Dukes Put it Together, Down Tribe

It’s Homecoming Week!  And as hard as it would’ve been to believe when we left Bridgeforth a couple weeks back after a lackluster opener against CCSU, the Dukes are coming home 3-1 after back-to-back road wins over ranked teams after taking down William & Mary 20-14 last night.  And even crazier, there are signs the old Dukes swagger the program seemed to have misplaced the last two years is coming back!

One more laugh at the Griffin everyone.

But before we get carried away getting excited for this coming weekend, a little wrapup from last night’s game.  Solid straight game story can be found here.  Yes, the Dukes caught a few breaks last night (dropped TD catch, botched FG, and catching WM in the middle of a four-alarm QB crisis), but after the Tribe’s strong opening drive, the D stepped up big time to clamp down on the CAA’s best player in RB Jonathan Grimes.  In typical Dukes fashion, they made us all sweat the whole way through a late Tribe comeback attempt, but don’t let the score or the naysayers fool you on this one.  JMU was dominant last night on both sides of the ball in a way we haven’t seen in way too long.  Deeper, more physical, and more athletic all over the field.  Getting Latney in the mix at RB added a new dimension to the running game and they found ways to get Kerby Long the ball in space.  JT seems to be getting his legs back under him as well and was  a threat to run all night.

But it was the old JMU attitude that came right through the non-HD screen (complete with the un-PC Tribe logo WITH feathers on Comcast) and emboldened hopes that this season may be starting to get on track!  The D, led by Robertson and Middleton, was just stifling and came to hit.  And I have to grudgingly admit I loved the stubborn old MM playcalling for numerous reasons for once!  The Dukes had a two-score lead for huge stretches of this game, the rain was torrential for most of the third quarter, and they seemed to be able to knock the Tribe off the line and pick up four or five yards at will.  Oh yeah, and they also beat W&M last year attempting one lonely pass.  If ain’t broke, don’t fix it.  You just know Mickey loved a gameplan where JMU only attempted four passes!

Ok, now we can move on to freaking out about how the hell JMU”s going to stop UR wideout Tre Gray next week and planning for some serious cooler rustlin’ during a huge HC tailgate in P-Lot!