Saturday, November 4
Houston, Texas
12:00 P.M.
East Carolina University
2-7 , 1-4
27
at
52
Houston
6-3 , 4-2
1st
2nd
3rd
4th
F
ECU
0
10
7
10
27
Houston
21
7
17
7
52
Pirates Fall At Houston
November 04, 2017 | Football
ECUPirates.com
Quarterback Gardner Minshew had a record-setting game in relief Saturday, but it wasn't enough as the ECU football team lost to Houston 52-27 at John O'Quinn Field inside TDECU Stadium in Houston.
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Minshew took over on ECU's third possession and went on to complete 52 of 68 passes for 463 yards with three touchdowns and one interception. He set the school record for completions in a game, eclipsing the 46 that Shane Carden had against ODU on Aug. 31, 2013; attempts in a game, surpassing the 66 that Carden had in the Birmingham Bowl against Florida in 2015; and his yardage is third, behind the 480 Carden had against Tulane on Oct. 12, 2013, and the 465 Blake Kemp had against UCF on Nov. 19, 2016. Nineteen of his completions went for at least 10 yards.
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But the Pirates, who dropped to 2-7 overall and 1-4 in the American Athletic Conference, dug themselves too big a hole early. Then when they appeared to be about to climb their way out of it, the Cougars, who improved to 6-3 and 4-2, put them away with a couple of quick strikes in the third quarter.
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ECU ran 98 plays on offense to 48 for Houston, out-gained the Cougars 504-472, and had the ball for 40:23. But Houston hit big play after big play and came up with three takeaways.
Cougars quarterback D'Eriq King completed 15 of 21 passes for 330 yards and three touchdowns. Steven Dunbar had six catches for 171 yards, including a 75-yard touchdown, and Linell Bonner had seven catches for 147 yards, including a 62-yard score.
Cougars quarterback D'Eriq King completed 15 of 21 passes for 330 yards and three touchdowns. Steven Dunbar had six catches for 171 yards, including a 75-yard touchdown, and Linell Bonner had seven catches for 147 yards, including a 62-yard score.
"We've got to find a way to do a better job covering, that's for sure," ECU Head Coach Scottie Montgomery said. "We didn't cover very well at all throughout the game. We threw a couple different things at (Houston) in the second quarter and even in the third and fourth quarters, and at the end of the day that was exactly what we needed to do.
"The flip side is we didn't cover very well and turned the ball over on some stuff that just can't happen. I thought Gardner did a good job while he was in there. There were some things we learned about some of our younger players."
ECU took the opening kickoff of the second half and went 75 yards on 14 plays, scoring a touchdown on a 9-yard pass from Minshew to Trevon Brown, who caught the ball at the 5 and carried three defenders with him into the end zone. That cut the deficit to 28-17.
But Houston quickly answered as King hit Dunbar for a touchdown on the first play after the kickoff. The Pirates then were driving again trying to answer and got as deep as the Cougars 14, but a fumbled pitch from Minshew to Devin Anderson was recovered by Houston's Matthew Adams.
Two plays later, the right-handed King rolled right and hit Bonner for his long score, making it 42-17. The Pirates were unable to mount a serious threat from there.
"(King) does some great things himself, but the players around him, Steve, Linell, and obviously the offensive line and the backs, allowed him to have some success, and he'll be the first to tell you that," Houston first-year coach Major Applewhite said.
Brown had a career-best 11 catches for a career-best 141 yards and two touchdowns. He also set a career-best for all-purpose yards with 227. Quay Johnson set career marks with 14 catches for 115 yards, and he had one touchdown reception.
Ten different players had catches for ECU. Jimmy Williams had seven for 58, Davon Grayson had six for 38, and Tahj Deans, making his first career start, had three for 27. The Pirates rushed 24 times for 36 yards, but Montgomery said that stat is misleading.
"The plan was to have a lot of ball-control offense," he said. "You may look at the rushing today, but the rushing was kind of skewed because you add all those spit-outs to the run game. Because of the way they were loading the box, we kind of knew that was going to happen."
That in part paved the way for Minshew's big game.
"I thought he did a really good job distributing the football," Montgomery said. "We knew that he would start playing better, he was a lot more calm. We worked really hard offensively to try to put together a good plan for these guys, and we thought we had it. We turned the ball over and we had some ill-advised penalties. We tossed the ball one time, put it on the ground. You never see those things happen, but it happened to us today."
