Monmouth University’s once-promising season has been reduced to playing out the string after suffering its third loss in a row, falling 33-20 to New Hampshire Saturday at Wildcat Stadium in Durham.
With two games left in the season, both against ranked teams, the outcome of these games will depend on just how much pride this team can muster and its ability to overcome adversity. From fast-tracking to the FCS playoffs to being on the outside looking in, Monmouth’s rapid descent has been as frustrating as it has been mind-boggling.
Monmouth’s once prolific offense continued to struggle to find any rhythm Saturday. It was again plagued by turnovers, dropped balls by its receivers, and another subpar performance by star quarterback Derek Robertson, who had a season-low 198 passing yards, completing just 17 of 34 passes with two touchdowns.
“I think you have to give New Hampshire a lot of credit, especially for the way they played,” said Monmouth head coach Kevin Callahan. “I thought they had the upper hand most of the day, and they took advantage of their opportunities and made us pay for them.”
Fourteen of New Hampshire’s 33 points came after fumbles by Monmouth that gave the Wildcats a short field.
With the score knotted at 7-7 early in the second quarter, Monmouth’s defense forced a New Hampshire punt after a three-and-out, but Makhi Green muffed it with the Wildcats recovering at the Hawks five-yard line. Two plays later, quarterback Seth Morgan connected with wideout Logan Tomlinson, who finished with ten receptions for 115 yards and was a torn in Monmouth’s side all day, for the touchdown and a 14-7 lead.
New Hampshire returned the favor on the Hawks’ ensuing possession. A false start penalty on first down led to a Monmouth three-and-out and a Luke Schabel punt. Joey Corcoran then muffed the punt, with Monmouth recovering at the Wildcats’ 28-yard line. Four plays later, Monmouth running back Sone Ntoh ran it in from 19 yards out for his 21st rushing touchdown of the year to tie the game at 14-14.
The Wildcats added a field goal on their next possession to make it a 17-14 game.
Then, on first down on the Hawks’ ensuing possession, Rodney Nelson ripped off a pretty 21-yard run but fumbled while trying to stretch it out. New Hampshire recovered at the Hawks’ 46-yard line, but on third-and-11, end Mile Mitchell sacked Morgan for a nine-yard loss, forcing a punt.
Later, towards the end of the third quarter, with the Hawks still in it at 23-14, Robertson completed a pass to tight end Marcus Middleton for six yards, but he fumbled at the Hawks’ 27-yard line with New Hampshire recovering. Five plays later, running back Denzell Gibson ran it in from 11-yard out for a 30-14 lead with 14 seconds left in the third quarter.
“You just can’t give them short fields,” said Callahan. “That was 21 points right there.”
New Hampshire had starting positions at the Monmouth five, 46 and 27-yard lines and the UNH 43-yard line with three out of four of those possessions resulting in touchdowns.
Despite the 33 New Hampshire points on the day, Monmouth’s defense played a pretty good game at times; they just couldn’t get off the field or keep them out of the end zone. New Hampshire ground it out with scoring drives consuming 15, 13, 12, 10, and nine-play drives, and they more than doubled Monmouth’s time of possession, 41:37 to 18:23. However, the defense allowed just 335 total yards by New Hampshire, well below its average.
“I thought there were times when the defense played pretty well, but we couldn’t get off the field,” said Callahan. “And they were able to eat up the clock. On New Hampshire’s first possession of the second half, I think they went eight-plus minutes on that drive and ended up scoring on it, and that just reduces the time we have left to answer it. It wasn’t like they were picking up big chunks of yardage; they were just able to move the chains. I haven’t looked at the third-down conversions yet, but I bet it was pretty high.”
New Hampshire converted on 7-of-18 third down plays, while Monmouth was good on just 4-of-14. The Wildcats were also a perfect 7-for-7 in red zone scoring.
Monmouth’s offense didn’t help the cause. Through three quarters, their longest drive was six plays, twice. They had possessions of 4, 3, 4, 1,3,1, 3, and 3 plays before putting together an 11-play, 70-yard scoring drive to start the fourth quarter that pulled them with 10, 30-20. Robertson connected with wideout Tra Neal for an eight-yard touchdown, but Robertson’s pass for a two-point conversion failed.
New Hampshire then added a field goal on a 15-play, 62-yard scoring drive that took 7:10 off the clock.
With the score now 33-20 with 4:55 left in the game, Monmouth still had an outside shot at the win and quickly drove to the New Hampshire 17-yard line. However, on first down, Robertson’s perfect pass to wideout Maxwell James for what looked like a sure touchdown was dropped. Then, two plays later, T.J. Speight, who scored on a 36-yard shovel pass in the first quarter to tie the game at 7-7, dropped a Robertson pass at the five-yard line on third down. Robertson’s fourth-down pass fell incomplete, and New Hampshire then ran out the last 2:48 with one first down and three straight kneel-downs.
“They were nothing different than what we had seen,” added Callahan. “They just did a better job than we did. They make it very hard to get anything consistent going, and they’ve got a really solid unit front to back.”
Monmouth’s record now falls to 4-6 overall and 2-4 in the conference, while New Hampshire moves to 6-4 overall and 4-2 in the conference.
