What do you do when you start your season at 0-2?
Do you quit, or do you pick yourself up and keep fighting?
Four weeks ago, Ashland University's football team was 0-2. Today, the Eagles are 4-2 overall and 4-0 in the Great Midwest Athletic Conference – leading the league alone and controlling their own destiny with five regular-season games to go.
Ashland's latest victory was a 41-21 decision at No. 20-ranked Findlay on Saturday (Oct. 12) afternoon…and slightly into the evening following two lengthy lightning delays. The hours and hours of waiting for the game to resume was but a small part of Saturday's story…
WHAT A DEFENSE
The Eagle defense didn't allow a point until the team was ahead 24-0 late in the first half. The run-stuffers continue to do their job, as, thanks to allowing just 49 rushing yards to the Oilers, the 186 ground yards yielded over the last four games are the fewest since the last four games of the 2012 season (161).
What Ashland's defense has done so far this season has been a group effort:
- 16 sacks have come from nine different players (junior defensive end Michael Shimek and senior defensive end Jeffrey Barnett each have 3½).
- 32 tackles for loss have come from 14 different players (Shimek has 5½).
- Eight interceptions have come from seven different players (sophomore linebacker Ben Holzopfel has two).
The Eagles forced four takeaways on Saturday at Findlay – the most for an AU defense in a game since last year at home vs. Hillsdale (also four).
Conclusion? An obvoius one – defensive coordinator
Tim Rose (who turns 83 on Oct. 14), and his defensive schemes, are timeless.
"Tim had a great game plan going in," said head coach
Doug Geiser. "That's a really, really good offensive football team. Matthew Reuve is one of the best quarterbacks not only in the league, but in the country. They are hard to contain, and the defense played their tails off."
AN OFFENSE IN RHYTHM
Ashland's 41 points and 499 yards of offense were season-bests, and of the Eagles' 12 drives on Saturday, seven ended in scores, four ended in punts, and one took the teams into halftime.
On Saturday, Ashland had a 300-yard passer (senior quarterback
Trevor Bycznski, 335 yards), 100-yard rusher (sophomore tailback
Olando Kamara, 117 yards) and 100-yard receiver (senior wide receiver
Tony Pannunzio, 204 yards) in the same game for the time since Sept. 25, 2021. The connection between Bycznski and Pannunzio was impressive throughout, and in the second half, Kamara ran like a back who wanted to close out a win strong – while earning his first collegiate 100-yard rushing game.
"Trevor, it was different," noted Geiser. "It was different all week. Today, he made it his football team. He took ownership of the football team today."
Both Bycznski and Pannunzio spoke about the team's turnaround after Saturday's victory.
"Resiliency," said Bycznski. "We preach it all week. No matter what, win or lose. Close the book after we watch film the next day, move on and get better."
Pannunzio added, "The difference is the unity of the team. The leaders of this team, and even the younger guys, really began to understand the mentality and the goals that this team has in front of us. It's just going 1-0 every week."
RHODES KEEPS CONNECTING
Junior kicker
A.J. Rhodes, a two-time Great Midwest Athletic Conference special teams Athlete of the Week so far in 2024, made two more field goals and five more extra points on Saturday, and drove four of nine kickoffs for touchbacks.
Through the first six games of 2024, Rhodes is 10-of-11 on field goals and 13-of-13 on extra points, and has 13 touchbacks on kickoffs. His 27 career field goals have him seventh on the program's all-time list, and he is on pace to break the program record for single-season field goals (17 by
Aidan Simenc in 2017).
SOME QUICK HITTERS
- Geiser is 13-5 in his first 18 games as head coach – the best mark in the first 18 games guiding an Ashland football team since Robert Brownson in the 1950s (15-3).
- Ashland has more wins (31) and more games played (52) against Findlay than any other opponent. It is a rivalry which spans an entire century, as the first meeting was a 33-0 Ashland win at home on Oct. 24, 1924.
- Saturday's game was Ashland football's 950th all-time.
A YOUNG TEAM GROWING UP FAST
Of the 52 players who played for Ashland on Saturday, 25 were underclassmen (14 freshmen, 11 sophomores) – so going on the road and beating a nationally-ranked team in and of itself would be impressive enough.
But when one takes into account that a) a transportation snafu turned getting some of the players to the game into a gumball rally, and b) there were two first-quarter lightning delays which made the game duration a whopping five hours and 18 minutes, Saturday's win was one of the most impressive in a regular-season road game in recent memory.
