Football looks to go 4–0 in clash with Bowdoin

Coming off their resounding 47–14 blowout of the Bates Bobcats in their annual Homecoming game, the Jumbos are looking like serious contenders for the NESCAC crown.They will look to continue their strong start as they go on the road to the face the Bowdoin Polar Bears in Brunswick, Maine, who will be hosting their own Homecoming festivities.

The Jumbos will head into Saturday's game with a perfect 3–0 record. Tufts is accompanied by Amherst and Williams as the league’s remaining undefeated teams. The Polar Bears, on the other hand, sport a 0–3 record and are coming off a difficult 24–14 loss at the hands of the Amherst Mammoths.

Junior linebacker and co-captain Greg Holt maintained that the team cannot grow complacent, even after such a dominant start to the season.

"There are always things we look to improve," he said. "We come in to study film on Sundays, ready to work so that we can be better than the week before. Once we hop into the film we are able to identify all of the little things we can do to improve both our pass and run defense."

Tufts also clashed with Bowdoin in the fourth game of its 2017 campaign. In the Oct. 7 matchup last year, the Jumbos came away victorious in a 31–3 rout of the Polar Bears. Senior quarterback and co-captain Ryan McDonald led the team in both passing (215) and rushing (72) yards in that game. He also both threw and ran for a touchdown, while sophomore running back Mike Pedrini and junior running back Jay Tyler rushed in for the other two scores.

The Jumbos' defense proved dominant in the game, performing with the same intensity that it showcased in this year’s opener against Hamilton. Tufts limited Bowdoin to only 88 passing yards and sacked sophomore quarterback Griff Stalcup a whopping five times. Former Tufts defensive lineman Doug Harrison (E '18) led the charge, finishing the contest with a sack and his first career interception. Despite trailing by a surprising margin in time of possession, Tufts outgained Bowdoin in total yards, 462–216.

Tufts will look to recreate its overwhelming success from last year’s contest. Just like in 2017, Bowdoin is carrying a winless 0–3 record into the game. However, the Polar Bears have played some of the conference's toughest teams this season. Bowdoin lost its season-opener to Williams, 41–6, before coming up short in its following two games against Middlebury and Amherst, which have been some of the most consistent teams in the conference the past few years. 

"[Bowdoin is] really good. They’ve played the two top teams in the league, and in case anyone hasn’t been paying attention, Middlebury’s pretty good too — they’ve won a lot of football games over the years," coach Jay Civetti said. "So when you look at the first three scores, I don’t think the final outcome is at all an indication of how good this team is, and I think they’re only getting better."

Civetti cited Bowdoin's defensive scheme, quality playmakers and the successful recruitment that coach JB Wells has added over the last four years as reasons to not sleep on this week's opponents.

"Defensively they are a 3–3 stacked team, they also would put pressure on the quarterback, play some man [defense]," Civetti said. "They’re certainly someone who you can see the improvement week to week. They get better each week, they’re playing a lot of young guys and a lot of guys are stepping up. In their recruiting efforts, you’re finally seeing the four years of all coach Wells’ guys in there."

Part of the challenge for Tufts will be Bowdoin's sophomore quarterback Austin McCrum. McCrum, a transfer, led Thornton Academy to back-to-back state championships in Maine and played for Lafayette until recently. In the backfield, junior running back Nate Richam leads the conference with 396 rushing yards on 64 attempts. On paper, the Polar Bears' offense will prove to be a significant threat to the Jumbos. On Saturday, Bowdoin will not only seek redemption for last year’s rout but also its first win of the season and a much-needed end to its 20-game losing streak. However, the Jumbos are ready to take on their hungry opponent.

"We go into each week with the same mindset regardless of who we are playing," Holt said. "Throughout the week, our coaches prepare us for things we will see on Saturday. We want to focus on playing Tufts football as a unit and executing our schemes to the best of our ability. Everyone has a job to do, and we are all focused on making sure we have our teammates' backs."

While Civetti was pleased with the team's performance against Bates, he knows that the team has to do better, especially in the face of a challenging opponent like Bowdoin.

"It’s [about] consistency and the focus — you can’t put 10-play drives together and come up empty on offense, you can’t drop passes in critical situations," Civetti said. "If we really want to be able to execute and really want to be the best we can be, we need to be more clutch, and I don’t think we’ve been clutch enough. Defensively, we need to stay locked in — we can’t let guys get behind us, we can’t assume things. Attention to detail needs to be amplified."

In particular, Civetti spoke about McCrum's quality as something the Tufts defense needs to be aware of.

"Obviously, you look at our statistics — 13 sacks, 7 more sacks than anybody in the league — we’ve got good pressure on the quarterback and we need to continue that, but when you’re going to sack a 6-foot-5, 210-pound kid, that’s a little different," Civetti said. "That’s a big kid with a big arm who’s played [Div.] 1 football, and we’re certainly not going to scare him. He’s a smart player; he takes what the defense gives him. We just need to be really great tacklers, and we need to keep everything in front of us."

Tufts' bid to stay unbeaten will kick off at 1:30 p.m. on Saturday.