The Florida A&M football team suffered its worst loss of the year on Saturday night, in a 70-17 loss against the University of South Florida Bulls at Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Fla.
What started off as a competitive first two minutes, turned into a record-setting day for B.J. Daniels and the Bulls.
The Rattlers punted on nearly every possession of the first quarter. The Bulls scored within the first two minutes of the game, when Tallahassee native and USF quarterback B.J. Daniels completed a 43 yard touchdown pass to wide receiver A.J Love. In the past two weeks, Daniels had two of the top five passing performances in USF history. Daniels tied Matt Grothe’s school passing record, going 21-31 with 382 yards in the air.
“The most important thing is being consistent,” Daniels said. “It’s getting the win, and trying to prevent the bad play.”
South Florida junior running back Darrell Scott had a monster night rushing the ball. In his first start of the season, he set a South Florida record. He now is the first Bull to ever have over 50 yards on
the ground. Scott’s longest run was a 56- yard scamper to the end zone in the first quarter. He also caught an 84-yard touchdown pass from Daniels in the first half.
The Bulls set numerous records offensively against the Rattlers in front of 50,128 fans. It was the second highest scoring game in South Florida history. The highest scoring affair came against Kentucky Wesleyan, after they beat them 80-3.
With the game well out of reach at the end of the first quarter, South Florida head coach Holtz pulled Daniels out of the game. He put in second string sophomore, Bobby Eveld, for the next series. Eveld attempted a pass, which was picked off by freshman cornerback Terry Johnson, and he took it all the way down to the South Florida seven yard line. Holtz immediately took out Eveld after the interception.
“We went into the game knowing we wanted to get our second strings significant time on the field,” Holtz said. “After that possession we wanted to keep B.J out there until the end of the first drive after halftime.”
The matchup between the Big East and the MEAC turned into a game that had South Florida historians rewriting their history books. The previous record for total yards for the Bulls was 580 yards. They broke that record on the first drive after half time.
The next game for FAMU will be in Atlanta on September 24th at 3:30 p.m. against Southern University.