Danes’ mood turns serious
Looking for redemption in home opener after loss
The University at Albany football team will play its first home game on Saturday since an NCAA firstround playoff victory over Central Connecticut on Nov. 30, 2019, almost 16 months ago.
The Great Danes (1-1 overall, 1-1 Colonial Athletic Association) are scheduled to take on Rhode Island at 1 p.m. at Casey Stadium, not only the spring home opener but a chance to atone for a sloppy 38-34 loss at Maine last week.
“We’re happy to be back here for a couple of weeks,” head coach Greg Gattuso said on a Zoom call Wednesday. “It’s always hard in our conference traveling and the conditions have been difficult. The kids have been great, they’ve been resilient, they’ve done everything we asked them to do, so that’s made it a little easier, that’s for sure.”
The Great Danes pulled out an opening 24-20 win at frigid New Hampshire with key defensive stops late. But that defense barely showed up in the loss to the Black Bears, who burned them with big plays and took advantage of several offsides penalties.
“Obviously, giving 38 points is definitely a heavy hitter,” defensive tackle Mazon Walker said. “The mood has been very serious, to say the least. Very serious. Obviously, that’s not something we’re OK with. We just have to live and learn. There are things we could have done to prevent all the scores that they got. Now we can build on it for
this week.”
On the other hand, Walker said he is looking forward to being back in Casey Stadium and playing on Bob Ford Field, named after the longtime Ualbany coach.
“The energy in ‘The Bob’ is definitely unmatched,” Walker said. “A day hasn’t passed where I really haven’t thought about one of our more important games at ‘The Bob.’ It’s definitely nice to know we’re about to play there this weekend. It just adds fuel to the fire.”
It will be without fans as Ualbany continues to adhere to state COVID -19 guidelines.
Regardless of the venue, Great Danes senior running back Karl Mofor hopes the team will realize the latest challenge it faces against URI in the highly competitive CAA. The Rams defeated sixth-ranked Villanova on the road last Saturday, the highest-ranked opponent URI had beaten since 2010.
“I just feel like everybody is starting to understand the concept of you can’t take any game lightly in this conference because there’s a lot of people that haven’t played in this conference yet,” Mofor said. “After seeing Maine lose to Delaware badly (37-0 the week before), some people may have thought they could slack off. But you just have to know in this conference that every week they’re going to bring their all, every team.”
Gattuso said his team is “very beat up” going into the game, though he wasn’t more specific about who might miss the contest. The Great Danes won’t have starting safety Tyler Carswell for the first half, but not because of injury.
He must sit out the first 30 minutes after getting ejected for a targeting penalty in the second half against Maine. He’ll be available for the second half. Sophomore Larry Walker Jr. will get his first career start in Carswell’s place.
“Larry’s a star in the making,” Gattuso said. “We’re going to miss Tyler, but it was unfortunate. The penalty was not something that was a blatant hit. We’ve just got to survive the first half and get him back. His hit (on Maine quarterback Joe Fagnano), the problem is today’s game, these quarterbacks, they run, they jump over people and then they want to slide late and we’re giving 15-yard penalties for kids hitting them.”
While Gattuso said that penalty was purely accidental, he was more concerned about his team’s general lack of sharpness in the Maine loss.
“We have a challenge this week, and if we’re as sloppy as we were at times last week, we’ll be in trouble,” Gattuso said. “I think they recognize that and they definitely had one of the best practices we’ve had (this week) since early camp.”