Sept. 25, 2004

In business, the old saying goes "Location, location, location." In football, substitute "field position" for "location" and you get the same meaning. And that's a great place to start in describing Saturday's 40-0 win by the University of Dayton over Austin Peay.

Austin Peay has demonstrated its long-term commitment to football with an impressive $800,000 facelift to Governors Stadium that includes a beautiful new playing field. Unfortunately for the Govs, for most of Saturday's game they only got $400,000 worth of their investment. APSU was in Dayton territory once the entire game (late in the second half), while Dayton finished 12 of its 14 possessions in Austin Peay's side of the 50. In fact, just five plays were run from scrimmage in Dayton territory in the second half (all by Dayton), and that included the last three of the game when Dayton got the ball on its own 20 to run out the clock.

Austin Peay's average field position for the game was its own 22-yard line, while UD's was its own 47.

The Flyers took the opening kickoff and drove 46 yards to set up the first of four Jason Resch field goals to give UD a 3-0 lead. Resch's four field goals tied the UD record for field goals in a single game. It had been done six other times by five different Dayton kickers (Greg Schwarber, Mike Duvic, Tim Duvic, Jesse Obert and John Bianchi twice).

Resch's 38-yard boot was the only scoring of the first quarter, and after an exchange of three punts, the Flyers had their longest drive of the day, going 64 yards and scoring on a Matt Mong 17-yard run on the first play of the second quarter to make the score 10-0. On UD's next possession, the Flyers moved 51 yards to set up a 25-yard Resch FG, and make the score 13-0.

That was the halftime score, but only because of a glaring Governor gaffe. In that only possession in Dayton territory, Austin Peay went for it on 4th-and-8 at the 32, and when the Dayton defender slipped and fell down on the new turf, quarterback Jesse Kellogg put the ball right on the money but the ball went right through his receivers hands in the end zone. That, on top of a great Doug Jones bat-away at the goal line on the previous play, kept the Governors off the scoreboard.

UD scored two more Resch field goals of 33 and 23 yards on either side of a 10-yard TD pass from Brandon Staley to Ryan Wrobleski to lead 26-0 after the third quarter. In the fourth, tailback Marques Warner scored from six yards out and backup QB Robert Dence scored his first career TD, a 24-yarder, with 4:21 left in the game.

The Flyers dominated two key statistical areas. The had 26 first downs, compared to just five for Austin Peay, and Dayton had a virtual two-to-one advantage in time of possession. UD had the ball for 39 minutes and 50 seconds, compared to 20 minutes and 10 seconds for the hosts.

Staley completed his first seven passes of the game en route to a 12-for-16, 123-yard day passing. Dence was two-for-two for 24 yards to complete his first career passes in a Dayton uniform as well. Wrobleski continued his breakout season with seven catches for 99 yards. His 22 catches in the first four games of 2004 are already more than he had last year in 11 games (19), when he was second on the team.

UD out-gained the Govs 253 to 34 on the ground. Nine Flyers carried the ball, and all had ten yards or more. Six had more than 20 yards and three had more than 30. Warner led with 57 yards on 10 rushes.

The Dayton defense had a tremendous day across the board. APSU tailback Chris Fletcher came into the game averaging 102.7 yards a game, but had no room to operate and was held to just nine net yards on 10 carries. UD's secondary allowed Governor quarterbacks to complete consecutive passes on just two occasions.

Linebacker John Hoppe led the Flyers with five hits. Six more Dayton defenders had three tackles-Brian Kelly, Casey Klaus, Chance Walton, Pat Weale, Mike Neuberger and Chris Cowan.

Cowan joined Resch as a special teams hero. He returned a total of seven punts for 114 yards, and in the third quarter he made certain the Flyers would have a short field to work with. He returned back-to-back punts of 30 and 26 yards to the APSU 25 and 38 respectively.

The win over Austin Peay was Dayton 100th as an NCAA Division I-AA team. Since I-AA Non-Scholarship/Mid-Major football came into existence at the beginning of the 1993 season, the Flyers are 100-24. The next closest team at this level is Duquesne, with 73 wins.

UD also extended its road winning streak to 10 straight games, and the game also marked the 315th straight game UD has not been shut out. That's the longest such streak in all of college football.

Dayton will return home next week to take on Davidson. Saturday's game time at Welcome Stadium is 1:00 p.m. EDT.