During coach Brian Bohannon’s mid-week press conference last Wednesday, he commented on the athletes the Edward Waters Tigers football team had and how they could be scary at times.
On Saturday at Fifth Third Bank Stadium, it was the Kennesaw State defense that displayed an abundance of athleticism and likely left plenty of Edward Waters’ players frightened from the ball-swarming antics of the Owls.
“Early in the game, our guys, they were flying around,” Bohannon said. “When you’ve got a bunch of guys flying around to the football, good things happen. It just looked like a bunch of black jerseys going 100 mph.”
The black jerseys attacked early on defense as senior Mason Harris got in the backfield on the third play of the game and forced a fumble deep inside Edward Waters territory. Sophomore linebacker Izzy Sam scooped the ball up and returned it to score the first touchdown ever at Fifth Third Bank Stadium.
“It was a great feeling because in my whole life, I’ve never scored before,” Sam said. “I played running back a little bit, but I was usually just blocking, and if I caught the ball I never scored. So, this was the first time.”
Early in the second quarter, another Kennesaw state player scored his first touchdown. Defensive back Derrick Farrow got in the backfield and laid a huge hit on the Edward Waters ball carrier, which sent the ball flying high into the air. Defensive lineman McKenzie Billingslea picked it up and ran it back 22 yards for the touchdown to put the Owls up 45-0.
“Derrick Farrow made an outstanding play that set me up,” Billingslea said. “This is my first touchdown.”
Even though Edward Waters ended up with over 200 yards of total offense in the game, the KSU defense was completely dominant in the first half when the starting unit was on the field.
The Tigers were limited to five rushing yards on 15 carries and 13 passing yards on seven attempts. With 18 total yards on 22 plays, Edward Waters didn’t have a single first down and were unable to cross midfield until the third quarter.
The stingy defense and forced turnovers by the KSU defense allowed the offense to have plenty of opportunities to put points on the board.
“Coach Newberry came up with a great defensive plan,” Farrow said. “We wanted to get the ball back to the offense as fast as possible.”
Possibly lost in the swarming KSU helmets and forced turnovers was how fundamentally sound the Owls looked defensively. While the players flying around and knocking the ball loose is what stands out after the game, a defense has to be disciplined and consistent with assignments to not allow a single first down in a half.
“Our goal for this game was to be very assignment-sound because last game we made a lot of mistakes on defense,” Sam said.
Despite all of the big plays defensively early in the game, the play that got the most attention from coach Bohannon came late in the third quarter by Derrick Farrow. It was Farrow’s second forced fumble in the game, but he had to run a lot farther for it.
Farrow ran across the field to chase down an Edward Waters ball carrier at the KSU 3-yard line to prevent the Tigers from scoring their first points. The Owls recovered the forced fumble and Farrow wiped out what would have been a 73-yard touchdown run for Edward Waters.
“Play of the game, no two ways about it, best play of the game,” Bohannon said. “I told him that when he came off the sideline. In a lot of situations, everybody would be like ‘he’s in, he scored,’ this kid hustled all the way down the field and raked the ball out and kept them from getting in the end zone. That’s who we’ve got to be here.”
