No. 6 Furman picks off Tennessee Tech in 2023 opener
Game 1: No. 6 Furman 45, Tennessee Tech 10
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| Furrman graduate senior wide receiver Kyndel Dean |
When Furman finished the 2022 season leading the nation in interceptions (18), pass deflections (57) and turnovers gained (29), those numbers certainly weren’t an aberration or any sort of anomaly, with tangible proof of the Paladin defense has made getting the ball away from the opposition’s offense somewhat of an art form.
Many who saw the score of: Furman 45, Tennessee Tech 10 were fooled. Most of us sitting in the press box and in the stands at Paladin Stadium left wondering just how it got to be that. It’s not because Furman necessarily played bad outside of the normal miscues you might expect from a season opener, however, the Paladins were dominant the way a No. 6 ranked team should be if we’re judging on score alone.
Unlike the 2022 opener against North Greenville, which saw the Paladins amass over 500 yards of offense to produce 52 points, the 2023 opener against a Division I foe saw the Paladin defense dominate the dark, as the Paladins were burglarized Tennessee Tech six time, intercepted four passes and forcing two fumbles. Furman returned two of those four picks for touchdowns of 42 and 68 yards, respectively.
It allowed the Paladins to rest a little easier in the final quarter, getting three hard, physical quarters from their visitors from Cookeville before finally being able to breathe a little easier. When Ian Williams knocked through a 32-yard field goal with just under four minutes remaining in the third quarter, Furman was clinging to a 24-10 lead, and while the Paladins new unis sparkling from its shiny knight’s armor lids-to-its fashionable black jerseys and pants with purple piping around the numbers, it’s offense and the game as a whole, by comparison, was more like if the Paladins had donned something less aesthetically pleasing similar to the Paladins 2014 Homecoming uniforms. In case a refresher is needed think Oreo Cookie-ish.
No surprise then that the 2014 Paladin fashion trend was met with immediate disdain from trendy offense gadget-galore Samford, who handed the Paladins a 45-0 loss in its own stadium, using all kinds of offensive Mindbenders along the way to baffle Furman's seemingly inept defense and handing Furman one of its worst losses in Paladin Stadium history.
While the offense wouldn’t find some explosiveness until late in the contest, which came when senior Paladin signal-caller Tyler Huff hooked up with redshirt freshman wideout Ben Ferguson, as the redshirt freshman made an acrobatic grab in-stride on a 3rd-and-4 play early in the fourth quarter to set up one of the three fourth quarter scores that came within a seven-and-a-half minute span as a part of that late offensive flurry, which saw the Paladins outgain the Golden Eagles 178-18 in a dominating final 15 minutes.
Huff added an acrobatic 18-yard scamper earlier in the second half, which saw him hurdle a would-be Golden Eagle tackler. He also added a beautifully flighted pass to wideout Kyndel Dean, who brought in the pass over his outside shoulder for a gain of 24 yards for one of the Paladins’ longest passing plays of the night in the first half, which was one of Furman's handful of highlights on that side of the football.
A native of the Sunshine State by way of Orange Park, Huff entered the 2023 with some high praise from the leagues other eight coaches, garnering preseason second-team All-SoCon recognition. He would not wow like he did in the 2022 season opener, though he really didn't need to, as the Paladins know what the main horse in the stable is all about by now. Huff would finish the night completing 15-of- 27 passes for 172 yards, with an INT.
He once again showed flashes of his overall athleticism and versatility at times, finishing with 42 rushing yards on 10 attempts and was sacked twice.
Huff’s understudy Carson Jones finished seeing some mop-up duty, completing 1-of-2 passes for 18 yards. Jones' father, Michael Jones, was a first-team All-OVC quarterback at Tennessee Tech in the mid-1990s.
As far as the ground game was concerned in the contest, All-SoCon running back Dominic Roberto finished the contest with 59 rushing yards and a pair of scores on 18 carries. Myion Hicks added 45 yards on two carries, while Grant Robinson added 26 yards on four carries. Jayquan Smith rushed for 18 yards and his first TD as a Paladin on four rushing attempts.
Kyndel Dean, who scored his first TD as a Paladin on a 6-yard scoring run in the second quarter, hauled in five passes for 56 yards. Ben Ferguson hauled in two passes for 56 yards, matching Dean’s game-high receiving total.
