Sept. 26, 2009
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Final Stats | Photo Gallery 
EASTON, Pa. -"Faith," "Strength" and "Courage" are three words written in permanent marker on Davis Rodriguez's right shoe. It took all three for the junior kicker from St. Petersburg, Fla. to leave a permanent impression on the Fisher Stadium faithful. Rodriguez, who had missed a 37-yard potential game-winning field goal in the fourth quarter, came through in overtime with a 28-yard field goal to clinch a 20-17 win over Penn on Saturday night.
The Leopards (2-1) have won three straight against Penn (0-2), whose other loss came vs. No. 2 Villanova. The last time Lafayette won three straight in the series was 1978-82 when Lafayette captured four in a row.
In the Leopards' first overtime game since 2001, Lafayette won the toss and chose to go on defense first. Lafayette forced a 32-yard field goal attempt by Andrew Samson that went wide left.
When Lafayette took over, Tyrell Coon rushed for seven yards on 2nd-and-4 to move the ball to the 13-yard line. Lafayette managed to pick up only three more yards and Rodriguez was forced to kick a 28-yarder in a steady rainfall.
The snap by center Michael Wojcik and the hold by Chris Cosgrove were clean and the ball sailed through the uprights for the victory. It was Rodriguez's second game-winning kick vs. the Quakers, as he helped the Leopards' capture an 8-7 victory at Penn's Franklin Field on Sept. 15, 2007.
In the first quarter on the Leopards' second possession of the game, QB Rob Curley (18-for-27, 208 yards and two TDs) helped march the Leopards down to Penn's 30-yard line before. The Quakers' Joe Goniprow broke through and sacked Curley for a loss of nine yards. Curley responded on the next play when he tucked the ball and dashed for an 18-yard first down to Penn's 21-yard line.
WR Mark Layton continued his breakout season by capping off the 70-yard drive with an over-the-shoulder, 19-yard catch in the corner of the endzone as Lafayette jumped on the scoreboard first, 7-0.
Lafayette was just as efficient on its ensuing possession. On 4th-and-1 at the Penn 14, Tyrell Coon leaped over the pile to get the first down and put the ball at Penn's 12-yard line. Curley was then sacked for the second time in the half but again rallied, and this time found Mitchell Bennett alone in the endzone to punctuate a 74-yard drive with the 21-yard scoring catch.
Samson missed a 47-yard FG with six minutes left in the half. Lafayette got the ball back and closed out a 10-play, 62-yard drive with a 29-yard field goal that gave Lafayette a 17-0 lead with 1:05 left in the half.
Samson broke up the shutout with a 40-yard field goal attempt with five seconds on the clock to make it a 17-3 ballgame at the half.
Penn's offense seemed to take a play from Lafayette's book as the Quakers began the second half with its longest drive of the game to that point. A 64-yard drive culminated in a seven-yard TD pass from Kyle Olson to Tyler Fisher, making it a one-touchdown game (17-10) with 11:10 on the clock.
Penn tied the game later in the third quarter. Olson found Bradford Blackmon in the endzone for a 21-yard touchdown with 5:22 on the clock.
TB Jerome Rudolph responded with a 44-yard kick-off return to put the Leopards at their own 46. On 3rd-and-4, Curley kept the ball and rushed for the first down but was shaken up the next play. Sophomore Ryan O'Neill took the field for his first action of the young season.
Both offenses stalled on the next several possessions and it remained a tie ballgame with just under six minutes to play. Penn fumbled the ball and Eric McGovern came up with the recovery to put the Leopards' offense right back on the field at Penn's 34-yard line with 5:26 on the clock.
O'Neill, who remained in the game for an injured Curley, moved the Leopards to the 20-yard line. Rodriguez came out to attempt his second field goal of the night, this one from 37 yards out, but it was inches left of the goalpost with 2:32 remaining.
Penn got the ball back with one minute remaining. Kondash booted the ball into the endzone to put Penn at its own 20-yard line with 49 seconds to work with but the Quakers opted to let the clock run down and send the game into overtime.
The Lafayette defense was led by a 16-tackle effort from Michael Schmidlein and 11 tackles from Carlos Lowe.
Lafayette travels to Yale on Saturday, the team's first matchup since 2006.
Postgame Notes:
- There were no penalties in the first half for either team
- This marked the first time this year the Leopards failed to score in the second half and the first time since Oct. 4, 2008 vs. Harvard.
- The last time Lafayette played in an overtime game was on Sept. 8, 2001 when the team suffered a 16-13 loss at Towson. The last time the Leopards won in overtime was on Nov. 11, 1995 (24-21 over Fordham). Lafayette's win snapped a streak of four straight overtime losses.
