UConn Football falls to Syracuse in 27-20 Overtime Loss
The UConn football team was within minutes of securing the program’s third Power Four victory of the Jim Mora era in its Week 2 matchup against Syracuse inside JMA Wireless Dome (Syracuse, N.Y.) on Saturday. Despite holding an 11-point lead in the fourth quarter, the Huskies couldn’t hang on, falling 27-20 in overtime fashion.
The first quarter was a tale of two defenses.
Syracuse received the opening kickoff and quickly marched down the field to the UConn seven-yard line. However, defensive lineman Marquis Black stuffed Dan Villari on 4th-and-2, forcing a turnover on downs. The teams then traded several punts, ending the quarter tied at 0-0.
Finally, on the first play of the second quarter, the Huskies cracked into the scoring column.
What looked like a screen pass to wide receiver John Neider turned into a 15-yard flea-flicker touchdown to tight end Alex Honig, giving UConn a 7-0 lead after Chris Freeman’s extra point. Neider’s pass to Honig was perfect—unsurprising, given that he was the 2022 Gatorade Connecticut Football Player of the Year as a quarterback at local Jonathan Law High School (Milford, Conn.).
The UConn defense stood tall yet again after their first score. Senior defensive back Tyrece Mills strip-sacked Orange starting quarterback Steve Angeli on fourth-down, forcing yet another Syracuse turnover.
UConn and Syracuse once again exchanged punts, but the Orange special teams unit pinned the Huskies at their own 19-yard line after a bad snap by long snapper Zach Christinat. Despite the excellent field position, the UConn defense shut down the Syracuse offense once again, forcing a field goal from kicker Tripp Woody to preserve a 7-3 lead late in the second quarter.
Following the Orange field goal, Huskies quarterback Joe Fagnano marched the offense to the Syracuse 45-yard line, and on the fifth play of the drive, running back Mel Brown broke free for a 45-yard touchdown run to extend UConn’s lead to 14-3. Syracuse responded with a solid drive of their own, but had to settle for a field goal, going into halftime trailing 14-6.
The Huskies received the second-half kickoff and once again cruised down the field. Fagnano found a wide-open Cam Edwards running down the sideline for a gain of 34, which set up a Freeman 35-yard field goal to extend the Huskies’ lead to 17-6. After exchanging several possessions, both offenses came up empty-handed for the rest of the quarter, entering the final period of play with the same 17-6 score.
The Syracuse offense finally strung together a semblance of a touchdown drive on their first possession of the fourth quarter. But on 3rd-and-4 at the UConn 30-yard line, Angeli dropped back to pass and was drilled by linebacker Oumar Diomande for a huge sack, forcing the Orange to settle for a 48-yard field goal attempt—which they missed.
A Huskies three-and-out gave Syracuse the ball back once again, but the UConn defense continued to shine. D’Mon Brinson picked off an Angeli pass, forcing another Orange turnover. Even with the takeaway, the offense couldn’t put anything together and punted the ball right back to Syracuse.
Angeli finally delivered. In a game riddled with inaccurate and dropped passes, he found a wide-open Justus Ross-Simmons streaking down the field for a 53-yard touchdown. The Orange made things interesting by attempting a two-point conversion, but it was unsuccessful, keeping the score at 17-12.
With 5:31 left, the Huskies attempted to run the clock out through a series of Edwards runs. The Orange defense held up, forcing a UConn punt that gave them the ball at their own 25.
The Orange offense cruised down the field in 1:18, capped off by a 3-yard touchdown run from running back Yasin Willis. Following the score, the Orange elected to go for two and succeeded, as Angeli found Darrell Gill Jr. wide open in the back of the end zone for an easy catch.
All hope seemed lost for the Huskies, trailing 20-17 on 4th-and-10 from their own 25-yard line with only 23 seconds left.
And then there was Skyler Bell.
The star wide receiver somehow hauled in a 27-yard Fagnano pass with one hand to give the Huskies a first down, setting up a 41-yard Freeman field goal attempt. Freeman just barely snuck the ball through the uprights, sending the game into overtime, where UConn won the toss and chose to start on defense.
Angeli found Ross-Simmons open for a touchdown yet again on their fifth offensive play, making an amazing diving grab in the front corner of the endzone to take a 27-20 lead.
On their overtime possession, Fagnano led the Huskies down to the Syracuse two-yard line. Although the Huskies were poised to score, freshman linebacker Antoine Deslauriers batted down two consecutive Fagnano passes on 3rd and 4th down, forcing a turnover on downs and sealing a 27-20 Syracuse overtime victory—their first of the season.
In the loss, Fagnano completed 24 of his 43 passes for 259 yards and no touchdowns, while his counterpart, Angeli, went 33 of 55 for 417 yards and two touchdowns. Bell also caught 11 passes for 105 yards for the Huskies, recording his second 100+ receiving yard performance of the season.
After the game, UConn head coach Jim Mora sounded very displeased with his team’s performance in the postgame presser:
“Very disappointing loss for our young men. We played hard, but we didn’t make plays when we needed to make plays—and I’m talking about everybody, not just the players.”
“It was just very disappointing.”
UConn (1-1) will travel southward next week to take on the Delaware Blue Hens (1-1) of Conference USA in their inaugural FBS season. Kickoff is set for 3:00 p.m. at the famous Delaware Stadium in Newark, Delaware.
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