By Lisa Byers
October 5, 2008
October 04, 2008 11:36 pm
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EDINBORO — On Tuesday, Edinboro University senior running back Ulysee Davis suffered a loss far greater than any he had faced as a member of the Fighting Scots’ football team with the passing of his grandmother, Alice Hill.
Four days later, Davis, still overcome with emotion, chose to honor his grandmother with his best performance in over a year. That effort was not only part of the healing process for Davis, but a huge boost for the Fighting Scots, who shook off a rough start on their way to a 40-3 win over Gannon on Homecoming Weekend at Sox Harrison Stadium.
“This felt just great,” said Davis following the game. “With the passing of my grandmother on Tuesday, I just wanted to go out and do it for her and all my family in Georgia. My family … everyone is in down in Georgia. I just did it for them.”
Davis finished yesterday’s game with 95 yards rushing on 18 carries with two touchdowns. It was his biggest offensive output since Oct. 27 of last year when he ran for 95 yards on 24 carries.
Davis moved into seventh place all-time in Edinboro history with 22 rushing touchdowns and is now tied for ninth place overall in career rushing yards with 1,900.
None of Davis’ yards yesterday, though, were quite as important as the 57 he tallied in the second half with the Scots up by just 11 at 14-3 and in need of a huge boost offensively.
“At halftime, we felt that he had the hot hand,” Edinboro coach Scott Browning said of Davis. “We felt that he was running the ball a little harder than the other guy. It didn’t have so much to do with what Houston Brown was doing wrong, but what Spud (Davis) was bringing to the table.
“He just came ready to play and we felt we should just go ahead and play him.”
Good call.
Edinboro came out of the gates very slow against the Knights, who were playing the Scots for just the third time in program history and the first time ever as a member of the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference West.
The Scots grabbed the momentum early when freshman Ryan Skelton forced a fumble on the opening kickoff and recovered it at the Gannon 22-yard line. Three incomplete passes by Trevor Harris and a run for a loss of a yard by Brown, however, ended a key opportunity for the Scots to put points on the board early and it didn’t get any better from there.
Edinboro committed three turnovers were penalized four times for 50 yards in the opening half.
“I don’t know if our guys were too excited or what,” Browning said. “They just didn’t handle the situation well. We just didn’t play very well. We made too many mistakes.”
“We were killing ourselves,” added Harris. “We were shooting ourselves in the foot. We’d drive down the field and make plays, but we left a lot of plays out there. I left a lot of plays out there.
“I think this might be the worst game I’ve played in maybe the last year, year in a half … since West Chester. But you know, that’s why it’s the ultimate team game.”
Gannon took a 3-0 lead with 9:57 left in the opening half on a 35-yard field goal by Jeremy Ditzler. Edinboro finally got on the board with 6:20 left on Davis’ 21-yard touchdown run. But it wasn’t until the closing minutes of the first half that the Scots really seemed to come together. And that came courtesy of a outstanding touchdown pass from Harris to Rich Cerro.
Harris had rolled out almost to the right sideline when on his third look he found Cerro open in the corner of the end zone on the opposite side of the field. The touchdown pass was officially from just seven yards out, but Harris said the throw was approximately 40-50 yards.
“He wasn’t even part of the progression,” Harris said. “I booted out to the right and there was a guy and I shed him down. My one and two reads weren’t open. I didn’t have anywhere to run, so I was like let’s check back outside real quick. Richie was open, so I just threw it across field and it worked out pretty well.”
It worked out pretty well for the Scots as a whole too.
From there Edinboro went on to score 26 unanswered points on its way to its fifth win of the season.
The Scots were aided by a huge performance by their entire defensive unit, particularly in the second half. On the day, Edinboro had three interceptions and also recovered a pair of fumbles. Two of the interceptions were by true freshman Branden Williams, the second of which he returned 46 yards for a touchdown.
Sophomore wide receiver Josh Brown, who played both offense and defense yesterday, recorded the other interception.
“Our defense played well,” Browning said. “I thought they played well all day. They’ve had their tough moments this year, but they stepped up (yesterday) and did a heck of a job for us.”
General McLane graduate Dan Skelton led the way with seven tackles.
Offensively, Harris finished the game 18-of-29 for 202 yards and a touchdown. He moved to within 51 yards of breaking the career record for passing yards at Edinboro and with 65 yards of the career mark for total offense.
Cerro caught seven passes for 78 yards.
Gannon running back Jon Richardson, the PSAC’s leading rusher entering yesterday’s game, was held to just 57 yards on 17 carries.
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