ECU Falls At Home To South Carolina, 20-17

Saturday, September 11

Greenville, N.C.

12 p.m.

East Carolina University

0-2

South Carolina

2-0

1st

2nd

3rd

4th

South Carolina

East Carolina

September 11, 2021 | Football

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GREENVILLE, N.C. – Everything set up for a special Saturday afternoon in Greenville.

From the Pirate Walk, a sea of purple and gold tents, and savory tailgating smells outside of Dowdy-Ficklen Stadium to the reverberating roars inside, football reclaimed some sense of normalcy in more than 650 days, and East Carolina seemed primed for its first win of 2021. But South Carolina, making its first trip to Greenville since 1997, proved an uncooperative guest and spoiled the party.

Parker White's 36-yard field goal as time expired gave the Gamecocks of the SEC a 20-17 victory – their only lead after falling behind 14-0 – and stunned the bulk of a sun-splashed crowd of 40,816, the largest for an ECU home game since a Sept. 16, 2017, loss to No. 16 Virginia Tech. The heartbreaking end drops the Pirates to 0-2 heading into a road game at Marshall next week.

"Those are the games that you've got to learn how to win, and they made the kick at the end," ECU head coach Mike Houston said. "Hats off to the kicker from South Carolina. Great job there. That's a big-time kick there at the end."

Parker's last of two fourth-quarter field goals dealt the final blow to a game that started with such promise for ECU – an end-around pass from Tyler Snead to Jsi Hatfield for a 75-yard touchdown on the Pirates' first offensive snap. It marked the second-straight week ECU jumped out to a quick lead but could not hold on.

"We wanted to come out and be aggressive," Houston said. "We thought they would be aggressive with us. It's either going to be second-and-10 and we've loosened them up or it's a touchdown, one or the other. Tyler made a great throw. Jsi did a great job selling the screen and then the go and did a great job converting it. A big-time play. The kids were excited about it."

Snead said he found out Thursday at practice that the play would be coming his way.

"I was really excited," he said. "We practiced it, we worked on it so I'm glad we executed the outcome. Those fans went crazy for it."

Few other highlights followed. Quarterback Holton Ahlers completed just 11 of 24 passes for 77 yards. He was sacked five times and picked off twice. Rahjai Harris led the ground attack with 70 yards on 14 carries.

ECU's defense, meanwhile, did its part a stranglehold on the Gamecocks much of the day by, forcing three turnovers. But the Pirates could not capitalize on numerous opportunities as South Carolina picked up its fifth-straight win in the series and improved to 2-0 to start the season.

The Gamecocks had to overcome a multitude of mistakes, many of which an aggressive ECU defense created, and snapped the ball just once on the Pirates' side of midfield in the first half. Three first-half drives ended in turnovers, and third-down sacks thwarted two more. Warren Saba extended ECU's streak to 10 games with at least one turnover with an interception Zeb Noland's fourth pass of the game. Nolan Johnson prevented a South Carolina touchdown when he stripped Josh Vann of the ball near the goal-line, forcing a touchback, and Jeremy Lewis forced another fumble later in the half.

ECU, which netted just 188 total yards after Snead's opening pass, cashed in just one of the turnovers for points when Ahlers scored his 14th career rushing touchdown with a 3-yard run for a 14-0 lead with 11:53 left in the second quarter. The Pirates' bid for its first shutout in a first half since Oct. 17, 2015, against Tulsa vanished when Damani Stanley nabbed an Ahlers screen pass and rumbled 63 yards just 1:00 before halftime.

"That was a big play," Houston said. "You'd give anything to have it back. They had a pressure called; we had a screen called. Screens sometimes are feast or famine. You get it off, it's going to be a huge play for us. The kid made a great play. That's probably the difference in the ballgame."

South Carolina pulled even at 14-14 with 46 seconds left in the third quarter on a 13-yard pass from Noland to Dakereon Joyner. Snead appeared to score on a 14-yard pass from Ahlers but was ruled down at the 8. Owen Daffer, who missed earlier from 44 yards, then kicked a 26-yard field goal for a 17-14 lead. Juju McDowell's 63-yard kickoff return set up a game-tying a 39-yard field goal by Parker.

After a three-and-out, the Gamecocks got the ball back a final time and marched from their 28 to the ECU 18 to set up Parker's game-winner.

"It is a tough locker room in there right now," Houston said. "The kids are hurting in there."

But he believes his team will continue to battle.

"If anything, I think everybody sees the kind of heart this bunch has," he said. "They're going to fight. We're going to show up next week, we're going to play. We've got pretty high expectations internally. The kids have worked their tails off. Certainly, they wanted this one badly for a lot of reasons, particularly because it was at home. What a great crowd we had. Appreciate Pirate Nation being back. We wanted to give them a win. The kids, it matters to them. These fans matter to them. How they represent the university matters to them. They'll be back."