For NESCAC watchers, this weekend lived up to its promise and then some. Amherst at Wesleyan featured two of the top-three teams trading punches the entire game until Phillip Nwosu ’15 decided it. Then up in Maine, Trinity was without Chudi Iregbulem ’15 and needed a fourth quarter comeback to knock off a resilient Bowdoin team. Middlebury got to above .500 for the first time this year. Finally, Colby got into the winning column in a huge way. There is a lot to cover, so let’s get to the stock report.
Stock Up
Kicker Phillip Nwosu ’15 (Amherst): Back in the preseason when we made Nwosu our team MVP for the Jeffs, many probably found it unusual to see a kicker get so much love. Then the senior went 1-4 on field goals entering the game Saturday with the three misses all coming from 33 yards or fewer. He was still forcing plenty of touchbacks, but something was off. Well Nwosu could not have picked a better time to get his form right than Saturday. He finished 4-4 on field goals and 3-3 on extra points to account for 15 of Amherst’s 33 points. His most important kick was also his best: a 41-yarder in unsure footing with under a minute left to force the game into overtime. The win for Amherst was of course a complete team effort with big games from Gene Garay ’15 and Chris Tamasi ’15 in particular, but at the end of the game after Nwosu had hit the game winner, it was the kicker who was hoisted onto the soldiers of his teammates in celebration.
Colby Leadership: We have made note several times of the brutal schedule that Colby had to face to begin the year, and Saturday saw the Mules take all their frustration out on the Continentals. The Mules came out on a mission from the first snap of the game. The Continentals were the poor team that had all that aggression taken out on them, and they are a better team than they showed on Saturday. Still, this game was over even before halftime with Colby up 40-0. Hats off to the Colby seniors for keeping the team together and working hard in the lead up to this game. Jason Buco ’15 was the star for the defense with two interceptions, and Luke Duncklee ’15 had his best game of the season recording three total touchdowns. Gabe Harrington ’17 looked comfortable in the pocket spreading out his throws to a wealth of receivers. The Mules go to Bates on Saturday in the opener of the CBB (Colby-Bowdoin-Bates). After Saturday, Colby sees no reason why they can’t close the season on a torrid streak.
Bowdoin Linebackers: The trio of Brendan Lawler ’16, Branden Morin ’16, and Bjorn Halvorsen ’17 combined for 34 tackles with 5.5 tackles for loss. Lawler recovered a fumble while Morin accounted for Bowdoin’s only touchdown with a 45-yard interception return for a touchdown. We mentioned on Friday how Bowdoin had the worst rush defense in terms of yards per rush allowed, but on Saturday Trinity gained only 2.8 yards per rush without Iregbulem. The play of the Bowdoin linebackers and the front seven in general forced the Bantams to turn to the air in order to claw their way back for the 17-10 victory. After a slow start to the season, all three linebackers have started to make plays all over the field for the Bowdoin defense.
Stock Down
Bates’ Triple Option: At this point the Bates offense has essentially come to a grinding halt. The Bobcats are averaging a league worst 13.0 points per game. They are also averaging only 231.2 yards per game, the worst mark by any NESCAC team since Tufts averaged 219.5 yards in 2011. Bates usually tries to run the ball all over teams with the triple option, but the running game has had no consistency. Their 2.2 yards per rush average is by far the worst in the NESCAC, with Middlebury the next worse at 2.6. Quarterback Matt Cannone ’15 is the most talented player on the offensive side and he was the player most capable of breathing life into the offense when the running game struggled. However, injuries have slowed him in recent weeks and he has been far from 100 percent. Without him healthy, a once promising season is near the precipice.
Running Back Kyle Gibson ’15 (Wesleyan): After the injury to LaDarius Drew ’15, this was supposed to be the year when Gibson shined as the lead back in Wesleyan’s run heavy attack, but for whatever reason it just has not materialized. Gibson averaged 6.5 yards per carry last year but only 3.4 yards this year. It is entirely possible that Gibson has been struggling with injuries or something else is up because he averaged only 27.5 yards in his past two games. Wesleyan’s running issues do not end with Gibson though. After leading the NESCAC in yards per rush last year with 4.7, the Cardinals are seventh in the NESCAC at 2.9 yards per rush. The Cardinals are so lost for how to get it moving that Donnie Cimino ’15 and Jake Bussani ’14 each got carries on Saturday in an attempt to inject some life into the offense. Jesse Warren ’15 has raised his play almost enough to offset those issues, but a passing offense is not what Wesleyan wants its identity to be.
Week 1 Results: It has now been a month and a day since the first results of the season came back, and at this point it is very important to remember what has changed. Williams was the team of the week with their 36-0 beatdown of Bowdoin. They were riding high until Trinity came in and returned the favor with a 38-0 win. Williams has now lost four games in a row and it looks like they are in disarray. The Polar Bears turned their season around and came close to pulling the upset of the season on Saturday.
Look, Week 1 did tell us a lot. It told us Wesleyan would not be the juggernaut we thought they could be without Drew running the ball, that the Amherst defense was going to be really good, and that something really cool was going on in Medford. Yet you can’t trust everything that happens in the first week of the season. Teams in the NESCAC are closer talent-wise than they might appear from week to week. One injury or a weird bounce can put an “elite” team into a dogfight like Trinity found themselves in this weekend. Teams mature and change over the course of the season so that at times it seems that what we saw in the first week was a mirage.