Courtesy of NC A&T Athletics
RICHMOND, Va. – After two consecutive weeks of highly disappointing road losses to old-school HBCU football rivals, the North Carolina A&T football team put a scare in the 21st-ranked team in Division I-FCS on the road before losing to the University of Richmond (UR) Spiders 20-17 at Robins Stadium on Saturday.
The Aggies were a failed 4th-and-2 away from really making the Spiders sweat before falling to 1-5 overall and 0-2 in the Coastal Athletic Association (CAA). The Spiders got 200 yards and a touchdown on 25 carries from Zach Palmer-Smith to improve to 4-2 overall and 2-0 in the league.
“I told our kids there are no moral victories, but I was extremely proud of the way they fought,” A&T head coach Vincent Brown said. “We showed improvements in a significant number of areas. But we made mistakes at critical moments that unfortunately became the deciding factor. I told our team that is a very good football team that we played. We are very close to putting it all together to come out with a winning record this season.”
Many of the deficiencies present for North Carolina A&T in previous weeks were absent on Saturday. A&T graduate quarterback Justin Fomby looked comfortable in the pocket, going 22-27 on passing attempts and throwing for 261 yards, two touchdowns, and no interceptions. The defensive unit, which had given up 153 points in its last three contests, forced four punts and a turnover on downs, and UR was 1-for-8 on third-down conversions.
The Aggies even got off to a 10-0 before the Spiders scored 20 unanswered points to take a 20-10 lead into the fourth quarter, where the Aggies did find an answer. Fomby rallied the team with a touchdown drive that featured two third-down conversions and one fourth-down conversion.
Those gritty plays were rewarded with a touchdown pass to tight end Anthony Rucker, who caught the pass from Fomby in the middle of the field and ran it in for a 38-yard touchdown. A week after achieving his first career touchdown reception, Rucker led the team with eight catches, compiling 91 yards receiving and two touchdowns.
Following the Fomby to Rucker score, all North Carolina A&T needed was a stop and a score to either tie the game or retake the lead, and the defense did their part by forcing a three-and-out on UR’s next drive. Unfortunately for the Aggies, who had relative success on late downs up to that point, Fomby missed a deep throw to Jayvonne Dillard while scrambling on fourth down to turn the ball over at the UR 48-yard line.
“We went unbalance. We had a sprint out play called. We’ve worked over the past few weeks. We felt good about calling it. Obviously, it did not work out in our favor there,” Brown said.
There were still more than four minutes on the clock, but the Spiders achieved the three first downs they needed to run down the clock. The Aggies will now take their bye week to work on a few things before preparing for the Greatest Homecoming on Earth against HBCU football foe Hampton University at Truist Stadium on October 19.
“We will do an extensive self-scout and look at every aspect of the program and how we are doing schematically,” Brown said. “We are going to take a little time to get healed up. We are very beat up as a team right now. We are going to do some recruiting and make sure we can go out and find future Aggies. Then we’ll start the plan to get ready for homecoming.”
The Aggies looked ready early on Saturday as sophomore linebacker David Mack II, who leads the HBCU football team in tackles, sacked Spiders quarterback Camden Coleman for a loss of 12 yards to force UR to punt on its first drive.
On the next North Carolina A&T drive, Fomby threw it over the middle to Rucker, who dodged a tackle for a 27-yard pickup. Two plays later, Rucker caught another pass and got hit late after running out of bounds, resulting in a 15-yard unnecessary roughness penalty on UR that pushed the Aggies into the red zone.
Fomby took aim at Rucker once more in the end zone on 3rd-and-8, but the pass was incomplete, and junior kicker Andrew Brown put the ball through the uprights from 26 yards to give the Aggies a 3-0 lead. A&T’s defense continued to play well, stopping the Spiders on fourth down from the A&T 4. Fomby took advantage of the opportunity and passed the ball to the middle of the field to junior receiver Ger-Cari Caldwell, who broke away from the defense and ran down the sideline for 76 yards.
Fomby finished the drive with a four-yard touchdown pass to Rucker to give the Aggies their 10-0 lead before the Spiders scored 20 straight points. The Aggies threatened to interrupt those unanswered points in the third quarter. Trailing 13-10, the Aggies drove the ball to the A&T 49. They had a chance for more as freshman running back Daniel Coles ripped off a 23-yard run. But as Coles completed his run, UR’s Jabril Hayes put his helmet squarely on the football as he tackled Coles. The ball slipped from Coles’s grip to the ground, and UR’s Chance Graves recovered the ball at the UR 28, stopping the Aggies’ opportunity to either recapture the lead or tie the game.
“The fumble was a critical game-changing play for us,” Brown said. “But when you look back at it, there are probably 10 or 12 different plays at any point in the game that impacted the final outcome.”
Caldwell had a definite impact on the game. He had a career day with seven receptions for a game-leading 130 yards. Sophomore Cameren Dalrymple, who has carved out a role after several injuries to A&T’s running backs, led the rushing unit with 45 yards on 15 carries.
Now, the Aggies will finally return to Truist Stadium after four weeks away to try to take down an old-school HBCU football rival once again when the Hampton Pirates come to the east side of Greensboro.