Bulldogs one win away from the Ivy League title
PRINCETON, N..J. — It was just another day at the office for the recordbreaking Yale football trio of Kurt Rawlings, Reed Klubnik and JP Shohfi who continue to keep statisticians and opposing defensive coordinators rather busy.
However, for all the individual brilliance that trio displayed in the final road game of their remarkable college careers, star billing in the Bulldogs’ 5114 win at nationallyranked Princeton was not limited to the offensive side of the ball.
The returning defensive players had to live with the memories of last year’s game when Princeton ran for nearly 500 yards. Thanks to a pair of momentum changing stops on fourth down and a pair of crucial turnovers on Saturday, the Bulldogs are in position to earn at least a share of the Ivy League title when Harvard comes to the Yale Bowl.
“We kept in the back of our minds what happened last year, how we gave up so many points, so many big plays,” said Yale senior linebacker Ryan Burke, who finished with a gamehigh eight tackles including a key hit behind the line of scrimmage on one of the fourthdown plays. “Throughout this week we kept that in the back of our heads. We played with that chip on our shoulder, we had that steelyeyed look in our eyes that we weren’t going to be denied, we were going to play a good game.”
Princeton, which had 634 yards of total offense in the last meeting, finished with only 277 on Saturday. The margin of victory is tied for the longest in the series with Princeton, which only happens to be the secondlongest series in college football history.
With Burke and his teammates shutting down the highoctane Princeton offense, Rawlings and company did the rest.
The senior quarterback set a Yale singlegame record with six touchdown passes to give him 11 in the last two weeks. He now owns the career record for passing yards, total offense and touchdown passes as well as the season mark for touchdown throws.
“We have a lot of seniors, a lot of guys who love playing the game and we kind of looked at ourselves in the mirror what are we going to get in those last two weeks?” Rawlings said. “I think we really took it upon ourselves to make it the best week we had yet in practice and preparation to come out here today. I couldn’t be more blessed to be a part of this team, I am so lucky to have opportunities every Saturday to have fun with my best friends.”
Rawlings has one Saturday of football left to play at Yale. With the Bulldogs recording their fifthstraight win and Cornell upsetting previously undefeated Dartmouth, Yale needs to beat Harvard to earn at least a share of the title. It that were to happen, it would mark the first time since 1981 that a Yale senior class had multiple Ivy League titles during their time in New Haven.
“I’ve got a few buds on that team, I will call them in a little bit,” Rawlings said. “I had no idea. The last time we were rooting for something to happen [when Dartmouth beat Harvard on the final play of the game] and it didn’t go our way so I told myself I am going to enjoy our win, enjoy our team and good things will happen as Coach [Reno] says.”
Rawlings finished with 338 yards passing. Three of his touchdowns went to Klubnik, who became Yale’s leader in career receiving yards. Shohfi led the Bulldogs with eight catches for 141 yards and two scores as he has the second most receiving yards at Yale.
Klubnik said his hope for their final game, other than a win over Harvard, would be for him to finish with the same number of receiving yards as Shohfi.
Rawlings, who became the 10th quarterback in Ivy League history with at least 7,000 career passing yards and helped Yale score at least 50 points in backtoback games for the first time since 1894, could make it happen.
“You don’t teach the talent that each of those guys have,” Rawlings said. “I am so fortunate to stand back there and throw the ball to them.”
Former Fairfield Prep quarterback Patrick Conte caught an 18yard touchdown pass, Alan Lamar had a 1yard TD run and Sam Tuckerman a 43yard field goal as the Bulldogs improved to 81, 51 in the Ivy League.
Collin Eaddy, who finished with 80 rushing yards after running for 266 yards and three touchdowns in the 2018 meeting, had a 15yard scoring run to make it a 107 game early in the second quarter.
Klubnik had scoring catches and 27 and 47 yards and Shohfi came up with a 29yard touchdown reception with nine seconds left in the half as Rawlings lofted the ball up to Shohfi despite double coverage. Not only did the Yale captain get both of his hands on the ball but he got a foot inbounds as Yale took a 307 lead into the lockerroom at halftime.
Kyle Ellis had an acrobatic interception and Jaelin Alburg recovered a muffed punt by Princeton with the Bulldogs scoring touchdowns after both turnovers.
Zach Keller had a 1yard scoring run for Princeton (72, 42).