maly, too: Drake's 'Defensive Line Has the Opportunity To Be Special'

Saturday, April 20, 2013

Drake's 'Defensive Line Has the Opportunity To Be Special'

Drake's White squad defeated the Blue, 7-3, in the Bulldogs’ annual Blue & White Game at Drake Stadium on Saturday afternoon.

The game consisted of two complete rosters playing four 8-minute quarters of live action with special teams situations being simulated.

As expected, the veteran defenses for both teams stole the show with 15 total sacks on the afternoon against offensive lines that have faced injuries all spring and quarterbacks in non-contact jerseys. Brett Park (Olivette, Mo.), who missed most of 2012 with injury, paced the White squad with five tackles and two sacks. Brandon Coleman (Cary, Ill.) recorded two sacks as well for the White team.

“Our defensive line has the opportunity to be special,” coach Chris Creighton said. “I don’t know that we’re there right now, but in my five years here our defensive line has always provided leadership and I think we’re going to be looking to those guys to be leaders in our football program this year.”

The Blue team’s defense was led by cornerback Evan Erickson (Lafayette, Colo.) with four tackles and two tackles for loss while Bob Quilico, Jr. (Schaumburg, Ill.) and Brad Duwe (Dubuque) each had four tackles.

“I think our defense looked good today and our only turnover of the day came at the very end of the game,” Creighton said. “Defense and turnovers win games, so I was happy to see the ball not being turned over and great defense being played.”

Both offenses sputtered initially as they struggled to find their rhythm, but the White squad got in gear towards the end of the first quarter as Andy Rice (Stevens Point, Wis.) found Neko Graf (Racine, Wis.) down the sideline for a 45-yard diving touchdown grab. Cam Bohnnert (Edmond, Okla.) tacked on the extra point for the day’s only touchdown following a drive that covered 79 yards on nine plays.

Rice finished the day by completing 11 of his 19 attempts for 111 yards with no interceptions. Freshman tight end Eric Saubert (Hoffman Estates, Ill.) was his favorite target with four catches for 22 yards. Michael Hudson (Urbandale) also saw time under center for the White squad and completed one of his three passes for nine yards.

“At the quarterback position, we got better throughout the spring, all three of them did,” Creighton said of his three quarterbacks competing for the starting position.

The Blue team’s only score of the day came off a 30-yard Spencer Lee (Johnston) field goal that capped a 9-play, 66-yard drive. Nick Ens (Grand Rapids, Mich.) quarterbacked the Blue team and had 11 completions on 26 attempts for 175 yards with an interception.

J.T. Teague (Carrollton, Texas) caught four balls from Ens for 73 yards while Zach Zlabis (Wheaton, Ill.) caught two passes for 68 yards. Senior tight end Kevin Marshall (Glen Ellyn, Ill.) also had six catches for 31 yards and rushed once for 18 yards and a first-down.

Ens engineered a late drive into White territory during the final minute of the contest with a the 7-3 deficit. However, with 35 seconds left, Seth Hedman (Tulsa, Okla.) picked Ens off on the 10-yard line and returned the ball 17-yards to seal the victory for the White squad.

During halftime, former Drake great and NFL Pro-Bowl kicker Billy Cundiff competed against Drake students in a field goal kicking competition to raise funds for Colleen’s Dream. The organization’s goal is to raise funds and awareness for ovarian cancer detection and treatment. It is named in honor of Cundiff’s mother-in-law who recently succumbed to ovarian cancer following a five-year battle with the disease.

With spring practices over, the Bulldogs will return to the weight room to continue offseason workouts in preparation for defending their back-to-back Pioneer Football League titles in the fall. The 2013 season begins on Aug. 29 against Grand View at Drake Stadium.

