Thomas’ kickoff return lifts Yale
NEW HAVEN — There weren’t any surprises on the play that, ultimately, won Saturday’s Ivy League opener for Yale’s football team. Rodney Thomas had a pretty good idea the ball could be coming to him. Coach Tony Reno knew what he might do with it.
“The position I’m in, it comes to me pretty often,” Thomas said after he grabbed a Cornell onside kick on a bounce and returned it 48 yards for a touchdown, the ultimate difference in a 23-17 win. “I tried to keep my eye on the ball.”
Reno said the Bulldogs had drilled onside kicks Friday.
“He goes, ‘coach, if I catch it clean, can I run it back?’ I said absolutely,” Reno said.
“He caught it clean, and you just saw the blur. I said ‘he’s running it back.’ He did a heck of a job. He had a great game today.”
Thomas also had two interceptions. His personal foul on a fourth down prolonged the Big Red’s drive after the onside-kick return, which ended up in the end zone three plays later, but Jaylan Sandifer pulled in the second onside-kick try to end the threat.
Attendance was 4,916 at Yale Bowl for the Ivy opener. The Bulldogs (1-1, 1-0) are on the road the next three Saturdays at Lehigh, Dartmouth and UConn, returning home Oct. 23 against Penn.
If Saturday wasn’t flawless (14 penalties for 144 yards, for one), it was still an improvement from last week’s 20-17 loss here to Holy Cross.
Some of the just-missed plays from last week connected on Saturday. Griffin O’Connor finished 23-for-38 for 317 yards and two touchdowns, to Darrion Carrington and Chase Nenad.
“We talked as a team that we needed to stay united,” O’Connor said. “A lot of times during a game you can focus on your own personal issues, the ups and downs of the game, get caught up in the moment of what you’re doing.
“For a well-oiled offense to work, we need 11 guys with same vision and alignment.”
Yale’s Wande Owens picked off Cornell starting quarterback Richie Kenney in the end zone on the first drive of the game, and the Bulldogs never trailed.
They extended their 9-3 halftime lead with a 10-play, 75-yard drive to open the second half, getting a fourth-down conversion on a pass from O’Connor to Sandifer right before the 25-yard strike to Nenad.
It stayed 16-3 awhile, thanks in part to Thomas’ second interception with 9:20 to go on the Yale 2.
“The game was coming down to crunch time,” Thomas said. “We knew we needed a big stop to switch momentum. They were moving the ball down the field nicely.
“On my end, personally, I had some things to clean up on that drive.”
The Big Red did score on their next two drives, switching quarterbacks to Ben Mays and getting help from some penalties.
“We’ll take a look at the film and work together with the players,” Reno said, “and make those corrections and improve on them.”