Tennessee Tech was paced offensively by quarterback Ethan Roberts, who finished the night connecting on 25-of-38 passes for 204 yards, with one TD and three INTs.
Bradley Clark was Roberts’ top target in the passing attack, hauling in six passes for 73 yards. Willie Miller, who had two catches on the night for 28 yards, accounted for the Golden Eagles’ lone TD of the night, hauling in a 26-yard scoring pass from Roberts with just under a minute remaining in the first half.
For a large majority of the night, the Golden Eagles defense made it tough on Huff and the Paladin offense, and Furman came out of the 2023 opener truly having to earn everything it earned in the contest.
A win is a win, and just like the pig with the lipstick, winning isn’t necessarily concerned with aesthetics. That’s true at every level of college football.
When the voters submit their weekly Top 25 Poll to FCS STATS media relations director Craig Haley on Sunday night, the “How They Fared” section will only list: No. 6 Furman 45, Tennessee Tech 10.
With that, you can expect it appear to be a blowout on paper because if you weren’t at the game, you would assume that Furman did what it was supposed to do, and it did, however, it’s domination was almost all defensively-influenced the entire night.
Offense was a grind. Furman ended up closing up a 12-play gap (42-30) and almost nine-minute time of possession deficit (19:13-10:47) at the half down to just five plays (74-69) and a little less than three minutes in time of possession (31:14-28:46) by the conclusion of the 2023 season opener. It all led to Furman finishing the night with a slight 384-291 advantage in total offense.
Furman’s defensive dominance is given credibility by the fact that Tennessee Tech was held scoreless in the second half, as well as not charting a single snap inside Furman’s red zone the entire game.
All told, Furman's six forced turnovers in the 2023 season opener, now has them at 35 turnovers gained over the last 14 games. It also means the Paladins now have an outrageous 22 pickoffs in its past 14 games. Five of those have gone the other way for six.
As defensive coordinator Duane Vaughn subtly postgame…”How many INTs do we have in the past 22 games again?” Vaughn asked as he looked in the direction of special teams coach Tommy Spangler and smiled…Then looked again at Spangler and asked…”How many games has he been on staff?”…The answer, of course, is 14. I am sure those are directly related and it was a nice touch by the young DC to point it out so clearly.
Spangler, who had led Presbyterian to its best record as a Division I program in the spring of 2021, was unceremoniously let go. That turned out to be an obvious blessing in disguise for Furman.
Five of Furman’s six turnovers would end up resulting in points in the contest for the Paladins. The end result would see the Paladins score 31 of their 45 points in the game off turnovers.
It’s a carryover from a theme we saw woven throughout last season, which was Furman capitalizing on the opposition's miscues and converting them into points with an uncanny regularity.
The Paladins completed the 2022 campaign with a total of 114 points scored off turnovers, and with the 31 accounted for in the 2023 season opener, that's nearly 30% (27.2%) of last season's combined total through 13 games.
Over the past 14 games dating back to the start of the 2022 season, the Paladins have scored 149 points off turnovers—an impressive stat to be sure.
The four INTs in a game were the most since the Paladins picked off four passes in a 45-17 win at Chattanooga back in 2017. The Paladins have five INT returns for scores over the past 14 games.
Each of the past two Thursday night openers with under the concealment of new helmets and black uniforms, cloaked by the dark, the Paladins have come like thieves in the night, seeking opportunities to pounce upon the opposition's mistakes and make them pay in full.
In each of the past two season debuts, Furman has returned three picks for touchdowns, including two on the opposition's opening series of plays.
The Paladins were paced defensively by preseason All-America selection Hugh Ryan, who led the Paladins with 12 tackles and forced a fumble.
Cornerback Travis Blackshear and linebacker Dan Scianna both registered pick-sixes in each half, with Blackshear’s covering 42 yards in the first half, while Scianna added a 68-yard return for a score in the fourth quarter. Reserve free safety Jack Rhodes and nose tackle Xavier Stephens also added INTs.
Tennessee Tech was led defensively by linebacker Aaron Swafford’s 12 tackles. The Paladin defense grounded the Golden Eagles’ ground game, holding Tennessee Tech to just 79 yards on the ground, which included out-gaining the Golden Eagles, 194-79, in total rushing yards in the contest.
