Nov. 20, 2004
Stats
GREENVILLE, S.C. -- Ingle Martin threw two touchdown passes to lead second-ranked Furman to a 51-31 Southern Conference title clinching win over Chattanooga Saturday afternoon at Paladin Stadium.
The victory gives Furman (9-2, 6-1 SoCon) the SoCon's automatic bid to the NCAA I-AA playoffs and secures the program's 12th league football crown -- the most by any school in the SoCon's 81-year history. The Paladins will make their 13th playoff appearance and host a first round game next Saturday against an opponent to be announced Sunday at 1:10 p.m. on ESPN News.
The loss was the 10th straight by Chattanooga (2-9, 2-5 SoCon) to Furman dating back to the 1995 season.
Martin, a junior from Nashville, Tenn., in his first season as the Paladins' starting quarterback, played only one series in the second half and completed 11-of-17 passes for 137 yards, including touchdown strikes covering 19 yards to Isaac West and 12 yards to Brian Bratton.
Furman rushed for a season high 338 yards, outgained Chattanooga 489-397 in total offense, and averaged 8.4 yards on 58 offensive plays. Cedric Gibson paced the Paladin ground attack with 104 yards and a touchdown on nine carries, and Brandon Mays added 96 yards and a touchdown in the contest.
"We're happy to win the game and conference title and head into the playoffs with additional momentum," said Furman head coach Bobby Lamb, whose squad claimed its fifth straight decision. "We didn't feel like Chattanooga could stop us on offense, and after a slow start we were able to get going, put points on the board, and get a lot of our starters out of there."
"We came out and competed and got up, but then had some breakdowns," said Chattanooga head coach Rodney Allison. "It was a tightly officiated game, and our guys didn't handle it very well."
After a Jonathan Godfrey 26-yard field goal gave the Mocs an early 3-0, Furman covered 79 yards in nine plays to take a 8-3 lead on a 19-yard touchdown strike from Martin to West and two-point conversion run by Renaldo Gray with only 34 seconds left in the first quarter.
Furman made it 10-3 with safety a little over two minutes later when a snap sailed over the head of UTC punter Jonathan Wright and into the end zone to ignite a 23-point Paladin second quarter outburst.
Taking the Mocs' free kick following the safety, Furman needed only 55 seconds to reach the end zone. Using a 50-yard run by Brandon Mays to the Chattanooga 5-yard line, the Paladins turned to fullback Jerome Felton on the next play for a 5-yard scoring burst to extend its advantage to 17-3 at the 12:39 juncture.
Furman scored on its final two possessions of the first half. A 55-yard Cedric Gipson run to the UTC 25 led to a 12-yard strike from Martin to Bratton, and a Gipson 1-yard plunge with 1:37 to go sent the Paladins to the locker room with a 31-3 halftime lead.
The Paladins' extended the advantage to 38-3 with a Justin Stepp 15-yard run around right end midway through the third quarter before UTC answered with a pair of scores on a 2-yard scoring run by Cedrick Stevens and a 42-yard fumble return by Randy Craft.
The two teams traded a pair of fourth quarter touchdowns with Furman defensive reserves on the field.
Redshirt freshman linebacker Gary Nelson paced Furman's tackle ledger with eight stops, a tackle-for-loss, and a sack, but sophomore defensive end Roy Ravenell led the Paladin defensive effort with six tackles, a sack, a forced fumble, and an interception, which he returned 31 yards. Furman matched its season high sacks total with four takedowns in the contest.
Chattanooga got a game high 10 tackles from Jonathan Leddy.
