Football holds on to beat Morgan State 20-10

[mat1992 2,235]

Ugly second half, but what a great job by the defense, especially Robert Javier with two INTs and four pass breakups. Offensively was another story and the play-calling at the end with the big lead left something to be desired. I get the fact that we don't have fullbacks or a big back to run between the tackles like Bangda. But not sure why we're throwing after rushing for six yards with 3:20 left or not taking the play clock down to 5 or less.

Morgan State's quarterbacks were pretty awful, but there were not a lot of wide open receivers, unlike the first week or big runs like the second week. Congrats to Coach Pete for getting his first win. No Towson team had started 0-3 since 1991. 

https://morganstatebears.com/sidearmstats/football/individual;team=away;category=defense

[mat1992 2,235]

https://x.com/BaltSunSports/status/1703223861100077232?s=20

[Blounge 521]

Winning in front of 9,800 people in a 10,000 seat stadium isn’t hateful. We shut them down for 3 quarters. Had them rattled. We definitely could have tackled better. Field goal unit sucked. (The blocked field goal for a touchdown will probably be a SC TOP 10) Nathan Kent played his best game but he was still meh. I liked the big runs after catch from DT and DK. Play calling towards the end was questionable. 

When the fight almost broke out I liked how our guys calmed #4 down and wanted no part of the trash talking and fighting. That was a classy move, that’s a good shinnick culture quality 

we win the battle for greater Baltimore again! Fun for us, sucks for them. Let see if we can keep winning thru 2027

[mat1992 2,235]

https://towsontigers.com/news/2023/9/16/towson-football-wins-the-battle-for-greater-baltimore.aspx

[TuTigers2012 1,071]

Feelin frisco! Jk but a nice win and a first win is great. Congrats to the new staff

[TSU88 1,073]

Kudos to Coach Shinnick for getting his 1st TU W. Good effort on D, though realistically the erratic passing of Morgan’s QB’s was a contributing factor. Great game by Javier. The offense…well, our QB is who we thought he is…a guy who’s ceiling is about what we saw tonight-a little over 50% completion percentage with less than 200 yards per game and probably about as many INT’s as TD’s. Hopefully next season we’ll have an upgrade. Next week is Norfolk State, so we should get to.500

[mat1992 2,235]

A couple more things and my head has been kind of out it since I left the game at the half due to the death of a long-time co-worker and friend. Very few expected a win here other than maybe Atlanta Tiger. Morgan State did play well in their first two games. Akron might stink but they are still FBS and the Bears literally fumbled that game away.

So it's a good win despite the major issues on special teams (blocking and snapping, not Vaughn) and the offense. Kent will be the focus but Brian Sheppard has to do a better job of managing the game and the clock when you have the game in hand. Kent is basically a game-manager so run the occasional QB draw. Our three running backs that we use are not big, I don't see them all of a sudden using Sabias Folley at 5-11, 235, but we did miss Bangda's size (5-10, 230). We miss him in terms of just ramming the ball up the middle with a nice lead though usually you have a fullback there. Dion Crews Harris is now a DL and so is Brockman Wallace. Can we move them to fullback in these late-game situations and go back to running the power? It's an offense that lacks an identity because I know Sheppard wants to throw a lot but we're not built for that. There was one great drive in that first half that was helped by a Daniel Thompson great run after the catch. IMO, we have to be precise to move the football and run long drives. We are not a very good running team though Morgan has a pretty good defense so I think they adjusted to those short passes to Perkins and James and took them away. Getting the ball to Perkins was great so see, but where is Cee Chosen? The burner from TCU should be on the field at least 1/2 the time and should run some end arounds.

BTW, the right side of the offensive line is still in flux. I've seen a bunch of different combinations there, but we ended with a true freshman in K.J. Brooks at right tackle. Florian Staehler also played right guard. Maybe that's the combination we need but at some point, we need stability there. We're certainly not small, but we need more athletic and long linemen to eventually run that Air Raidish offense.

But I have to give credit to Coach Dulin, who had his defensive backs on the Morgan receivers tonight. Even if their QBs were underthrowing and off tonight, their receivers were not open when they tried to go vertically. In the middle of the field? Sure, but it was nice to see Mason Woods out there manning the middle with the left hand wrapped up. Javier played about as well as a Towson CB could play since the days of Tye Smith and Jordan Love. He was fantastic. I thought Xavier Terry played well at safety and the combination of Charles Peoples and Shafeek Smith is somewhat promising. Don't love either but guess what? Norfolk State and the rest of the teams will be throwing away from No. 3. 

Impressive first half to an extent, but left too many points on the board on offense. It's all about getting better and they did that tonight.

[TUTigers 119]

Congrats to Coach Pete on his first W. Definitely thought Morgan was the better team coming into this game. Glad Towson proved me wrong. 

[mat1992 2,235]

Some highlights 

https://x.com/towson_fb/status/1703244167512731904?s=46&t=nScacl1TWT-KyOwj5stBaw

[mat1992 2,235]

Some comments from Pete after the game in The Sun and RJ3

“Great to get the first victory,” Shinnick said. “Proud of our guys. We’ve been telling them that we think they’re a pretty good football team, and we think they can play great football. So excited to see them do that.”

 

“Just making the quarterback feel uncomfortable and the secondary just having great communication,”  Robert Javier said of the defense’s keys. “We know they like to take shots. … We’ve seen that on film all week. We knew it was coming. So we just had to execute in the secondary.”

 

“Just knowing what the game plan is and just playing with fast pace and fast tempo and playing confident,” Natha Kent said of the unit’s success. “I think against Monmouth, we left some plays out there like we did tonight. But I think we came out and executed at a little bit of a higher level this week than last week.”