HARRISONBURG — James Madison coach Mike Houston and William & Mary coach Jimmye Laycock agreed it was the difference in the game.
Thanks to two costly second-half red-zone turnovers committed by the Tribe, the No. 7-ranked Dukes held off upset-minded rival William & Mary 31-24 in a Colonial Athletic Association clash on Saturday at Bridgeforth Stadium.
Leading 24-17 with less than two minutes to play, JMU senior cornerback Taylor Reynolds leaped in the end zone to intercept William & Mary quarterback Steve Cluley’s pass that was intended for wide receiver DeVonte Dedmond.
A touchdown for William & Mary plus the extra point would’ve tied the game.
“I knew they were going to run a fade or slant. They were going to try to isolate me with [Dedmond],” Reynolds said. “The ball was there, and I made the play.”
Houston called Reynolds’ grab “the game-changer.”
“That’s a play by a very good senior cornerback in a big ball game in a clutch moment,” Houston said.
Three plays later, the Dukes went ahead by two touchdowns when senior running back Khalid Abdullah sprinted past the defense into the end zone on a 74-yard speed-option play.
With fewer than five minutes left in the third quarter, trailing 17-10, Cluley botched a handoff to William & Mary running back Kendell Anderson and fumbled the ball. JMU defensive end Darrious Carter recovered it at the JMU 12-yard line.
“The two turnovers — Cluley’s fumble and the interception at the end — derailed two potential scoring drives for them,” Houston said. “But that’s the way it’s going to be in tight ball games. Turnovers and penalties are going to be the two things that make the difference.”
JMU scored 14 points off the turnovers.
Following the fumble, the Dukes went on a 19-play, 88-yard scoring drive that chewed more than eight minutes off the clock. Junior running back Cardon Johnson capped the series with a 1-yard scoring run.
“It cost us points,” Laycock said. “You get down there and you want to come away with points. You get blanked twice and that’s not good. And going against a team like JMU, you have to get every point you can get because they’re certainly going to put some on the board.”
In five red-zone trips, William & Mary came away with only 17 points.
Reynolds set the tone early for the Dukes’ defensive red-zone success when he stuffed Anderson on a third-and-goal from the 1 in the first quarter. Reynolds’ tackle went for a loss of 4 yards. After the play, Anderson was called for a personal foul, backing the Tribe up even further.
“I thought that was huge,” Houston said. “I thought it fueled our defensive kids a good bit.”
“We wanted to stop them from scoring,” Reynolds said of JMU’s red-zone defense. “We want them to have to kick field goals and then any time we can get a turnover, it’s huge. You see what happened when Khalid took it [74] yards. Turnovers create big plays.”
Abdullah finished the day with a career-best 194 rushing yards and three rushing touchdowns on 25 carries. The senior has now eclipsed 100 rushing yards in five straight games.
“Having a back like him that’s strong enough to break tackles, between the tackles and punish tacklers and also has the ability to break the big one like he did on the speed option, he’s a special player,” Houston said.
JMU has now won six straight times over William & Mary in Harrisonburg and holds a 22-17 advantage all-time in the series.
The Dukes (5-1, 3-0) travel to New Hampshire on Saturday while William & Mary (2-4, 0-3) returns home to meet Delaware.
