EASTON, PA., Oct. 8th -- If former British Prime Minister Winston Churchill was a football fan and alive today, he might have described the Big Green's victory over Lafayette College as "victory at all costs."
The 27-15 win was painful. Dartmouth lost three players to injuries, including starting quarterback Ren Riley '96 with a broken arm, wide receiver David Shearer '95 with a knee injury and tackle Brian Larsen '97.
Dartmouth coach John Lyons, when asked if ever felt worse about a victory, said, "I'm not sure . . . for two reasons: the fact that we lost a number of kids to injuries and the fact that we had an opportunity to put the game away and couldn't do it again."
On this beautiful fall day, the Big Green's defense contained Lafayette's all-time league rusher tailback Erik Marsh to 35 yards in the first half and forced four Leopard turnovers in the game.
Indeed, if it were not for the four interceptions -- two of which were returned for touchdowns -- the game might have looked more like the four point loss to Colgate or the four inch shortfall to the University of Pennsylvania.
Big games from Josh Bloom '95, Brian Crowell '96, Brian White '95 and Jamie Whitticom '96 made up for the non-existent passing game.
The win put Dartmouth on even ground in the Patriot League -- winning their last two after dropping the first two -- heading into six Ivy League games, where the Big Green has a record of 0-1. Lafayette fell to 0-5.
Offensively, Dartmouth's win over Lafayette was downright ugly; the Big Green completed twice as many passes as it had quarterbacks in the game.
The list of quarterbacks Dartmouth used today looked more like the number of brothers in a typical Kennedy family than what has been the ordinary pattern for Dartmouth in the past four years.
Riley, who completed five out of 10 passes for 65 yards, was hammered by Leopard linebacker Rawle Howard, who ran untouched on a blitz in the waning minutes of the second quarter.
Riley was taken to the hospital, rumored to have a broken wrist, but the injury turned out to be a lot worse. "I broke my arm," Riley said sullenly. "I broke it in three places." The quarterback will be having surgery on his arm this week and will be out of commission for six or more weeks, and therefore, the season.
Quarterback Jerry Singleton '96, the highly-touted transfer student from Colorado State who fought Riley for the starting position in pre-season, threw six airballs after taking over in the second quarter.
Finally, in the third quarter, quarterback Jon Aljancic '97 came to close it out, completing one of two passes for 20 yards.
For the game, on 18 attempts, Dartmouth completed six passes for 85 yards. However, Pete Oberle '96 provided the Big Green with its only shining point offensively.
The 210-pound runningback scored a touchdown in the second and third quarters. By half-time, Oberle had already notched 82 of his total 139 yards on the ground.
With about 15 minutes left in the half, Oberle scored off a rambling 24-yard run, breaking a tackle and evading a second wave of defenders. Kicker Dave Regula '98 missed the extra point. That touchdown gave Dartmouth a 6-0 lead.
Lafayette came back, mounting a 10-play, 42-yard drive to the Dartmouth 16. But Dartmouth pressured the quarterback and the Leopards settled for a 32-yard field goal before the half.
Proving that offense doesn't always win games, the Big Green defense came out strong in the third quarter.
After going three and out, White drilled Leopard Tramont Evans after a pass from quarterback Shawn McHale. White put his helmet on the ball, popping it up to a waiting Chris Boran '95.
Boran grabbed it in the air near the sidelines and ran it 28 yards for the touchdown. The extra point by Regula gave the Big Green a 12-3 lead.
After Lafayette went three and out, Dartmouth mounted an eight-play drive, capped by a 2-yard Oberle run off the right guard. The extra point, with eight and a half minutes left in the third quarter, gave Dartmouth a 20-3 lead and a locked-in victory.
But the Leopards were not ready to be caged.
In the first possession of the fourth quarter, Marsh ran for 18 yards on four plays including a 1-yard run up the middle for a touchdown. McHale's pass for the 2-point conversion was incomplete, leaving the score at 20-9.
However, the Big Green couldn't close it out on the gridiron. The Leopards came back with a 54-yard drive, capped by fullback Chris SanGiovanni's 5-yard, second effort touchdown.
With less than a minute to go, visions of another possible blown win were dancing in Coach Lyons' head.
But, as was typical today, the Dartmouth defense came up big and put the game out of Lafayette's reach.
White, who was hanging a little behind receiver Jarrett Shine, intercepted a floating pass and ran it back 36 yards for a touchdown.
"This pick at the end was just gravy," White said of his interception. "The quarterback had to go deep . . . he aired it out and put a little too much on it."
