Hanover
What if the Dartmouth College football team hadn’t started inexperienced quarterback Bruce Dixon IV during its homecoming game Saturday against No. 23 Harvard? What if the Big Green’s receivers hadn’t developed a case of the drops once junior Jack Heneghan entered and got hot?
What if cornerback Jarius Brown, sprinting down the sideline with the football under his arm after a blocked extra point, hadn’t been shoved out of bounds at midfield by the barest of margins?
Well, things might have been different, and the Crimson might not have escaped with a 23-21 victory, its 13th consecutive triumph in the Ivy League teams’ series. The result guarantees the Big Green’s first losing season in the league since 2011, erases even its most far-fetched hopes for a share of the league title and left an announced Memorial Field crowd of 7,012 frustrated and wet from periodic rain.
Dartmouth is 3-4 overall and 0-4 in the Ivy League. It has lost two consecutive games and four of its last five, including a 9-7 loss at lowly Columbia last week during which Heneghan struggled. It was walking off the field after that contest that Dartmouth head coach Buddy Teevens decided he was switching signal-callers.
“You can play ‘what if’ and I wish Bruce had played better, but with our offense in those circumstances, I’d do it again,” said Teevens, who watched an early Dixon interception lead to Harvard’s first points. “Like I told our (coaching) staff, Jack will be Jack and if he comes off the bench, he’ll get it done.”
Heneghan mostly did, looking as poised and polished as Dixon looked confused. Heneghan completed 32 of 48 passes for 301 yards and a touchdown and kept the ball secure when he scrambled. Dixon, seen as the presumptive starter last spring but beaten out during early September drills, appeared rusty and held the ball out like a target for tacklers when he ran. He completed 1 of 6 passes for 28 yards and was intercepted once.
Dixon was yanked after he scrambled right on second down and during the first quarter’s closing moments. With the play breaking down, he inexplicably launched a pass up for grabs down the near sideline. It should have been intercepted, and his coaches had seen enough. Heneghan trotted onto the field for third down and stayed the rest of the way.
“Great leadership and character by Heneghan,” said Harvard coach Tim Murphy. “He gave them an opportunity to win the football game. They seemed to move the ball effortlessly at times with a pass possession game. We just had to try to make tackles and to knock the ball loose.”
Dixon’s first pass, on the game’s second play, was intercepted and returned 14 yards to Dartmouth’s 30-yard line. The sophomore was hit as he threw and Harvard opened the scoring five plays later, Justice Shelton-Mosley catching a 12-yard touchdown pass and Jake McIntyre adding the extra point. The game was not yet three minutes old.
Dartmouth’s next possession was a three-and-out, the third-down play resulting in a dropped pass by Emory Thompson. After an exchange of punts, the Big Green got the ball back on an Isiah Swann interception at Harvard’s 36-yard line with eight minutes remaining in the first quarter. However, the hosts soon turned the ball over on downs, and the Crimson drove 68 yards in 10 plays and went up, 14-0, when quarterback Joe Viviano ran for a 5-yard touchdown with two minutes remaining in the opening stanza.
Dartmouth pulled within 14-7, the score coming with 16 seconds remaining in the half and on a 1-yard pass from Heneghan to tight end Stephen Johnston. David Smith added the first of his three extra points.
Harvard pulled ahead, 17-7, on a 26-yard field goal three minutes into the second half. However, Dartmouth embarked on a 11-play, 79-yard drive capped by Miles Smith’s 3-yard touchdown run, the sophomore bursting out of a pile at the goal line and Smith’s conversion kick making the score 17-14 with four minutes remaining in the third quarter.
Harvard didn’t give the hosts much time for celebration, however, creating their own, 72-yard, 12-play march and scoring on a 7-yard Semar Smith run. The extra point was blocked by Jeremiah Doucheee and returned by Brown to midfield, making the score 23-14 at the fourth quarter’s start.
Douchee did it again with eight minutes remaining in the game, leaping to deflect a 38-yard field goal attempt. The Big Green’s subsequent possession, however, ended with Heneghan incompletions on third and fourth down.
“You expect guys to make plays in critical situations and we probably had close to double digits (in dropped passes),” Teevens said. “There were a lot of balls in the air. Jack had a pretty good game but if we catch six to eight more, it’s a real good game.”
Dartmouth got the ball back on a punt and took over their 12-yard line with 4:23 on the clock. A Heneghan pass was intercepted a minute later but Harvard was called for roughing the passer and the Big Green moved swiftly downfield, scoring on a Heneghan scramble up the middle. Smith’s kick made the score 23-21 with 2:32 to play, holder Ben Kepley saving the play when he got a high and wide snap down in time for Smith’s boot.
The hosts were hoping to get the ball back and used up their timeouts for that purpose. However, Viviano engineered a possession that ate up the game’s remainder, including a 7-yard scramble for a crucial first down with 1:37 on the clock.
Teevens, who said he decided coming off the field last week after losing at Columbia, was emphatic that Heneghan will start this week at Cornell.
“He played like a starting guy,” the coach said. “You can conjecture all you want, but the guy is demoted and he comes back in, and that’s the best football he’s played all year against the best team we’ve played all year.
“It’s a good message for the team. He sat down and guys felt bad for him but he came out and grew from it.”
Tris Wykes can be reached at twykes@vnews.com or 603-727-3227.