By T. Scott Boatright
The “Cardiac Cats” were back at it Saturday night inside Eddie G. Robinson Football Stadium.
For a second straight week the Grambling State University football team played a barnburner that went down to the very end.
And for a second straight week, the Tigers won.
On Saturday, one week after winning a game in overtime, the Tigers again found themselves trailing with under two minutes remaining,
And for a second straight week, GSU’s defense made the plays it had to late in the game, lifting the Tigers to a 31-28 home win over East Texas A&M University.
Last week it was an overtime scoop-and-score that gave a win to the Tigers.
This time it was a defensive stop for the Tigers that forced the Lions to try a 49-yard field goal attempt that sailed wide left with 20 seconds remaining.
“I want to take my hat off to my coaches and players for fighting,” Joseph said. “Just keep fighting. We say don’t look at the scoreboard, just keep fighting until the scoreboard says zeros. So I want to take my hat off to them. It was a good win for us.
“We knew this was going to be an emotional game because it was an emotional game last year (in an overtime win for the Tigers at ETA&M). I have to do a better job of getting my kids to check their emotions, but I understand sometimes that when they’re being hit, they’re being punched and they’re getting their facemasks grabbed and it’s not being called — I just tell the players that they can’t worry about the things they can’t control. But happy for the win. We’ll go back and look at the film and then we’ll go to the 24-hour rule and move on to PV (Prairie View, next week’s opponent for the G-Men.”
The Lions controlled much of the first half, building a 14-0 lead before Marquel Linzer picked off a ETA&M pass at the Lions 18-yard line with 1:25 left on the second quarter clock.
Three plays later GSU quarterback C’zavian Teasett fired an 11-yard scoring strike to tight end Codavis Knighten to put the Tigers on the scoreboard with 59 seconds left in the first half and cut East Texas A&M’s halftime advantage to seven points at 14-7.
Joseph said he was proud of his two-minute offense to close out the first half.
“It’s a situation that we work on every week,” Joseph said. “We work that every Thursday. Every Thursday we work that. Our kids are comfortable in the two-minute situation. We were surprised that they came out and threw it.”
Grambling tied things up early in the third quarter thanks to a ball snapped over the head of the ETA&M punter that rolled to the Lions’ 2-yard line.
The Lions’ punter ran back to the ball and kicked it out of the back of the end zone. After a referees conference they flagged the ETA&M punter for an illegal, marking the ball half the distance from the original spot, which was the 2, giving the G-Men a first-and-goal at the 1-yard line.
But three plays later — two gain runs by Tre Bradord and Byron Eaton Jr. with an incomplete pass sandwiched in between on second down — Teasett disappeared into a pile at the goal line on a quarterback sneak.
And that pile of humanity was pushed forward just enough so that when officials finally unpiled the group, Teasett stood up in the front of the end zone holding the football to tie the game at 14-14 at the 11:10 mark of the third quarter.
The teams then traded touchdowns on their ensuing offensive drives — the Lions scoring on a 26-yard pass before Eaton burst up the middle to open space and raced 54 yards to the end zone to tie the game at 21-21 with 5:10 left in the third.
“He’s 10-5 all day,” Joseph said about Eaton. “Kid played quarterback in high school. He’s just learning how to play the running back position. He can’t do anything but get better. Remember, all those backs are redshirt freshmen — (graduate student) Tre Bradford is the only 23-year-old in there. Everybody else is about 19 years old. So they’re going to get better.
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The Lions moved back on top with a 6-yard touchdown run making the score 28-21 in their favor with 13:24 left in the contest before GSU kicker Theodore Caballero booted a 41-yard field goal to cut the ETA&M lead to 28-24 with 10:54 remaining.
After holding the Lions to a three-and-out, Teasett directed a 77-yard drive culminating with a 1-yard TD dash to the right side that put the Tigers on top 31-28 with 1:56 remaining.
Taking over at the ETA&M 25-yard line after a touchback kickoff, Lions quarterback Eric Rodriguez, who escaped a fierce GSU pass rush for much of the game save for two sacks, used his scrambling ability to buy enough time to complete a pair of passes to move to the GSU 48.
“Boy, he was shifty,” Joseph said about Rodriguez. “He gave us some problems. We knew he’s a runner. But he’s also a good general of the offense. We’ve got to do a better job of containing (quarterbacks like Rodriguez).
On second-and-15, it was ruled Rodriguez had completed a pass that was fumbled, turning the ball over to the Tigers.
But after further video review, that play was overturned and the Lions kept the football.
“We thought it was a fumble,” Joseph said of the called catch and fumble for ETA&M that was overturned. “I guess they said he was bobbling it so it was an incompleted pass.
“But (the GSU defense) just kept getting after it. They just kept going. The D-line kept going. I challenged the D-line with the rotations and getting after the quarterback. And they did a great job.
They drove as deep as the Grambling 35-yard line before trying a 52-yard field goal on a fourth-and-10 with 22 seconds remaining.
Teasett took the snap and knelt on the ensuing play as the Tigers climbed to 3-1 with the win.
“We’re on the right side (of the scoreboard) again,” Joseph said. “I know there’s a lot of people out there that don’t like how we’re winning. But we don’t care. Either you’re 100% with us, or you’re not with us at all. All that fake support, we don’t need it. Stay away from us. That’s bad energy. We’re teaching our kids and coaches to fight ‘til the end.”
Teasett finished 14-of-26 passing for 179 yards and a score while adding 13 yards and another touchdown on the ground.
Eaton led the Tigers with 69 rushing yards on six carries while George Tyson led GSU in receptions with three for 59 yards.
Defensively, Grambling was led by Jamal Jordan with eight tackles while Bryce Cage added seven.
Next up for the Tigers will be a 6 p.m. game next Saturday against Prairie View A&M, which is 2-2 after defeating visiting Northwestern State 27-24 on Saturday, at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas.
