The Bridgewater College football team took a 25-point lead into the fourth quarter of its ODAC opener, defeating Hampden-Sydney 45-35 on Saturday at Jopson Field.
Malivai Barker rushed for 181 yards and three touchdowns on just 15 carries, while Rayvon Johnson caught five passes for 43 yards and a score and rushed five times on end-arounds for another 41 yards.
Defensively, Isaac Evans had eight tackles, an interception return for a touchdown, and five pass breakups. Kaiden Lewis led the Eagles with 12 tackles.
Barker had 149 yards and three touchdowns on eight rushes in the opening 16:16 of the game, as the Eagles’ offense was clicking from the first snap with screen passes and great blocking on running plays.
Bridgewater got a great start when Jason Monroe took the opening kickoff 59 yards, pushing the kicker over before finally being caught in HSC territory.
Quarterback Jay Scroggins (15-of-23 on mostly short attempts) completed all three passes on the opening drive, with Barker rushing 11 yards down to the one yard line and scoring on the next play to put BC on the board.
HSC drove right down and answered on Carter Cunningham’s wildcat TD rush, but Barker broke a 46-yard touchdown right up the middle to put Bridgewater back up by seven.
The Eagles completed their third straight scoring drive to start the game on a 31-yard Anthony Rossi field goal for a 17-7 lead. Hampden-Sydney then jumped offsides on third-and-1 to conclude the first quarter, ultimately being forced to punt.
Just over a minute later, Barker broke his third touchdown of the game for 75 yards, making it 24-7 Eagles with 13:44 left in the second quarter.
With the Tigers driving, Josh Brooks picked off a pass to end the Hampden-Sydney threat. Despite a nice leaping catch in the back of the end zone by HSC’s Cam Johnson, Scroggins hit Corey Jochimwith a back shoulder pass late in the second to send BC into the locker room with a 31-13 advantage.
Owen Costello added another nice catch for the Tigers in the back of the end zone in the third quarter. With momentum threatening to shift, Bridgewater put together a timely drive that ended on a 20-yard Scroggins pass to Johnson to make it 38-20.
Evans all but wrapped things up late in the third quarter when he jumped an outside route and took it 68 yards for a touchdown and a 45-20 scoreline. Two plays later Sonny Romine almost picked off another pass but couldn’t hold on.
Punter Andrew Donafrio successfully faked a kick for the second straight year against Hampden-Sydney in the fourth quarter; on the next play Gary Boxley‘s 33-yard touchdown run was called back for holding and the Eagles came up empty on the possession.
BC (2-2, 1-0) will travel next Saturday to face a Randolph-Macon team that has set the early pace in the conference with a mark of 4-0 (1-0 ODAC).
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