College Football Treats Georgia Schools Well

College football teams in the state of Georgia had pretty successful day this past Saturday. Of the four big time programs in Georgia, (University of Georgia, Georgia Tech, Valdosta State University, and Georgia Southern University) the Eagles of GSU were the only team to not win.

The Bulldogs had without a doubt, the biggest win of the day beating the Arizona State Sun Devils 27-10. Prior to the game, Kirk Herbstreit, a very reputable college football analyst for ESPN, had picked the Sun Devils to upset the number 3 ranked Bulldogs at home.

Both teams came in to the game looking to redeem themselves. The Sun Devils had lost at home to the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, a school known more for basketball than anything else, the previous week, and the Bulldogs had barely been able to scratch out a 14-7 victory over the University of South Carolina in Columbia. However, the Bulldogs had more to prove due to the fact that they started the season ranked number 1 in the nation, and despite no losses had fallen to number 3.

UGA's redshirt sophomore Knowshon Moreno had the first two touchdowns of the day for the Bulldogs on 9 yard and 3 yard touchdown runs in the second quarter. His second touchdown came following a fumble by Arizona State junior running back Dimitri Nance.

ASU would add a field goal off the foot of redshirt sophmore Thomas Weber. The Bulldogs 11 point lead would soon increase to 18 when junior quarterback Matt Stafford connected with freshman wide receiver A.J. Green for a 14 yard touchdown, giving the Bulldogs a commanding 21-3 lead at half time.

The Sun Devils would score first in the second half taking the opening drive down to the red zone and capping it off with a 6 yard touchdown pass from senior quarterback Rudy Carpenter to senior tight end Andrew Pettes. Freshman kicker Blair Walsh would add a field goal to give the Bulldogs a 24-10 lead going in to the fourth quarter.

Following a play which Moreno looked to have scored his third touchdown of the night, but officials claimed he was already down before crossing the line, Walsh would add his second field goal giving the Bulldogs a 27-3 win.

The Sun Devils were stonewalled to only 4 rushing yards on 19 plays in the game, and Carpenter was sacked 4 times. Moreno finished with 149 rushing yards and 2 touchdowns, Green had 159 receiving yards and 1 touchdown, and Stafford finished with 285 yards and continued his season without a single interception.

Next week the Bulldogs will face the number 9 ranked University of Alabama Crimson Tide in Athens at 7:45 pm. The game will be televised on ESPN.

The Yellow Jackets also had a big win, this time in more literal terms beating the Mississippi State University Bulldogs 38-7.

This game was all about the Yellow Jacket's rushing and defense. Freshman Embry Peeples was the first to score on a 7 yard run early in the first quarter. Following a hamstring injury to sophomore quarterback Josh Nesbitt, freshman Jaybo Shaw took over and threw a 20 yard pass to red shirt sophomore Demaryius Thomas for the Jacket's second touchdown of the quarter. In the second quarter, Shaw had a 25 yard run to give Tech a 14-0 lead going in to the half.

The Yellow Jackets could not have started the second half any better if they tried. Jonathon Dwyer, a sophomore running back out of Kell High School, would take the opening snap of the half 88 yards to set a school record for the longest rushing touchdown ever. The run broke a 60 year old record set by Bob McCoy in 1948.

Sophomore Scott Blair would add a field goal later in the third quarter and red shirt junior Greg Smith would tack on s 45 yard touchdown run in the fourth quarter to give Tech 38.

With 8:09 left in the game, MSU scored their first touchdown of the game on a 6 yard touchdown run by freshman Robert Elliott.

As a team, the Yellow Jackets rushed for 438 yards and 4 touchdowns. Dwyer finished with 141 yards on the ground. Georgia Tech had 10 different players rush for 5 yards or more.

The Yellow Jacket defense had 3 sacks and 2 interceptions in the game.

Next week Georgia Tech will play host to the Duke University Blue Devils.

Valdosta State Blazers played Ouachita Baptist in a Gulf South Conference match-up. The Blazers won 29-6 with 536 total offensive yards, 401 of which came in the second half.

The Blazers entered half time trailing 3-2, their only points in the first half came from a safety.

However, the second half looked like a completely different team. After going practically offensive less in the first half, the Blazers would score 14 points in third quarter and add 13 more in the fourth quarter, all the while holding OB to only a field goal.

Freshman quarterback Chris Hart finished with 330 passing yards and 4 total touchdowns including a 29 yard run for Valdosta State's final score of the game and junior T.J. Williams had 167 receiving yards and a touchdown.

This Saturday the Blazers travel to Livingston, AL to play West Alabama.

The lone loss for Georgia schools was given to the Georgia Southern Eagles by the Elon University Phoenix. Georgia Southern came into the game ranked 14 while Elon was ranked 18, and despite the fact that the Phoenix could only put together 1 touchdown, they edged out a 22-20 victory over the Eagles.

Georgia Southern sophomore Antonio Henton finished the game with 232 yards in the air and 57 on the ground with 1 touchdown. Freshman Samair Baker had a 94 yard kickoff return for the Eagle's other touchdown and senior Raja Andrews tied a school record with 9 receptions in the game. GSU's next game will be at home against Wofford University.