Fort Valley State 35, Edward Waters 14

October 13, 2007

Fort Valley, GA-Pierre Brown rushed for a game high 120 yards and quarterbacks Garrett Williams and Nate Samas threw for three touchdowns to lead the Fort Valley State University Wildcats to a 35-14 win over the visiting Tigers of Edward Waters College. The game, which was FVSU’s Homecoming, was played before an estimated overflow crowd of 10,037.

Fort Valley (6-2) got on the board first when Jerel Hall caught a 9-yard pass from Williams with :13 seconds left in the opening quarter. That made the score 7-0. The second quarter was all Fort Valley as the Wildcats reeled of 21 unanswered points to put the game away. Ivan Diggs returned a fumble 45 yards for a touchdown, then Williams threw his second touchdown strike of the day when he connected with Nate Randall on a 6-yard pass. Chris Watson closed out the scoring when he plunged to pay dirt from a yard out with 2:27 left. The key play of that drive was a 52-yard pass play from Williams to Antwonis Cutts that put the ball on the 1-yard line. Jake Grubbs kicked all three extra points, and the Wildcats were up 28-0 at the half.

Nate Samas, who relieved Williams for most of the second half at quarterback, closed the scoring for FVSU when he found Melvin Atueyi open in the secondary for a 31 yard touchdown pass. Grubbs’ PAT was true, and with 13:05 left in the fourth quarter, the Wildcats had a 35-0 lead.

Edward Waters (2-5) averted the shutout when Terrance Bethel threw a 13 yard touchdown pass to Yaqoob Thurston with 9:23 left in the period. That completed the only sustained drive of the day for the Tigers which covered 67 yards on nine plays. The two point play was successful to make the score 35-8 FVSU. Bethel put Edward Waters’ final points on the board when he threw a pass to Antonio Grier that was deflected by a Wildcat defender. That play covered 28 yards with 1:13 left. Fort Valley got the ball back and just ran out the clock.

Fort Valley’s defense held Edward Waters to 201 yards on the afternoon while the offense rolled up a season High 403 yards against Edward Waters’ defense. Brent McCullough led the way for the FVSU defense with eight tackles. The FVSU victory also secured second year head coach Deondri Clark his first winning season.