Football Set To Host Hoyas Under The Lights

Senior defensive end Denzel Paige and Georgetown wide receiver Marquis Wright are used to playing under the glare of Friday night lights, but that was four years ago, when they were on the same high school team at North Broward Prep.

Now they meet again, donning different uniforms and playing for different teams, but with the same excitement of a Friday night game. With a projected hurricane hitting the east coast this weekend, the atmosphere of the game may feel all too familiar for the Florida natives.

The Georgetown football team (2-2) will take on the Crimson squad (2-0, 1-0 Ivy League) in Harvard Stadium on Friday night. The retreat from the normal schedule of Saturday games means a shortened week of practice and the second night game at home for Harvard.

“It’s like any other week, but obviously there is a quick turnaround,” senior linebacker Jake Lindsey said. “There is more of a sense of urgency, but it’s the same schedule, same routine—just focus on getting better for the next game.”

In its first league matchup of the season, the Crimson dominated in all aspects of the game to deliver a trouncing to Brown, 53-27.

After such a convincing victory, it might be easy for a team to rest on its laurels and lose momentum going into a nonconference game, but not for Harvard.

“We only play 10 games. There are no playoffs, so next game, best game,” Lindsey said. “We are trying to go 3-0, then build upon that and hopefully win every game.”

According to Harvard coach Tim Murphy, the coaches and players see every game and every practice as simply an opportunity to improve and grow from the previous week’s performance.

“If you are staying the same, you are invisibly moving behind,” Murphy said. “We have to improve in all categories.”

The Hoyas are looking to dismantle the Crimson’s 16-game winning streak on their first visit to Cambridge, Mass. In last year’s matchup, Georgetown was unsuccessful in finding the end zone and fell to Harvard, 34-3.

Against the top-ranked FCS defense, the Hoyas were able to convert just 36 percent of their third downs.

Georgetown may be hard-pressed to move the chains again this weekend, when it faces a Harvard defense that didn’t allow any first downs to the Bears for the opening 21 minutes of last week’s game.

“[Last week was] just a confidence builder,” Lindsey said. “Against bad teams and even good teams, we have the ability to be very fundamental and also very accurate in how we play different schemes.”

But the Hoyas might have even more to worry about with an explosive Crimson offense that has put up 94 points over the last two games.

At the helm is senior quarterback Scott Hosch, who has completed 30 of 46 passes for 487 yards, six touchdowns, and only one interception this season.

The Georgetown defense will need to bring pressure against Hosch and close running lanes if it hopes to break the Crimson’s undefeated streak.

This may be a tall task for a team that gave up over 300 yards of offense—including 100 rushing yards—and 16 points in a close victory last week against a Columbia squad curently mired in a 23 game winless streak.

The Hoyas might be able to best the Crimson if they can protect the football Friday night. Georgetown has yet to drop a game when it does not turn the ball over.

But there’s a third player for this week’s matchup that may cause more turnovers than usual—the impending weather. With the threat of heavy rain, both teams will need to pay extra attention to protecting the football.

“We have been eyeing the forecast, and we see there might be a monsoon so we’ve changed the game plan a little,” said senior tight end Ben Braunecker. “We expect it to be pretty sloppy, not a lot of passing going on…. [We want to] keep it simple and try to out-physical them.”

Regardless of the weather, however, the team is excited to return to Friday night football.

“Our kids love night games,” Murphy said. “That’s how they grew up in high school football.”