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The No. 5 team in the country, University of New Hampshire, had its way with the University of Maine football team in the first half of Saturday’s matchup en route to a 50-36 UNH victory over the Black Bears. The win helped the Wildcats retain the Brice-Cowell Musket for the second straight season.
“With an interception, blocked punt and fumble early in the game, it was too big of a hole for us to truly recover from,” said head coach Jack Cosgrove. “They ended up breaking our hearts in the end.”
However, the Black Bears never gave up, staging a valiant second half.
“I never felt so loose or so happy coming out of the locker room,” said receiver Christian Pereira, who finished his senior career with 2,101 total yards and 21 touchdowns. “We wanted to let them know it wasn’t over.”
After overcoming a 40-14 deficit in the first half, the momentum changed to the Black Bears favor when Jermaine Walker caused a safety off a John McCoy rush. With the ball in its possession and two points added to its score, the Maine offense was ready for more.
Led by quarterback Ron Whitcomb, the team marched 53 yards down the field to create a 3 yard touchdown run for backup running back Montell Owens. The drive took seven plays to complete, closing out the third quarter of play.
“Offensively we just tried to play it drive by drive and not say we’re behind by X amount of points,” said Whitcomb, who tallied 422 yards and two interceptions for the day.
On the Black Bears first possession of the fourth quarter, the team continued to send doubt to the UNH sideline when Whitcomb found Pereira for six. Mike Mellow’s point after touchdown was blocked, but the score was now 43-29 with 9:14 left to play.
“They’ve got a lot of weapons over there,” said Wildcats head coach Sean McDonnell.
UMaine’s next possession proved that even more when Whitcomb this time hooked up with wideout Ryan Waller on a 45-yard touchdown pass, to put their team within seven with seven minutes left.
“It was hard to watch them come back,” said UNH receiver David Ball.
On the next drive, the Wildcats went three-and-out, giving the Black Bears another chance, but UMaine gained just one first down and was forced to punt.
With time winding down, UNH knew they had to put the ball game away.
McCoy broke through UMaine’s defense for a 24-yard touchdown run ending all hope for the Bears with just 1:06 left to play.
“I never felt confident all game until that last touchdown,” said McDonnell.
Cosgrove said the team’s philosophy ideally is to shut down the run game and make their opponent one dimensional. But UNH finished with a balanced offense; 291 yards on the ground, and 249 in the air.
At the same time, the Wildcats defense held UMaine 66 total rushing yards, where backup quarterback Chris Legree had 33 of those.
“They shut down our run game,” said Cosgrove. “We could not run the ball effectively.”
The Black Bears showed their depth in the receiver outlet, when Whitcomb went to six different players at least twice over the course of the game.
Sophomore Arel Gordon led the way with 157 yards and two first-half touchdowns.
UMaine’s defense was run by Brandon McGowan who finished with a game high 14 tackles and a fumble recovery. Anthony Hicks caused that fumble, while having 11 tackles as well.
