University of Connecticut Athletics
Football Improves to 8-3 With Thrilling Win Over Rutgers
11/8/2003 12:00:00 AM | Football
EAST HARTFORD, CT (November 8, 2003) – Freshman running back Cornell Brockington (Burlington, NJ) scored on a one-yard run with 26 seconds remaining after a misplayed punt return by Rutgers as Connecticut came from behind to defeat the Scarlet Knights, 38-31, in the final home game of the season at a sold out Rentschler Field.
The Huskies, winners of four straight, improve to 8-3 on the season. Rutgers slips to 4-5 on the campaign.
The game was tied at 24, when junior quarterback Dan Orlovsky (Shelton, CT) hit junior wide receiver Keron Henry (Brooklyn, NY) with a 72-yard catch and run scoring play with 4:25 remaining in the contest to put the Huskies ahead 31-24. Rutgers marched down the field, scoring on a 35-yard run by running back Brian Leonard (a season-high 184 yards on 33 carries with two touchdowns). The game was tied at 31, with 1:52 to play and it appeared destined to head towards overtime. After Rutgers held the Huskies without a first down and were forced to punt, the UConn special teams came up with the play of the day. Senior Adam Coles (Gladesville, Australia) punted the ball deep into Rutgers territory and the Scarlet Knights’ Tres Moses mishandled the kick and UConn’s senior Michael McIntosh (Edgewood, MD) pounced on the loose ball setting the stage for Brockington’s heroics. Brockington has now scored seven touchdowns in the last two weeks, six rushing.
The Huskies fell behind on the opening possession of the game, 3-0, but took their first lead of the game when starting tailback junior Chris Bellamy (New Britain, CT) bulled over from the 3. Rutgers held the UConn offense in check the rest of the half, limiting the Huskies to just 101 yards of total offense in the first half. The Scarlet Knights Markis Facyson scored twice in the first half; once on a return of a blocked punt and once on a 26-yard pass from Ryan Hart.
UConn bolted from the locker room after trailing 17-7 at intermission. Brockington (16 carries for 64 yards, 2 TD’s) rushed three times for the final 33 yards to cap a 68-yard scoring drive to start the second half. After junior linebacker Alfred Fincher (Norwood, MA) recovered a fumble caused by freshman cornerback Allan Barnes (Starke, FL), Orlovsky put the Huskies ahead by connecting with sophomore tight end Tim Lassen (Cheshire, CT) on a four-yard scoring strike. The scoring pass marked the 23rd consecutive game he threw a touchdown, and his 31 TD’s on the season increases his school record. He finished the game with 17 completions in 32 attempts, for 222 yards.
After Leonard’s second touchdown of the game put Rutgers ahead, 24-21, UConn attempted to take the lead. Junior cornerback Justin Perkins (Ft. Lauderdale, FL) intercepted his second pass of the game, and returned it 50 yards setting up a game-tying field goal by freshman place kicker Matt Nuzie (Trumbull, CT).
The Huskies will conclude the regular-season portion of their schedule next Saturday, November 15, when they travel to Winston-Salem, NC to play Wake Forest. Kickoff is slated for 3:30 p.m. and WFSB-TV 3 will televise the game locally.
POSTGAME QUOTES
UConn Head Coach Randy Edsall
To steal a line from Bill Parcells: “It’s not how, it’s how many.” There are 8 in the bank right now. Not that this was our greatest effort or greatest performance of the season, but we did enough to win the football game and that’s really what it’s all about. It’s finally good to be on the side where special teams helped us rather than hurt us and cost us the game.
I don’t know what it is. These kids just have a lot of resolve and a lot of heart and they just play until the whistle blows. I’m just so extremely happy for the seniors and this football team for hanging in there and coming out on top. We knew it was a good football team we were going against. And to get number 8 and to be 5 and 1 here at Rentschler Field in our inaugural season here, I just can’t say enough good things about today and where we’re at this point in time.
On Keron Henry's TD
They had 2 weeks to prepare for us and they did some things against us, but we ended up making enough plays. We just decided that when we got in the third and twenty situation – we were in a couple of long yardage situations on third down today – I just told Norries, “Let’s just take a shot and see if we can get an interference call, or if it’s not incomplete, to make a play.” Keron made a play and Dan made a play. That was big.
On beginning of 2nd half
I thought it was big coming out at halftime and getting back up on top and getting those points right away. I thought that was huge.
On muffed Moses’ punt return
I’m thinking that we’re going to go to the Mohegan Sun tonight and play some blackjack….He just made a decision and it didn’t work out for him.