How It Happened:
Furman’s defensive unit picked up right where it left off the 2022 season, when the Paladins led the nation in total interceptions (18), and for the second-straight game, it was the Paladins that got on the board early with its defense.
Just as Cally Chizik gave the Paladins the early lead with a 36-yard return in last December’s second-round FCS playoff game at Incarnate Word, Furman’s most veteran defensive performer Travis Blackshear picked off an Ethan Roberts pass and raced 42 yards for a score to give the Paladins the early 7-0 first quarter lead.
On the ensuing kickoff, Tennessee Tech got its first points of the season, as the Golden Eagles drove 54 yards in 13 plays and settled for a 38-yard field goal to make it a 7-3 contest.
Furman’s first offensive possession of the 2023 season yielded one first down, and then Tyler Huff was sacked for a loss and that would eventually force a Paladin punt.
It looked like the Paladins might be able to increase their lead shortly thereafter, as on the opening play of the second quarter following a fumbled exchange between center and quarterback, allowing Furman bandit linebacker Emanuel Adebayo to pounce on the football at the Paladin 47.
Unfortuntalely for Furman, the drive would take a sour turn and after reaching the Tennessee Tech 22, Huff’s pass, which was intended for sophomore receiver Ben Ferguson was intercepted by Dominic Howard to thwart the potentially promising scoring opportunity for the Paladins.
Furman’s opportunistic defense continued to come up with big plays to give its offense a short field.
On a 2nd and-6 play at its own 18, Tennessee Tech's Roberts was intercepted for the second time in the contest, as his errant screen pass was nabbed out of the air by Paladin nose tackle Xavier Stephens as he was falling backward at the Tennessee Tech 17, giving the Paladins their third forced turnover of the half.
This time the Paladins would cash in points, using five plays to cover the needed 17 yards for the score, which was capped off by a six-yard scoring run from Kyndel Dean on a quick pitch, marking the first touchdown of his Paladin career. Dean’s short jaunt extended Furman’s lead to 14-3 with 8:37 remaining in the half.
A little over four minutes later, the Paladins would find the end zone once again. Following another stellar defensive series, which saw the Paladins force a Tennessee Tech punt after only five plays, Furman's offense was set up in good stead following a 32-yard punt return from junior wideout Joshua Harris.
Roberto rumbled nine yards for a score five plays later, concluding the short 45-yard drive and giving the Paladins a 21-3 advantage with 4:32 remaining in the half.
The final fireworks of the opening half of the 2023 season, however, would be provided by the visitors from Cookeville, as the Golden Eagles used 11 plays to cover 75 yards, capped by a beautiful pitch-and-catch by Roberts to wideout Willie Miller for a 26-yard score to get the Golden Eagles back to within 11 with 46 seconds left in the opening half of play.
Furman’s defense would continue its will in the second half of play, continuing a theme that has become a calling card for defensive coordinator Duane Vaughn’s defensive over the past few seasons, and that is by making points scarce, thanks in large part to astute adjustments meticulously schemed at the intermission.
On this dark night, with helmets that were likely just as shiny as some of Charlemagne's knightly court, the Paladins rendered the Golden Eagles offense with Vaughn's patented golden goose egg on the scoreboard. Furman went on to outduel the Golden Eagles seemingly easily in the second half, outscoring the Golden Eagles, 24-0.
It was a sluggish third quarter, which saw both teams continue to sputter offensively, and neither was able to produce a long scoring drive in the opening 15-minute period of the second half. The lone points would come from Furman, as the Paladins kicked their first field goal of the 2023 season when redshirt junior Ian Williams, who missed a 58-yard field goal as time expired in the opening half of play, would easily convert the 32-yard chip shot field goal with just under four minutes remaining in the frame, fattening Furman’s advantage to two full touchdowns (24-10) at this juncture of the contest.
Williams’ 32-yard field goal attempt was enhanced by the Paladin special teams, which was set up by one of those six turnovers forced, and it started with beautiful 51-yard punt by Paladin punter Ryan Leahy, which drove the Golden Eagles return man Marcellus Jackson back inside 10, and that punt allowed a gaggle of black-clad Furman special-teamers to get a bead on the Tennessee Tech return man, with the initial hit and subsequent fumble having been caused by Paladin All-America safety Hugh Ryan and recovered by redshirt senior linebacker Nicky Kuzemka at the Tennessee Tech 12.
