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It was games like these that got Paul Pasqualoni fired as head coach of the Syracuse University football team. But this time, it’s not SU’s problem. Just the opposite, in fact. Perhaps the Orange’s 40-10 rout of Pasqualoni’s University of Connecticut Huskies on Friday night, Oct. 19, at the Carrier Dome will turn what appeared to be another sorry season into one that ends with a bowl appearance.
“It gives us a lot of confidence and we really needed that win,” said junior tight end Beckett Wales, who caught his first career touchdown pass. “It puts us in a good position to focus on what we need to do. We’re 2-1 in the Big East now, so it will give us some momentum going into the rest of the season.”
The Orange (3-4 overall) spoiled Pasqualoni’s homecoming by doing something it hadn’t done in a long time: beat up an inferior opponent. SU dominated the Huskies in every phase of the game—offense, defense and special teams—as the Orange notched its widest margin of victory in coach Doug Marrone’s four-year tenure.
In snapping a five-game losing streak against UConn, the Orange gained 502 yards of offense—a season-high 251 rushing and 251 passing—against a Huskies’ defense that had been ranked sixth in the nation in total defense (261 yards per game), albeit against the likes of Massachusetts, Buffalo and Temple. The swarming SU defense created two turnovers, limited UConn to minus-6 yards rushing, and didn’t allow the Huskies to score in the final 34 minutes of the game.
In typical football coach fashion, Marrone saw the dirty dishes instead of enjoying the tasty meal. But he did appreciate the way his players rebounded after the previous week’s five-turnover debacle at Rutgers. “Let’s call it like it is,” Marrone said. “We were 2-4 and that’s not good enough. The pressure is turned up. You have to go out and fight.
“The kids did a good job and they won,” he added. “That doesn’t take the pressure off. Let’s take this next step. I think that’s what we will be working on, and in the same sense this can’t be a comfort zone. There are still a lot of mistakes out there that need to be corrected.”
If that’s how Marrone felt, imagine what it was like to be Pasqualoni. While he would never say so publicly, you’d have to think Pasqualoni wanted to win this game as much as he wanted to win any of the previous 237 college games he had coached in his career.
“He coached here for 15 to 20 years, so I know there was a little something going on in his heart,’’ UConn wide receiver Nick Williams said. “We definitely wanted to go out here and win for coach because he was coming to a place where he spent the majority of his career. We know he had some personal attachments to this building and this campus, so it’s upsetting for him.”
Pasqualoni, you’ll recall, was fired after the 2004 season, which ended with a 51-14 drubbing by Georgia Tech in the Champs Sports Bowl. In 14 years as SU’s head coach, after four years as linebackers coach under Dick MacPherson, Pasqualoni went 107-59-1 with four Big East titles and nine bowl appearances.
In the seven full seasons after Pasqualoni, the Orange went 27-57 overall (9-40 in the Big East) with just one bowl appearance. Even with that perspective, Pasqualoni received mostly boos from the Dome crowd of 36,716 when he led the Huskies onto the field for his first appearance on the Dome sidelines since Nov. 6, 2004.
When asked after the game if it felt strange returning the Dome, Pasqualoni—as stoic as ever—said “not really” and not much else. But then again, what could he say? The Huskies are 3-5 overall (0-3 in the Big East) and they’re facing a future in Big East football purgatory while the Orange gets to move into the Atlantic Coast Conference next year.
“The people were great, the people were awfully nice, very hospitable,” Pasqualoni said of his trip to Syracuse. “The Dome is a great place to play. We just felt we could’ve done a lot better tonight.”
The Orange had a lot to do with that. While it was a team effort all the way around, a few players did stand out:
• Junior running back Jerome Smith set the tone by carrying the ball for 49 yards on SU’s first four plays and he finished with a career-high 133 yards on 19 carries. The Orange offensive line controlled the line of scrimmage as SU averaged 4.7 yards per rush and quarterback Ryan Nassib was not sacked once.
“When you watch it on film, not a lot of people run the ball on this team,” Marrone said. “We challenged those guys {the SU offensive linemen}. We challenged them up front. We challenged the backs. I think we did a nice job. It shows that we can keep building and keep becoming more physical.”
• Senior wide receiver Alec Lemon continued to torment the Huskies as he caught eight passes for 166 yards and a touchdown. In four career games against UConn, Lemon has 27 receptions for 475 yards and three touchdowns.
Lemon, who had three drops against Rutgers the previous week, had a career-high 68-yard reception and a 41-yarder ending just short of the goal line. But those catches led to touchdowns, and Lemon scored his own touchdown on an 11-yard pass from Nassib in the third quarter.
“It kind of stinks coming up two yards short, but we scored in the end and that’s all that matters,” said Lemon, who has at least one catch in 22 consecutive games. “It’s a team game and we got the victory and that’s why we came out.”
• Wales, SU’s tight end, caught four passes for a career-high 69 yards and scored his first career touchdown on a two-yard pass from Nassib in the first quarter. “For me it was a big game. I was able to help the team a lot, which is great,” Wales said. “Coach Hackett {offensive coordinator Nathaniel Hackett} was great calling the plays, and Ryan {Nassib} made some big plays for us.”
• On defense, the Orange held an opponent without positive yardage on the ground for the first time since Akron gained zero yards in 2009. The signature defensive play came in the second quarter, when sophomore safety Durell Eskridge blitzed and leveled UConn quarterback Chandler Whitmer, who lost the football. Sophomore linebacker Cameron Lynch recovered at the Huskies’ 45, and SU’s offense marched down the field for its first touchdown of the game.
“I think it did more than juice the defense up, it had them going crazy,” Eskridge said. “It had us knowing what we are capable of doing and we wanted to do that all night, all four quarters.”
• Sophomore safety Ritchy Desir replaced Steve Rene as punt returner and provided a spark with a 33-yard return in the first quarter that set up a field goal. It was SU’s longest punt return of the season. “It was good to have Ritchy back there,” Marrone said. “He got a return and got us some yards at times.”
• Junior kicker Ross Krautman tied his career high with four field goals, including a season-best 47-yarder. “Being in the Dome and winning a Big East game is a huge win and that’s all that matters,” Krautman said. “Offense, defense and special teams all worked well together and came out with a win.”
The Orange can even its record at 4-4 by winning a winnable game at 7 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 27, at South Florida (2-5, 0-3). The game will be televised by ESPN3. Needing six victories to qualify for a bowl game, the Orange needs to take care of business Saturday because it faces a daunting stretch against Cincinnati, Louisville and Missouri before finishing the season against Temple.
“We’re destined for greatness, but we are going to take one game at a time,” said senior safety Shamarko Thomas, who punctuated the UConn rout with an interception. “Yes, we made mistakes today and even though we got the win, we still have to work on things.”
