A tale of two halves
It finally happened.
The Aggies were able to change the zero in the win column to a one Saturday afternoon as they defeated the Division I-AA Idaho State University Bengals 28-27 at Romney Stadium.
Although the one point victory wasn’t pretty, as Utah State was down 27-0 going into the second half of play, it was a win nonetheless.
A win that was supposed to come easy to the Aggies. The toughest part of the schedule was behind the team, loses to Utah, Louisiana, Wyoming and BYU.
“One thing about playing those big schools is that we learned when you’re behind, the game is not over,” said defensive end Nick Onaindia. “You can still come back. When we were down to [ISU] we knew we could still come back and win the game.”
“I have concerns, but I am not going to take anything from the fact that we dug ourselves an insurmountable hole,” USU coach Mick Dennehy said. “It showed a great deal of character for the kids to battle back.”
Going into halftime, it looked as if the Aggies might remain as one of the only winless teams in college football, disappointing the 20,875 fans that came to witness a Homecoming victory.
“We were pretty embarrassed,” Onaindia said.
As they left the locker room and headed toward the field for the final half of action, Dennehy told his team if the offense could score 28 points and the defense could hold the Bengals scoreless, we would win the game.
That is exactly what the Aggies did, scoring seven points in the third quarter and 21 in the fourth.
Emmett White carried Utah State in the second half as he ran for 94 yards and three touchdowns, including the tying touchdown of the game, a 20-yard run with 4:47 left.
Kicker Dane Kidman’s extra point gave the Aggies the victory.
“It feels great since it’s been such a long time since we had [a victory],” White said.
Quarterback Jose Fuentes, who struggled during the first half, said, “It was not a pretty win, but we’ll take it.”
Fuentes made three costly errors in the first half that led directly to Bengal scores.
One interception was returned for a touchdown, another interception set up a touchdown and a poor pass recovered by the Bengals led to another touchdown.
Fuentes found himself on the sidelines during one series as backup quarterback Travis Cox played.
“[Coach told me] to clear my head, relax and get my composure back,” Fuentes said. “I know my coach has confidence in me. He just wants me to play good.
“Cox did a great job when he was in,” he said.
The Aggies finally found themselves on the scoreboard as Fuentes threw a 58-yard pass to wide receiver Kevin Curtis to make it 27-7 with six minutes remaining in the third quarter.
On the first play of the fourth quarter the Aggies were able to cut the ISU lead in half when Fuentes hit White with a 19-yard scoring pass.
The Bengals tried three straight passes, looking for anything that would move the ball toward their goal line, but on the last one Nathan Barber picked off the ball and returned it 29 yards to the ISU 16-yard line.
Barber’s interception would put the momentum in the hands of the Aggies and four plays later, White scored from the 4-yard line bringing the Aggies within six points, 27-21, with 9:06 left.
“We got worn out a little bit in the second,” Idaho State coach Larry Lewis said. “We had opportunities – we just didn’t capitalize on them.”
The first half was all about Idaho State though as the Aggies struggled coming off a bye week. Halfway through the first quarter, Fuentes was picked off by Jared Allen, who ran 38 yards for a touchdown.
Later in the quarter Fuentes was intercepted at the USU 30 and two plays later, Doug Baughman found Charles James for a 26-yard touchdown pass to make it 20-0.
Fuentes threw the ball over the head of Chris Stallworth on a lateral. The Bengals recovered and capitalized on the turnover as Baughman found Jermaine Anderson on a 20-yard touchdown pass.
It looked as if the Aggies might get on the board just seconds before the first half was over but the touchdown was called back due to an illegal formation call on the Ags.
Trying one more time with six seconds remainingin the half, Fuentes was forced out of bounds as time ran out.
Utah State´s Jose Fuentes battles for ground through a couple of Idaho State Bengals at Saturday´s Homecoming game as J.R. Suguturaga attempts to pull an ISU player down. The Aggies came away with a 28-27 victory. (Zak Larsen )