Dan Orlovsky
On the72 yard touchdown pass to Keron Henry
He ran a good route. He got off the jammed corner. I threw it up over the corner, but not too high to get hit by the safety. He (Keron) went up and made a great play. He’s 6-3, 220 pounds and when he breaks a tackle he’s able to outrun everyone.
On the punt at the end of the game
I was just hoping to pin them. I understand what the kid was trying to do – he’s just trying to make a play for his team, not pin his team back in. Finally we got a bounce on special teams our way, and it was nice to get.
On the Rutgers defense and being down early
They got good pressure on us up front, and they were covering the pass well…I wasn’t down. We’ve been here before. And it wasn’t our best day. I didn’t have my best half, personally. We didn’t have our best half as a team. I think we had only 101 yards offensively. But if it was just 30 minutes of football, they wouldn’t have halftime.
On being 8-3
It’s not mind boggling, but it’s nice. I’m not going to sit here and say I expected it. But I’m not going to say I’m awed by it. I knew we had talent on this team and I knew the kind of kids we have, so I thought 8, 9, 10, 11, or 12 was realistic.
Confidence going into the 2nd half
I wasn’t really down at all. They had their bye week and they prepared for us well. They didn’t do won thing we expected in the first half. They changed up their whole defense really.
There’s a thing with our offense. We get into a groove and we find plays that work for us. So your whole team gets into it and the crowd gets into it. Those two drives (to start the half) were big for us.
Mike McIntosh
On recovering the punt
It was a great feeling to set up the team for a victory. But the best thing is that we got the victory. That’s what we always shoot for…I just played my role and the ball just fell into my hands.
What did you think when he touched it
I was shocked. Actually I thought they were just going to down it and try and drive down the field. But luckily our special teams were hustling to get down the field and make the play.
Was the recovery like Christmas?
Yes. It was a great gift to have. It’s my last game here. And for everything we went through just to get to this moment, it is just a great feeling to have this victory, to have our eighth win. My first year here we were 4-7 and now where 8-3.
On his punts deep into Rutgers territory
It’s great that it happened today.
Change the approach after the block
Not so much. On the last one I just tried to get it off basically as fast as I could because the coaches said to watch out for the block.
We did this for the seniors. For all 19 seniors, it was their last game here at Rentschler Field. We played our heart out just for them.
It came down to the wire and big plays were made on both sides of the ball. That punt was huge. Without that we’d be playing overtime right now, probably still playing. But big plays by Keron and big plays by Perkins – the whole defense really – opened up things to happen at the end.
On not getting discouraged when they’re down
We’ve just built up a confidence in each other that it’s going to happen if we need it to.
Rutgers Head Coach Greg Schiano
It was certainly a heck of a football game, that we came up on the wrong end of. A great college football game. All of the momentum swings and all of the great plays and excitement that you look for. We’ll be in many more of these down the road and we’ll win our share, I’m sure of that. Today wasn’t our day.
On muffed punt return
It’s easy to make that play the game, but we don’t know what would have happened in overtime. We don’t know if we would have driven the ball down field – Who knows? Tres Moses just tried to make something happen and, unfortunately, it backfired. Certainly you could see his thought process. We were all standing there seeing the same thing. But without Tres Moses we don’t do a lot of things we do. So it’s a tough learning experience for this football team. He knew what to do. He just tried to make something happen.
On time management at end of 4th quarter
We felt that we had an opportunity to block a field goal if we could make them kick a field goal. We saw things that we didn’t get to, but we saw it. That’s why we decided to use them (time outs) late there. Could we have managed them better? I don’t know – maybe we could have. I called a time out at the beginning to slow everything down, much like a basketball coach does when momentum is getting out of hand there. I wanted to get Tres Moses out of there and get him over to the side and get our defense settled down. It was a young football team that wasn’t knowing how to handle that situation.
If there is one thing that happened today is that we got beat by a football team that is just a little further ahead of us in development as a program. Notice I didn’t say “talent” and I didn’t say “facilities” or “players,” just a team that’s been together for 5 years now and understands, from top to bottom, how they’re going to play, how they’re going to live, how they’re going to do everything. We’ll be there. Hopefully, we can accelerate it and reach that point earlier than 5 years. That’s our goal.
This isn’t a question of one or two plays in a football game. It’s a series of plays that ended up not ending in our favor.
Fullback Brian Leonard
This is the biggest game of my life and the hardest loss of my life. I’ve never been in a game this close before in my life. It was an exciting game but I wish it came out the other way.
