Page 13 - Florida Sentinel 11-15-16 Online Edition

Black College Sports
FAMU’s Freshman QB Pushes Team To Another Win
TALLAHASSEE, FL– Red- shirt freshman quarterback Ryan Stanley fired two touch- down passes in a three-minute span late in the fourth quarter to help lift Florida A&M past Morgan State, 22-21 in a Mid- Eastern Athletic Conference game at Bragg Stadium Satur- day evening.
Stanley, the Pembroke Pines, Florida product who has led FAMU (4-6, 4-3 MEAC) to four wins in his six collegiate starts.
The redshirt freshman fin- ished the game with 264 pass- ing yards on 25 of 42 passes, with three touchdowns against one interception. He also rushed 15 times for 59 yards, giving him 323 total yards Sat- urday.
The sluggish Rattlers seemed out of sync until their backs were against the wall in the fourth, trailing a struggling Morgan State (2-7, 2-5 MEAC) squad, 21-9 headed into the fourth period.
FAMU QB Ryan Stanley has led the team to 4 wins since starting.
third scoring toss, a two-yard aerial to Brandon Norwood, putting the Rattlers ahead for the first time in the game.
Stanley drove the Rattlers 80 yards in six plays capping things off with a 29-yard swing pass to speedy Bowers, who raced through the Morgan de- fense for the touchdown.
The Rattler Nation faithful turned out 16,879 strong to send off the 12 seniors and the Rattler Football team as a whole toward their final regular sea- son game next Saturday in Or- lando against archrival
Bethune-Cookman
Devin Bowers led FAMU
on the ground with 88 yards on 18 carries, while he caught three passes for 47 yards.
The four FAMU wins is the most for the Rattlers since their 4-7 finish in 2012, and a win Saturday against Bethune- Cookman would push them to five victories, the most for the Rattlers since 2011 (7-4).
Saturday’s win vaulted the Rattlers into fourth place in the MEAC at 4-3, behind North Carolina A&T and NCCU (both 7-0), and Hampton (5-2).
FAMU made its’ move, aided
by the Rattler Defense, which
forced a turnover deep in Mor-
gan territory, when Auburn with 5:40 left on Stanley’s transfer end Raashad Ken-
nion shook the ball loose from
Bear quarterback Chris An-
drews on the MSU 23.
Four plays later, Stanley tossed an 11-yard strike to St. Petersburg native, Devin Bow- ers to cut the deficit to 21-16 with 8:55 left.
The Rattler defense would force Morgan to punt after a stirring stand aided by a rau- cous Bragg Stadium crowd, whose noise levels caused a
false start, and seemed to un- nerve the Bears.
Bethune-Cookman And FAMU Go Into This Weekend’s Classic Almost Evenly Matched
FAMU would take the lead
The Florida Classic is more than just a football game and more than an in-state rivalry. It is now the top attended game in NCAA Division I-AA, as well as the nation’s largest football game between two Historically Black College/University (HBCU) schools, so losing for either team is not an option.
The Rivalry began in 1925.
Despite FAMU’s early dom- inance in the series overall (at one point, the Rattlers won 19 straight), the two schools drew ever-increasing crowds.
The FAMU Rattlers will close the 2016 regular season seeking to end a five-game los- ing slide in the Florida Blue Florida Classic to archrival Bethune-Cookman. BCU has one other game to play after the Classic.
In that first “Florida Classic” game in Tampa in 1978, Florida A&M turned a 17-0 halftime deficit into a scintil- lating come-from-behind 27- 17 win en route to the inaugural NCAA Division 1-AA title.
In 1997, the two schools moved the Florida Classic to Orlando.
Florida A&M holds a 20-10 edge in the meetings since the instate rivalry moved from a home-and-home scenario to an annual neutral site spectac- ular.
Overall,theRattlersleadthe series, 48-15-1.
The game will be tele- vised by ESPN Classic and ESPN3.com, starting at 2:30 p.m. from Camping World Stadium in Or- lando.
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