History Made!

The annual Schuylkill rivalry between the Villanova Wildcats and Penn Quakers was one for the ages, as Penn knocked off Villanova 24-13 under the lights at Villanova Stadium. The game start was pushed back from Saturday night to Thursday due to the arrival of Pope Francis. It was the first time since 2005 that Villanova played a Thursday night home game. A lot of history was made as Penn defeated Nova for the first time since 1911, to put that in perspective Franklin Field, home of the Quakers, was only in its sixteenth year of existence. This win was quite memorable for head coach Ray Priore, not only was it his first victory with the Quakers, but his first against Nova and a ranked team. Talk about a first impression.

There was very little for Villanova to celebrate as the team looked flat throughout the entire game. After coming off a big win versus Delaware last week, where red shirt freshmen quarterback Zach Bednarczyk led the team to victory (after taking over for the injured starting QB John Robertson who went down with a PCL injury), the team could simply not put anything together. After the first half the Wildcats went three and out three times and coughed up the football, which eventually led to a Penn touch down. The Wildcats only owned possession of the ball for a little over twenty minutes, whereas Penn owned possession for just under forty.

The numbers certainly do not lie as Penn took advantage of just about every one of their drives. The Quakers converted multiple third downs and were assisted by the multiple penalties taken by Villanova on a couple of fourth downs. Penn’s wide receiver Justin Watson had quite the night as he recorded five receptions for 87 yards including two touchdowns. Quakers quarterback Alek Torgersen wound up completing 14 of 22 passes for 171 yards, including the two touchdown passes to Watson. That would be just about all the offense Penn would need. With just under six minutes to go in the game, the Wildcats found themselves close to narrowing Penn’s 17-7 margin as they drove all the way to Penn’s fifteen yard line. However as luck would have it, Villanova’s running back Javon White would cough up the football at Penn’s ten yard line, and linebacker Donald Panciello would return it for a ninety-three yard touchdown. That was the longest recorded fumble return against Villanova. As mentioned earlier, tons of history was made during this game and it will be one spoken about for many years to come.

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Tags: Andy Talley, Big 5 rivalry, caa, Joe Buscemi, NCAA, Penn Football, Penn Quakers, Philadelphia Sports News, Philly Sports, Ray Priore, TalkSportsPhilly, UPenn, Villanova football, villanova stadium, Villanova vs Penn, villanova wildcats