Christian Santos – now a defensive back after beginning the year as a wide receiver – intercepted an Oberlin College pass at Wooster's 15-yard line with just over 2:30 remaining, and The College of Wooster football team's defense shut down one final Yeomen drive as the Fighting Scots rallied back to win 34-30 on Saturday afternoon at the Knowlton Complex in Oberlin, Ohio.
Wooster (2-4, 2-3 North Coast Athletic Conference) trailed 30-27 after an Oberlin (0-7, 0-6 NCAC) 26-yard field goal with 12:42 remaining in the game. Two drives later a 10-yard touchdown run by Brandon Adams capped a 7-play, 81-yard drive and put Wooster in front 34-30 for good.
Two big pass plays from Gary Muntean set up the go-ahead score. First, Connor Allan made a game-changing 27-yard reception positioning the Scots near midfield after being backed up inside their 20-yard line. On the very next play, Nick Cummings continued his series of big-time contributions, this time with a 37-yard reception to move the chains to the Oberlin 21-yard line. Three plays later, Adams plunged up the middle for his second touchdown of the day.
From there, Wooster's defense took over as the Scots forced a three-and-out on the Yeomen's next possession with Marcus Bowersknifing into the backfield for a 2-yard loss on a third-and-2 play.
On their next possession, the Yeomen were in prime position after a 15-yard pass interference penalty moved the ball to Wooster's 39-yard line, but Santos recaptured the momentum for the Scots, and stepped in front of a Zach Taylor pass to thwart a potential scoring threat.
Then, with one last chance to strike, Aaron Roberson knocked down Taylor on a second-down play on the next possession, and D'Andre Brown dragged Taylor down short of the first-down marker two plays later.
Earlier in the game, Wooster wasted no time getting going offensively with Antonio Bailey taking a handoff for 33 yards on the game's first offensive play, marking Wooster's longest run of the season. Later in that sequence, Bailey capped the 10-play, 67-yard drive with a 1-yard touchdown plunge on a fourth-and-goal play.
Oberlin chipped into Wooster's lead with a 21-yard boot by Michael Leshchyshyn that made it a 7-3 contest with 5:03 left in the first quarter.
Moments into the second quarter, an 18-yard Muntean-to-Adams connection set Wooster up at Oberlin's 2-yard line, and the running back took control from there on the very next play, finding the end zone, and making it a 14-3 contest with 13:16 left in the first half.
Wooster extended its lead to 20-3 on the next drive when a 17-yard Muntean-to-Cummings connection capped an 8-play, 74-yard drive. Earlier in the drive, Muntean scrambled for 16 yards on a third-and-12 play, and later, added 17 more yards on the ground.
Muntean continued to make plays with his feet on the next possession, as he answered an Oberlin field goal with a 6-yard run with 1:16 left in the half to make it a 27-6 game.
Oberlin didn't go quietly, scoring touchdowns on its next three possessions, with a 6-yard scoring strike from Taylor to Alec Bean knotting the score at 27 with 4:54 left in the third. In fact, Leshchyshyn's 26-yard field goal with 12:42 left in the fourth that made it a 3-point Oberlin lead, capped a 24-0 run for Oberlin.
Wooster had a big break late in the third quarter when Oberlin fumbled at the goal line with Riley Markko coming away with the recovery to prevent the score.
Muntean paced the offense on the afternoon with 323 yards of total offense. In the passing game, the junior completed 24-of-37 passes for 273 yards and a score with six of the completions, 85 of the yards, and the score going to Cummings.
As a team, Wooster rushed for a season-best 170 yards with Adams seeing the bulk of the fairly even distribution at running back. He finished with 14 totes for 65 yards and two touchdowns.
Defensively, Bowers led the way with a career-high 17 tackles, marking the most tackles by a Scot since Mitchell Czerniak logged 18 versus Wittenberg University in 2014. Other defensive standouts included Kevin Komara (2.0 sacks) and Patrick Johnson (interception).
Taylor accounted for over 400 yards of total offense for Oberlin, and he completed 27-of-44 throws for 375 yards and three scores. Justin Cruz was a key player in the passing game with nine receptions for 132 yards.
Defensively, Von Wooding led the way with 12 tackles, and the Yeomen recorded four sacks on the afternoon.
Wooster remains on the road next week with a 1:30 p.m. clash with No. 19 Wabash College (5-1, 4-1 NCAC) at Crawfordsville, Ind.