By Chris Johnson, Connect Bridgeport
Bridgeport – On the surface, 51 rushing yards for Princeton’s Marquel Lowe and 58 for Brodee Rice might not seem like that big of a deal.
However, when you have a duo in the passing game like Grant Cochran and Dominick Collins, anything you get in the running game certainly helps keep an opposing defense on its toes.
Class AAA No. 5 Bridgeport’s stout run defense never really got comfortable on Friday night at Wayne Jamison Field and that as much as anything else helped the No. 13 Tigers hold on for a 34-29 upset victory.
“It’s a big win for our program,” Princeton coach Chris Pedigo said. “Since I’ve been here we were 4-26 the first three years, we’ve made the playoffs the last two years. We’re still learning how to finish but I thought we finished tonight. It wasn’t pretty but that’s because Bridgeport is a phenomenal program.”
The Indians made it interesting late in the fourth quarter after falling behind 34-16.
Ty Martin scored on a 41-yard touchdown run to pull Bridgeport within 11 with 4:21 to play. The BHS defense promptly forced a three-and-out and with less than a minute left, Zach Rohrig scored on a 1-yard touchdown run to make it 34-29.
Bridgeport attempted a two-point conversion to try and get within a field goal with the hopes of recovering an onside kick. The conversion failed but at first glance it appeared the Indians recovered the onside kick and had the ball around midfield with about 50 seconds left.
The Indians were called for an illegal touching penalty, the Tigers took over and took three snaps out of the victory formation to secure the win and improve to 5-2.
Untimely penalties and turnovers (Bridgeport had three, while Princeton had zero) are two things BHS coach Tyler Phares has been stressing that his team needed to clean up before it cost them.
“Their run game was definitely improved this year,” Phares said. “Missing tackles in space has been a problem for us. We’ve got to do a better job there. But credit to them for being able to run the ball on us.
“We didn’t take a week off (Bridgeport was coming off a bye). We worked to get better and clean those things up. Missed tackles, untimely penalties, dropped snaps, you can’t do it.”
Cochran completed 17-of-24 passes for 176 yards and three touchdown passes to Collins. The senior quarterback helped out in the run game as well, actually leading the Tigers with 60 yards rushing, the majority of which came on a 59-yard designed keeper on the second play of the second half.
The Tigers were down 10-7 at the half, but following Cochran’s run, Run scored on a 14-yard run and they took the lead for good.
Princeton proceed to recover an onside kick and seven plays later, Collins caught an 8-yard touchdown pass and Bridgeport’s 10-7 lead was all of a sudden a 20-10 deficit with 8:34 left in the third.
Rohrig, who finished with 178 yards on 22 carries, made it a one possession game at 20-16 with a 33-yard touchdown run and 6 minutes still to play in the third.
Things got a little wacky after that.
On fourth-and-8, Princeton was forced to punt. A 5-yard roughing the kicker call on Bridgeport gave the Tigers a fourth-and-3 situation. They elected to decline the penalty and Bridgeport took over on its own 12.
They didn’t get very far and quickly were faced with a fourth-and-2 situation from their own 20. Bridgeport has went for it in similar situations all season long (the Indians have only punted eight times in eight games) and made it. This time they did not as Rice brought down Rohrig for a loss of 4.
The Indians’ defense held Princeton to a field goal attempt from 32 yards but a bad snap resulted in a loss of 11 and the Indians had the ball right back.
Two plays later though the Indians fumbled it right back to the Tigers and this time Cochran capitalized with a 12-yard scoring strike to Collins.
The turnover bug continued to bite BHS as on its next snap from scrimmage, Brad Mossor intercepted a pass to set up Rice’s second TD run, this one from a yard out and a 34-16 lead.
Last year, in the first-ever meeting between the schools, Princeton abandoned the run game rather early and the Indians cruised to a 42-7 victory. The Tigers seemed determined right from the beginning that wouldn’t be the case this season.
“Even in our two losses this year we weren’t able to establish a run game,” Pedigo said. “Tonight I thought we did a good job of establishing a run game. I’m proud of our linemen, proud of our backs and the way we executed.”
After each defense forced a punt on the opening drives of the games, Bridgeport and Princeton then traded touchdowns.
The Indians struck first as a Rohrig run of 27 set up a 5-yard touchdown run by Charlie Brazier. Taylor Thomas’ first of two PAT kicks made it 7-0.
Princeton countered with a five-play drive. Marquel Lowe had runs of 8, 12 and 14 yards before Grant Cochran hit Dom Collins in stride for a 31-yard touchdown pass. Casey Geso booted the extra point to tie it at 7.
The majority of the rest of the first half was controlled by each team’s defense.
The Tigers stuffed Rohrig at the line of scrimmage on a fourth-down run play to force a turnover on downs. BHS returned the favor on the ensuing drive as Cale Culicerto broke up a pass attempt to Collins on fourth-and-3.
Bridgeport advanced to the red zone on its next possession but a Reed fumble on the 10th play of the drive was recovered by Princeton’s Carter Meachum.
The Tigers proceeded to turn the ball over on downs again the give the Indians the ball on their own 35 with 1:13 left in the first half.
Maybe not necessarily known for being a hurry-up offense, the BHS single wing wasted little time getting down the field. Brazier had a run of 19, Reed followed with a pick up of 10 to get to Princeton’s side of the field. A Rohrig run of 11 gave the Indians first-and-goal from the 10 with 14 seconds left.
A run of 4 from Brazier moved to clock to 3.8 seconds and the Tribe brought on Thomas who kicked a 23-yard field goal as time expired for the 10-7 halftime lead.
Bridgeport finished with 418 yards of total offense, while Princeton had 321.
Complementing Rohrig in the rushing attack for the Indians, Reed finished with 79 yards on 18 carries, Brazier had 62 on nine attempts and Martin added 51 yards on three attempts.
Including his three TDs, Collins caught five passes for 69 yards, Mossor also caught five passes and finished with 59 yards
Stats provided by Princeton