After the Paladin offense could generate nothing offensively, with the drive starting with an incomplete pass and false start infraction against the Paladins getting the drive off to a negative start. Following two more Huff incompletions, the Paladins were forced to settle for Williams’ 32-yard field goal attempt.
The Paladins would finish the football game in strong fashion, however, scoring 21 fourth-quarter points to close out their first victory of the 2023 season in emphatic fashion.
Following a three-and-out forced by the Furman defense early in the fourth period, the Paladin offense took over the football deep in its own end following a beautifully angled punt by Golden Eagles’ punter Nick Bigelow, and following the 49-yard boot, the Furman offense would take over the football at its own six.
It would end up leading to Furman’s most impressive offensive scoring drive of the evening, as the Paladin offense used 14 plays to cover 94 yards, which would be capped by Roberto’s second scoring rumble of the night, as he barrelled in from nine yards out to give Furman a seemingly comfortable 21-point, 31-10, lead with 7:34 remaining in the game.
With its proverbial backs against the wall, it was inevitable that the Paladin defense could anticipate a predictable outcome similar to how they started the night—a 42-yard pickoff return by Blackshear for a score—and that would fuel the Paladins’ opportunistic defense that could instinctually sense another Golden Eagle miscue was on the horizon.
Furman and linebacker Dan Scianna wouldn’t have long to wait, as on a 4th-and-3 play at its own 38, Tennessee Tech quarterback Ethan
Roberts back-pedaled and tossed the ball wildly out into the flat on the far side of the field looking his running back, who was not there, however, Scianna was and snagged the ball out of the air, avoided Roberts 10 yards later, allowing him a the time and space to complete Furman’s second pick-six of the night.
By the time Scianna reached paydirt 68 yards later, his closest competition in race to the end zone was his own teammate and veteran linebacker Braden Gilby, who provided him a nice security escort to pay dirt in helping give the Paladins a 28-point cushion (38-10) with 5:38 remaining.
Tennessee Tech’s final of its six turnovers in the contest, which came as a result of a fourth interception when new quarterback Jordyn Potts had his pass picked off by reserve free Jack Rhodes, giving the Paladin offense the ball back with just over five minutes remaining at the Golden Eagles 41.
It wouldn’t take the Paladin offense, which was now being led by backup signal-caller and Volunteer State native Carson Jones under center, to cover the needed 41 yards to find the end zone for the final time of the evening and produce the final margin. After a pair of rushes from Jayquan Smith yielded 13 yards and a first down, Jones completed his lone pass of the night—an 18-yard strike to senior Bailor Hughes—however, Hughes fumbled the ball in the process of fighting for extra yards, but thankfully, teammate and true freshman Colton Hinton was in the right spot at the right time to recover the loose ball and allowed the Paladins to maintain possession of the football at the Tennessee Tech seven yard line.
Two plays later, Smith ran it in from six yards out, running over a Golden Eagles defender on his way to paydirt, putting Furman’s final stamp of approval on the 2023 season opener, as Furman increased its lead to 45-10 following the Axel Lepvreau PAT with 2:41 remaining. Smith’s first TD as a Paladin would prove to be the final points of the night.
While it wasn’t an offensive masterpiece from Furman by any stretch, it was a game dominated from the outset by the Paladin ‘Death Dealers’ on defense, and on a night when Furman honored legendary hall-of-fame coach Dick Sheridan by wearing his initials “DS” on the back of their silver chrome helmets, it was fitting that the Paladin defense, which became known by the aforementioned moniker during Sheridan’s tenure as head coach as a byproduct of their physicality and dominance in the late 1970s and throughout the decade of the ‘80s.
Furman has an extra couple of days to rest before jumping back into action next Saturday to face the South Carolina Gamecocks in Columbia. Kickoff is set for 7:30 p.m. EST at Williams-Brice Stadium. The Paladins and Gamecocks will be meeting for the 50th time and first since the Gamecocks posted a 41-10 win at Williams-Brice Stadium back in 2014. The Gamecocks hold a 28-20-1 all-time series lead.
Postgame Press Conference
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