Greeley – Just three points were separating the Northern Colorado Bears from Cal-Davis late in the third quarter Saturday. The Bears, fresh off a defensive stop and a touchdown, had the ball with momentum and a fresh, southerly breeze at their backs.
From there, the Bears’ fortunes followed that of the breeze. Surrendering the last 28 points of the game – 21 following turnovers – UNC dropped a 38-7 decision to the Aggies at Nottingham Field in a Division I-AA nonconference season opener.
It was a downer of a start to the Scott Downing era at UNC. Downing saw his team implode in the final 19 minutes after playing with relative efficiency and discipline.
“Turnovers will kill you. I expected we’d have a couple. I didn’t expect four,” said Downing, a former recruiting coordinator at Nebraska. “But, as I told our guys, this is the start of the season, not the end.”
It started falling apart for UNC quarterback Dominic Breazeale with 3:26 left in the third quarter. With the Bears trailing 10-7, the 6-foot-6, 245-pound junior wanted to add to the 29-yard touchdown pass he’d thrown to Jahir Waterman on the previous possession.
On second-and-13 from his 37, Breazeale threw long down the left side, but hung the ball a little too high. Free safety Jonathan Barsi made the interception and returned it to the Bears 31. Four plays later, Aggies quarterback Jon Grant ran 6 yards for a touchdown and a 17-7 lead.
On the next possession, Breazeale’s pass over the middle was picked off by linebacker Dave Heckman and returned 39 yards into the end zone with 38 seconds left in the quarter.
“It was nice to see some open field and a lot of white jerseys in front of me,” Heckman said.
Two Aggies touchdowns and a safety rounded a fourth quarter of humiliation for the Bears.
“We learned as a team that you can’t give multiple chances to a team like Cal-Davis,” Downing said. “We let Davis play on a short field much of the game. We can’t do that to our defense. Their punter also did a great job. He really pinned us down deep a lot early in the game. That didn’t give us a lot of room to move.”
Breazeale, who won the starting job in camp, completed 23-of-31 passes for 213 yards. The two interceptions ruined an otherwise solid start to his career.
“Overall, I thought my performance was pretty good,” Breazeale said. “But to let it all slip away like that, it’s pretty frustrating.”
The Bears didn’t run the ball as much as Aggies coach Bob Biggs anticipated, just 24 times for 32 yards.
“I was a little surprised they didn’t run more, especially in the second half,” Biggs said, “because they had had some success in the first half.”
UNC plays at Portland State next week in the start of its Big Sky Conference schedule.
Cal-Davis 10 0 14 14 – 38
Northern Colorado 0 0 7 0 – 7
First quarter: UCD – Garfio 1 run (Benjamin kick), 7:16. UCD – FG Benjamin 37, :14. Third quarter: NC – Waterman 29 pass from Breazeale (Dyches kick), 11:42. UCD – J. Grant 6 run (Benjamin kick), 1:15. UCD – Heckman 39 interception return (Benjamin kick), :38. Fourth quarter: UCD – Ng safety, 8:42. UCD – Nolan 4 run (kick failed), 2:11. UCD – Scott 38 fumble return (kick failed), :14. A – 6,072.
UCD NC
First downs 17 13
Rushes-yards 33-142 24-32
Passing 224 213
Comp-att-int 17-33-0 23-31-2
Return yards 79 19
Punts-avg. 4-43.8 5-36.6
Fumbles-lost 1-1 3-2
Penalties-yards 10-90 9-85
Time of possession 30:36 29:24
INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS
RUSHING – Cal-Davis, Nolan 13-65, Garfio 17-59, J. Grant 3-18. Northern Colorado, Wilson 16-54, Waterman 1-2, Breazeale 7-(minus 24).
PASSING – Cal-Davis, J. Grant 17-33-0-224. Northern Colorado, Breazeale 23-31-2-213.
RECEIVING – Cal-Davis, Chris Carter 5-97, Garfio 5-71, B. Rice 4-37. Turner 2-10, Nolan 1-9. Northern Colorado, Ealy 9-106, Wilson 4-28. Swanson 3-32, Waterman 2-32, Chesla 2-21, Fauver 2-7, Breazeale 1-(minus 13).
In Super Stats: Big Sky scores, standings. 7B
Adrian Dater can be reached at 303-954-1360 or adater@denverpost.com.
