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Last updated: Thursday, Feb. 9, 1:34 a.m.
Sports

Black Bears have UNH’s number

Football clinches tie for Atlantic-10 Championship with win

By Ryan Waning
Posted on Nov. 25, 2002, at 12:00 a.m.
Black Bears sophomore running back Marcus Williams stiff-arms a University of New Hampshire defender in Saturday's 31-14 UMaine win. The victory gave the Black Bears a share of the Atlantic-10 Conference title for the second consecutive year.
Julie Altenhoff
Black Bears sophomore running back Marcus Williams stiff-arms a University of New Hampshire defender in Saturday's 31-14 UMaine win. The victory gave the Black Bears a share of the Atlantic-10 Conference title for the second consecutive year.

John Meczywor, starting in place of injured quarterback Jake Eaton, threw two touchdown passes to Danny Fusco to lead the University of Maine Black Bears to a 31-14 victory over rival University of New Hampshire, successfully defending the Brice-Cowell musket Saturday afternoon at Morse field.

“We got enough offense to do the job,” UMaine head coach Jack Cosgrove said. “This [Meczywor] is a tough kid that got no reps, and all of a sudden he’s the guy.”

The Wildcats controlled the game’s tempo into the second quarter mostly without Stephan Lewis, who was a non-factor, carrying the ball 20 times for 33 yards.

UNH quarterback Mike Granieri capped a 13-play, 91-yard drive with a 32 yard touchdown pass to Michael Taylor, giving the Wildcats a 7-0 lead.

After a 33 yard field goal from Mike Mellow made it 7-3, UNH’s Danny Fusco hauled in his first touch down pass from nine yards out giving the Black Bears the lead, 10-7.

With under five minutes left in the half, little used tailback Onyi Momah took the handoff and cruised 33 yards for a lead extending touchdown, 17-7.

“We knew coming into the game that New Hampshire didn’t have a great run defense,” Williams said. “We wanted to make things easy for Meczywor.”

That score would stand until the fourth, when after Fusco’s second touch down, the Wildcats threatened again. Granieri found John Hart from five yards out to cut the Black Bear lead to 24-14.

However, the Black Bears stopped UNH’s final threat when defensive back Joan Quezada picked off Granieri at the three-yard line, and walked into the end zone, icing the game for UMaine.

With the victory, the Black Bears are assured a share of the Atlantic-10 Conference Championship for the second straight season.

“The goal today was to get the Brice-Cowell Musket,” Cosgrove said, referring to the trophy that goes to the winner of the annual football meeting between UMaine and UNH. “Now our goal is a bigger trophy.

This entry was posted on Monday, November 25th, 2002, 12:00 am. You can follow any responses to this article through the RSS feed.

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