Nov. 20, 2010

Final Stats |  Notes

Elon, N.C. - Elon's Scott Riddle threw for a career-high five touchdowns and 452 yards to guide the Phoenix to a 45-14 victory over Western Carolina on Saturday afternoon at McKinnon Field / Rhodes Stadium in the season finale for both squads.

Western Carolina finishes the year 2-9 overall and 1-7 in SoCon play while Elon was 6-5, 5-3.

"I thought we did some good things in the first quarter (on defense)," said Western Carolina head coach Dennis Wagner during post-game comments on the Catamount Sports Network. "(Elon) did a good job of finding what we were doing and picking on some of our weaknesses. Overall, we didn't play well today. We've got a lot of things to do in the off-season."

The Catamounts limited Elon to 97 yards of total offense in the opening quarter and trailed by one score, 7-0, after the opening 15 minutes. However, over the final three frames, the Phoenix and its fourth-year signal caller outscored WCU 38-to-14 and put up 546 yards of total offense.

Trailing by two touchdowns, the Catamounts got within one possession late in the second quarter on a Michael Johnson one-yard run, 14-7. But the Phoenix advanced their lead on the following drive as Riddle connected on a 20-yard strike to Matt Eastman to cap a five play, 71-yard drive covering 1:40 to take a 21-7 into the halftime locker room.

Elon continued its offensive prowess to open the second half, scoring on both of its first two possessions to take a 35-7 lead. Both drives for the Phoenix took less than two minutes to reach the end zone. Elon's Kenton Beal connected on a 31-yard field with 4:50 left in the third quarter to make the score, 38-7. On the following drive, WCU collected four, first-downs as the Catamounts drove 57 yards down to the Elon three-yard line. Yet, a Zac Brindise pass to Andrew Rogers in the back of the end zone fell short on fourth and goal to end the Catamounts drive.

The Phoenix added seven more points in the fourth quarter at the 14:03 mark when Riddle connected with Aaron Mellette for a 67-yard touchdown.

With 2:50 left in the game, WCU freshman Marshaun Edwards rumbled 60 yards on the Catamounts first play of their final drive to set up a Matt Wabby five-yard touchdown pass to Taylor Spangler to make the score 45-14 with 1:39 left in the game. It was Wabby's first WCU career touchdown pass and Spangler's first career TD reception.

Wabby finished 3-for-7 for 23 yards with the touchdown pass.

Junior Zac Brindise finished the contest with 227 yards passing - the third highest outing of his career - as the Catamounts amassed 358 yards of total offense, the second-highest total of the season and most in SoCon play this year. Josh Cockrell hauled in a career-best six passes for 66 yards to lead WCU, while Jacoby Mitchell caught five passes for 59 yards and SoCon Freshman of the Year candidate Deja Alexander had four for 45.

Defensively for the Catamounts, Ricky Schwarz finished with nine tackles including five solo stops and one for loss with both redshirt freshman Randy Pressley and true frosh Courtland Carson tallying seven stops apiece, the latter with 1.5 TFLs. Senior C.J. Johnson tallied four stops in his final game for the purple and gold with two pass break-ups and three quarterback hurries, with redshirt freshman Brian Johnson recording a sack for the defense. Saturday's road loss ended the collegiate careers of 14 Catamount seniors.

"People don't realize when you just look at the record and ask, `well, what did they do?' These seniors went through a lot," said Wagner on his senior class.