Blue Hens Overwhelm Tigers in Shutout

NEWARK, DE—The past few years of Towson's traditional rivalry with Delaware have given them a glimpse of future football stardom. Just never on their side.

Rich Gannon won an MVP with the Oakland Raiders and Joe Flacco needs no introduction to Baltimore Ravens fans. Pat Devlin has a chance to be the third Delaware quarterback to make an impact in the NFL and on Saturday afternoon in Newark, he showed why he's one of the best quarterbacks in Football Championship Subdivision.

Devlin threw for 318 yards and with touchdown and ran for one, shutting out Towson (1-8, 0-6) 48-0 before 21,603 fans at Delaware Stadium.The Hens (8-1, 5-1)  held the Towson offense to 158 total yards offense and completely shut down a unit that was without their starting quarterback, Chris Hart. Hart for a violation of team rules.

"It's a team game, not just about the offense," said Ambrose. "We discussed that we would have to be better on special teams and on defense. Force turnovers and make plays when they were there to be made. There were two plays early in the game when we had a chance to take the ball away from them and didn't. In a game where you are trying to cover up a hole, when the plays are there to be made, you gotta make them. If not, it ends up being a long day."

Ambrose certainly had a long day at Delaware. The Tigers' defense was on the field for more than 20 minutes in the first half as the Towson offense never reached midfield and accumulated just two first downs. Despite the ineptitude of the offense, which was shut out in the first half, the Towson defense held Delaware to 17 points at the half.

Despite being dominated statistically, the Tigers were still in the game until late in the second quarter. UD freshman Andrew Pierce broke loose for a 24-yard touchdown run off right tackle, capping a 59-yard, seven play drive to give the Blue Hens a 14-0 lead with 2:27 left in the half.

When the Towson offense was forced to go three-and-out again, the Tigers' special teams decided to give the Blue Hens a gift. Punting from the Towson 28-yard line, freshman D.J. Soven was forced to pick up a bad snap over his head, into the end zone.

He retreated, picked up the ball in the end zone, avoided a Blue Hen tackler and punted the ball to the Towson 38-yard line. The Blue Hens cashed in on their great field position. With the help of a personal foul penalty on the Tigers, Delaware moved into field goal range. With 12 seconds left in the first half, Mike Perry kicked a 29-yard field goal to give the Blue Hens an insurmountable lead.

The second half was all Delaware as the Hens cruised with 31 more points, thanks to several long runs, including a 63-yard touchdown scamper by Leon Jackson. Delaware amassed 589 yards on a Towson defense that was on the field for 36:03 and was missing many tackles in the second half. Towson turned the ball over just once, but never threatened to score and didn't force a single turnover.

At quarterback, the Tigers started grad student Bart Blanchard, a transfer from The Citadel, but he rotated with sophomore Brian Potts throughout the game.

Blanchard finished 10-for-24 for 59 yards with a long of eight yards. Potts completed 3-of-8 passes for 19 yards. Sophomore Dominique Booker led the Tigers on the ground with 35 yards on 10 carries.Towson has been through a rough patch the last three weeks, losing six players to suspensions.

Two of the starters who were suspended for last week's game against Rhode Island-cornerback Corey Ford and safety Nick Oates-returned for the Delaware game.

"The kids are incredibly resilient," said Ambrose. "Part of that has to come with a degree of toughness. We hold them to a higher standard. We make life on them very hard. When you do that, adversity is not so painful for a group or a person."

Towson returns home this week when they face Maine next Saturday for the home finale at 2 p.m. at Unitas Stadium.

Editor's note: Thanks to the The Review for letting us use their shots from Saturday's game!