The Pirates didn't get on the board until the second quarter, but by then they were down by 21 points. ECU's first drive was a three-and-out, and the second ended with an interception by Thomas Sirk. The third also ended with a punt.
Meanwhile, Houston scored three of the first four times it had the ball
Minshew finished the half 26 of 31 for 240 yards and one touchdown. Down by three touchdowns, ECU closed a 16-play, 70-yard possession with a 22-yard field goal by Jake Verity. The Pirates had third-and-goal at the 2, but Sirk, in his only play on the drive, was stopped for a 3-yard loss.
Houston wasted little time with its response and went up 28-3 as Mulbah Car scored on a 1-yard run. The drive began with a 41-yard pass from King to Dunbar and then a 39-yard pass to Bonner.
But ECU didn't give up. It came back with a touchdown of its own on a 34-yard pass from Minshew to Brown. Then the defense held Houston to a three-and-out, and the Pirates got the ball back at their own 28 with 4:20 left in the half.
They methodically moved the ball as close as the Houston 8-yard line, but had to settle for a hurried 37-yard field goal attempt by Jake Verity as time expired. On third down from the 11, Minshew was sacked at the 20.
"Right there at the end we had a great call," Montgomery said. "We thought we had what we wanted. Then we had a banzai kick and we didn't have our kicker ready in time. I don't understand that. We've got to be better in that situation."
Verity also had a career-long 52-yard field goal in the fourth quarter.
Up next, the Pirates will play host to Tulane at 7 p.m. next Saturday, Nov. 11, at Bagwell Field inside Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium.
Team Stats
ECU
HOU
Total Yards
504
472
Pass Yards
468
330
Rushing Yards
36
142
Penalty Yards
51
34
1st Downs
33
16
3rd Downs
12
5
4th Downs
2
0
TOP
40:23
19:37
1st Quarter
ECU 0, HOU 7
HOU - KING, D'Eriq 2 yd run (NOVIKOFF, Caden kick), 11 plays, 75 yards, TOP 4:12
ECU 0, HOU 14
HOU - CATALON, Duke 22 yd run (NOVIKOFF, Caden kick), 1 plays, 22 yards, TOP 0:07
ECU 0, HOU 21
HOU - LARK, Courtney 5 yd pass from KING, D'Eriq (NOVIKOFF, Caden kick) 8 plays, 81 yards, TOP 3:38
2nd Quarter
ECU 3, HOU 21
ECU - VERITY, Jake 22 yd field goal 16 plays, 70 yards, TOP 7:40
ECU 3, HOU 28
HOU - CAR, Mulbah 1 yd run (NOVIKOFF, Caden kick), 4 plays, 75 yards, TOP 1:21
ECU 10, HOU 28
ECU - BROWN, Trevon 34 yd pass from MINSHEW, Grdnr (VERITY, Jake kick) 6 plays, 76 yards, TOP 1:55
3rd Quarter
ECU 17, HOU 28
ECU - BROWN, Trevon 9 yd pass from MINSHEW, Grdnr (VERITY, Jake kick) 14 plays, 75 yards, TOP 5:57
ECU 17, HOU 35
HOU - DUNBAR, Steven 75 yd pass from KING, D'Eriq (NOVIKOFF, Caden kick) 1 plays, 75 yards, TOP 0:11
ECU 17, HOU 42
HOU - BONNER, Linell 62 yd pass from KING, D'Eriq (NOVIKOFF, Caden kick) 2 plays, 65 yards, TOP 0:42
ECU 17, HOU 45
HOU - NOVIKOFF, Caden 44 yd field goal 9 plays, 53 yards, TOP 2:53
4th Quarter
ECU 17, HOU 52
HOU - McDOWELL, Brand 74 yd interception (NOVIKOFF, Caden kick)
ECU 20, HOU 52
ECU - VERITY, Jake 52 yd field goal 11 plays, 25 yards, TOP 4:56
ECU 27, HOU 52
ECU - JOHNSON, Quay 18 yd pass from MINSHEW, Grdnr (VERITY, Jake kick) 11 plays, 76 yards, TOP 3:17
Game Leaders
Passing Leaders
CMP
52
TD
3
YDS
463
INT
1
CMP
2
TD
0
YDS
5
INT
1
Players Mentioned
Running Back
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Wide Receiver
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Wide Receiver
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Wide Receiver
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Placekicker/Punter
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