Friday Night College Results
Friday Night College Results
Friday night brought us three D1 college results of note—here's a look.
Iowa State 58 Iowa 5
The Cyclones looked pretty strong in their defeat of the Hawkeyes. Iowa State lost a tough, close game to Iowa Central last week, and this week put into practice some of the lessons from that game.
"It was a whole team effort," said ISU Head Coach Ant Frein. "Depth in the pack allows us to have fresh bodies on set piece and play pressure defense for 80 minutes."
Alex Geisart, who has moved to prop from lock, and back healthy and ready to play was a standout in the forwards.
Davenport 23 Adrian 12
Longtime D1A program Davenport defeated the 2021 D2 runners-up Adrian 23-12 in the opening game for both. Davenport are used to D1A-level pressure and they certainly put Adrian under pressure. They forced a drop at midfield that led to a Davenport counter, and then forced a couple more errors to set up a Davenport scrum five meters out. From there, after a couple of phases, hooker Matt Kelly powered over.
Adrian responded well with a couple of threatening moves—one via a run one via a kick—from Quinn Murray. The Bulldogs got right to the Davenport line but were penalized. Davenport kicked clear, got another penalty and soon were mauling to the Adrian line. They scored off this, and Kelly had his second.
Adrian finally did get it over about 25 minutes in. Davenport helped then with two pretty unintelligent yellow cards one after another. One was for tackling a player in the air, and the other for ripping a player's headgear off his head and throwing it at him. Now with 15 players on 13, Adrian ran a lineout, mauled it, and Max Miller popped off the back to score and make all of the tries so far by hookers. Despite some close calls on either end (and another yellow to Davenport), the score remained 12-5 through to halftime.
About 10 minutes into the second half a heads-up pick-and-go from a ruck in the middle of the field got Davenport in Adrian territory and then a tap penalty move put them over in the corner. Moments later a penalty in front of the posts allowed flyhalf Sean Nolan to put the ball over and Davenport led 20-5.
It was a physical, fractious game and certainly the start of a nice, heated rivalry between these two Michigan teams.
Adrian answered. A back-and-forth kicking exchange ended when Davenport was unable to catch an Adrian high ball. Bulldog No. 8 Inoke Takau raced in and took the ball on the bounce to gallop in. Murray, like Takau a freshman, slotted the extras and it was 20-12.
Davenport wisely took another penalty kick option and Nolan was good on that kick to make it 23-12 with about 20 minutes to go, but that was it for the scoring. Once again both teams had chances but couldn't finish.
Army 25 Kutztown 17
In what was expected to be a very tight game, West Point held off a determined Kutztown side 25-17.
Army scored early thanks to some powerful running and then a scything run from Maxwell Brown who was in at the corner. Kutztown came right back, playing a little bit of hot potato and then a nice given-and-go move put scrumhalf Aidan Smith through for a superb try, which was converted, and Kutztown led 7-5.
Army responded with a really well-taken backline sequence off a scrum (basically hands out, but well-timed) and they scored out wide with a good finish from Adam Bazan. That made it 10-7 Army, but Kutztown responded with a penalty goal to tie it up. After that the Army forwards went to work and pressured the Kutztown line before the ball was spun wide to flyhalf Matt De Freitas for the try and a 15-10 lead. Army returned to the Kutztown 22 but somehow the Bears kept them out.
But right on the stroke of halftime, the Black Knights were in the Kutztown 22 again. Off a five-meter scrum scrumhalf Tiaan Mosconi scored off a back row move and he was over. Once again the conversion was missed, but Army led 20-10.
The second half slowed down as teams tested some players and perhaps flagged a bit. The side traded tries, but Army will be shaking their heads at not being able to convert those tries into seven-pointers. PJ O'Reilly, meanwhile, helped keep Kutztown in the game with his boot.