	1^st Quarter	2^nd Quarter	3^rd Quarter	4^th Quarter	Final
White	7	0	0	0	7
Blue	0	3	0	0	3

Scoring

1^st Quarter

White – Neko Graf 45-yard pass from Andy Rice (Bohnert kick)

2^nd Quarter

Blue – Spencer Lee 30-yard field goal

White Statistical Leaders

White Passing Stats

Andy Rice – 19 attempts, 11 completions, 111 yards, 0 INT, 1 TD

Michael Hudson – 3 attempts, 1 completion, 9 yards, 0 INT, 0 TD

White Rushing Stats

T. J. James – 6 carries, 1 yard

A.J. Washington – 3 carries, 2 yards

White Receiving Stats

Eric Saubert – 4 catches, 22 yards

Brett Seeger – 3 catches, 9 yards

Dan Hohenstein – 2 catches, 10 yards

Neko Graf – 1 catch, 45 yards, 1 TD

Stephen Covalt – 1 catch 24 yards

White Defensive Stats

Brett Park – 5 tackles, 1 sack

Colton Rodgers – 3 tackles, 1 sack

Rory Driscoll – 3 tackles

Dustin Davis – 3 tackles

Seth Hedman – 2 tackles, 1 INT

Brandon Coleman – 2 tackles, 2 sacks

Blue Statistical Leaders

Blue Passing Stats

Nick Ens – 26 attempts, 11 completions, 175 yards, 1 INT, 0 TD

Blue Rushing Stats

Brad Troyer – 13 carries, 15 yards

Kevin Marshall – 1 carry, 18 yards

Blue Receiving Stats

Kevin Marshall – 4 catches, 31 yards

J.T. Teague – 4 catches, 73 yards

Zach Zlabis – 2 catches, 68 yards

A.J. Washington – 1 catch, 9 yards

Alex Cecena – 1 catch, 6 yards

Blue Defensive Stats

Evan Erickson – 4 tackles, 2 TFL

Bob Quilico, Jr. – 4 tackles

Brad Duwe – 4 tackles

John Hugunin – 3 tackles, TFL, PBU

Mike Cardamone – 3 tackles, TFL

Neal Walters – 2 tackles, 2 sacks

Matt Acree – 2 tackles, 1 sack

[This story was written for Ron Maly by Ty Patton, Drake's assistant athletic director for communications].

JOLTIN' JOE GOT IT STARTED

When Ron Maly was a kid in Cedar Rapids, he wanted to enter an essay contest, and he did. He wrote about Joe DiMaggio of the New York Yankees being his favorite baseball player. For finishing second in the contest, Ron won a Louisville Slugger baseball bat autographed by DiMaggio. Ron later wanted to be the first person in his family to attend college, and he was. He earned a degree in political science from the University of Iowa, and did what all political science majors do. He became a sportswriter. He had, after all, covered high school football, basketball and baseball games for the Cedar Rapids Gazette while he worked parttime during his university days. Ron wanted to sit in the press box and write about an Iowa-Minnesota football game, and he did. It happened while he was the sports editor at the Albert Lea [Minn.] Tribune, and the game was at Memorial Stadium in Minneapolis. Ron wanted to cover a World Series, and he did. Also when he was working for the Albert Lea newspaper. Ron wanted to cover Rose Bowls, Sugar Bowls, Orange Bowls, Cotton Bowls, Holiday Bowls, a Freedom Bowl, a Sun Bowl, a Super Bowl and NCAA basketball tournaments, and he did those things after he moved to Des Moines. Ron was a four-time sportswriter of the Year in the state of Iowa [the years were 1977, 1978, 1994 and 1996]. In 2006, he was named a charter member of the University of Iowa's media Wall of Fame in the Kinnick Stadium press box. A photo of the plaque that's displayed in the press box is displayed above this story. Following Ron's retirement from the newspaper business, a publisher asked him if he wanted to write a book about the rich football tradition at the University of Iowa, and he did. The hardback version of "Tales from the Iowa Sidelines" was a best-seller, and so was the revised, softback version. Now he's been asked by his publisher to update the book for a second time. He's in the process of doing that at the present time. Ron considers being asked to update a best-selling book for the second time to be the supreme compliment, considering the Hawkeyes won just four games in the 2012 season. When Ron isn't working on books, he's busy traveling and spending time with his family. Indeed, he attends the athletic, theatrical and musical [both vocal and instrumental] events in which his six grandchildren participate. He also writes about anything that interests him for his many websites. Every chance he gets, Ron proudly wears his America Needs Farmers T-shirt.

