds left at the Case 10 yard line and the Spartans took a knee to end the half with a 9-7 advantage.
The third play of the third quarter was intercepted by Billy Kelley (after a deflection by Bryce Merrill) and taken 34 yards to the end zone, the second-straight game W&J took an interception in for a touchdown. Davis added the extra point and W&J held a 13-9 lead early in the second half.
Three straight-punts occurred before W&J went on a 10-play, 58-yard scoring drive that was capped by a 20 yard touchdown pass from Coughlin to Ruffing, 20-9.
Once again, the W&J defense forced a three-and-out, which led to a second-down 52 yard catch-and-run by Creighan that set up a four-yard scoring rush from Ruffing, pushing the lead to 27-9 with just over 4:30 left in the third quarter.
At the start of the fourth, Case got a 32 yard completion to Zech Medved which was followed by a 39 yard rush right up the middle by Adam Hochman to cut the deficit to 27-16 with 14:18 to play.
Later in the quarter, W&J forced a turnover on downs thanks to a fourth-down tackle for loss by Tutino that led to a two-yard TD run by Ruffing, his 19th rushing score of the year and 22nd overall.
Case added a touchdown and two-point conversion with just over one minute left against the Presidents' second-team defense, but the ensuing onside kick went out of bounds and W&J posted the 34-24 win.
It was the fourth time in seven games that W&J reached 90 plays, as it entered running the second-most plays per game in Division III (90.7).
Overall, the Presidents rolled up 466 yards of total offense behind 329 passing and 137 rushing. Coughlin tossed for 300-plus yards for the fourth time this season, completing 32-of-47 attempts with an interception and touchdown. Zubik caught 11 passes for 130 yards, while Daniel Lis made six grabs for 51 yards and Creighan had four receptions for 76 yards.
Ruffing went over 100 yards on the ground for the seventh time this season, netting 111 yards on 30 carries. It puts the nation's fourth-leading rusher over 1,000 yards for the season.
The W&J defense held its opponent to under 300 yards of total offense for the third-straight week, surrendering 266 yards to the Spartans, 169 rushing and 97 passing.
Pratt, the PAC's leading tackler, finished two stops shy of the W&J school record with 16 tackles in the game. The record of 18 has been done twice, once by Frank Pilato (vs. Allegheny, 2003) and BJ Swartzlander (at Ursinus, 2001). Jon Turner made 10 tackles, including 1.5 sacks. Ryan Torrance collected eight stops and Merrill finished with seven tackles including 2.0 for loss. Kelley had four stops and 1.5 TFL to go along with his pick-six. In total, W&J had eight tackles for loss on the day.
W&J will host the 2014 regular season home finale on Saturday, Nov. 1 at 1:30 p.m. Before the game, the Presidents will honor the 10 senior members of the football team and four senior cheerleaders.
No. 16/18 W&J earns 34-24 Homecoming victory over Case Western Reserve
/seasons/2014/boxscores/20141025_wi17.xml
2014
Case Western Reserve
24
Washington and Jefferson
34
| Final | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | T |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Case Western Reserve (3-4) | 2 | 7 | 0 | 15 | 24 |
| No. 19 Washington and Jefferson (7-0) | 6 | 0 | 21 | 7 | 34 |
Oct 25, 2014