Three blocked field goals help Dayton beat Davidson

It took every one of those minutes for Dayton to clinch a 16-14 victory against Davidson. Adam Zouagui’s 51-yard field-goal attempt in the final minute fell short as the Flyers held on to improve to 4-1 overall and 2-0 in the Pioneer Football League.

Special teams carried Dayton to the victory. The Flyers blocked three field goals before the final miss by Davidson and also blocked a punt.

“I think you’ve got to look at the special teams,” Andrews said. “I think that’s the difference. We were able to overcome some things because of the special teams play. We had a lot of great efforts on defense and on offense. We didn’t probably capitalize on some of the scoring opportunities we had offensively, but we just kept cranking, and we were able to hang in there defensively and block some kicks.”

Defensive end Jerell Lewis blocked the first field goal, a 41-yard attempt in the first quarter.

In the second quarter, Mac Grant III blocked a punt and returned it 21 yards to the Davidson 10-yard line, setting up a 3-yard touchdown pass from Drew VanVleet to Jake Coleman with 9:40 left in the first half.

Dayton took a 13-0 lead. It got on the board earlier with a 27-yard touchdown pass from VanVleet to Donovan Weatherley in the first quarter.

Gideon Lampron blocked the second and third field goal attempts by Davidson: a 42-yard attempt in the final minutes of the first half; and a 46-yard attempt with 3:06 left in the fourth quarter.

“On the first one, I was just rushing my gap and trying to get my hand up,” Lampron said, “and the second one, it was the same exact thing.”

Davidson answered Dayton’s first two touchdowns with two touchdowns of its own. Mason Sheron scored on a 39-yard run in the second quarter and a 44-yard run in the third quarter. The Wildcats led 14-13.

Dayton regained the lead on a 25-yard field goal by Danny Baker with 10:03 left in the game. That turned out to be the game-winning score.

Davidson was driving in the final minutes but ran into a 4th-and-10 situation at the Dayton 34 with 27 seconds remaining. Despite the three previous field-goal blocks, Davidson tried the field goal again with wind causing havoc as well.

“He’s one of the better kickers in the league,” Andrews said. “Last year, I think he was 11 to 13 with a long of over 50. So I knew he has the potential to be very good. He kicks it out of the back of the end zone. He does all their punting. I think you get in the head a little bit, and they start to worry about protection.”

Mason Hackett was the offensive star for Dayton, rushing for 218 yards on 22 carries. His 58-yard run gave Dayton a first down at the Davidson 15 and led to the go-ahead field goal.

“The offense line did a great job,” Hackett said. “They were cracking back on their blocks. They created some big holes. I’ve got to give credit to the receivers for blocking on the perimeter. They made my job easy today.”

Dayton beat Davidson (4-2, 2-1) for the second straight season.

The Flyers are one of three teams with perfect PFL records. Drake (4-1, 3-0) beat Butler 27-17 on Saturday to stay alone in first place by a half game. St. Thomas (3-3, 2-0) beat Marist 39-27 and is tied for second with Dayton.

The Flyers play at Butler (5-1, 1-1) at 1 p.m. next Saturday in Indianapolis.

“Davidson is a good program,” Andrews said, “and you’ve got to show up ready to play four quarters against them all the time. It feels good for now, but we’ve got Butler next week and they beat us here last year.”