The Hawkeyes' Rich Football Tradition, Revisited

I mentioned a while back that I was in the process of updating my Tales from the Iowa Sidelines book. Updating it for the second time. The original hardback edition of Tales from the Iowa Sidelines [pictured at the right] was published in 2003, during the 10-3 season, when coach Kirk Ferentz and his Iowa football team had a 10-3 record that included a 37-17 victory over 15th-ranked Florida in the Outback Bowl and after the Hawkeyes went 11-2 in 2002. That book was a best-seller, so the publishers came to me again in 2005, a season that finished with a breathtaking 30-25 victory over No. 11 Louisiana State in the Capital One Bowl on New Year's Day, 2005. Because buyers had cleaned out the the shelves in the bookstores, the publishers wanted to know if I'd do an updated version of the book. I agreed, The revised, soft-cover edition [pictured at the left] was published in 2005. Warren Holloway, who teamed with quarterback Drew Tate on a miraculous 56-yard touchdown pass to win the Capital One Bowl, was featured on the cover. That book, too, turned into a best-seller, So I had reason to feel very good about my years as a published author. It's not every day that a the original version is a best-seller, and so is the updated version. Then, imagine my surprise when I received an e-mail from a senior editor at the publishing company last fall, wanting wanted to know if I was interested in doing a second updated version of the book. It came at a time when things weren't going well for the Hawkeyes in the 2012 season. They lost their last six games and finished with a 4-8 record. Frankly, the thought of doing a revised edition of the book during a 4-8 season seemed to be a stretch. "Maybe producing a revised edition in a year or two would be a better idea," I told the publishers. "We'd like to do it now," I was told. "Let me think about it," I said. After a few days of thought, I accepted the idea. I talked myself into the idea that this was the supreme compliment--being asked to do a second book update during a 4-8 season showed strong confidence by the publishers in me and in the Hawkeyes' football program. So I got back into the business of interviewing players and coaches again, going to postgame press conferences, weekly press conferences and a scrimmage in West Des Moines. After a press conference in Iowa City, I did a one-on-one interview with coach Kirk Ferentz, and mentioned to him that I was in the process of doing a revised edition of my two best-selling books. I congratulated him on the excellent things he had done for Iowa's football program--all of which contributed to the success of my books. "I think Coach Fry had more to do with it," he told me, bringing up the name of Hayden Fry, his one-time boss at Iowa and a man who brought Iowa's football program back from the dead in the 20th century. That's modest Kirk Ferentz for you. Even though the 2012 season wasn't something Hawkeye coaches, players and fans will recall with any special feeling, Ferentz has a 14-year record of 100-74 at Iowa that includes two 11-victory seasons [2002 smd 2009], two 10-victory seasons [2003 and 2004], plus he's been the Big Ten coach of year in 2002, 2004 and 2009, and national coach of the year in 2002. Indeed, Ferentz has done some wonderful things at Iowa City, and I fully expect his success to continue. I've concluded my writing for the second update of Tales from the Iowa Sidelines, and the senior editor has furnished me with an early look at the book. Not only are the Kirk Ferentz years included in the updated version, but so is the stuff I previously wrote about Howard Jones, Dr. Eddie Anderson, Heisman Trophy winner Nile Kinnick and the 1939 Hawkeye Ironmen, Ronald Reagan, Ozzie Simmons, Ossie Solem, Randy Duncan, Alex Karras and lots of other legends from Iowa's rich football history. I expect the book to be in stores soon. I hope you like it.