By Keith Henry
It’s nearly impossible to win games when you fail to take care of the football. Turnovers in the red zone ultimately costed Morgan State in their heartbreaking 27-22 loss to Towson Saturday night at Hughes Stadium.
Morgan State head coach Damon Wilson said about the difference in this game, “We had three turnovers in the red zone. So we got to focus on our discipline. That’s undisciplined football. Bottom line. We got to be more disciplined.”
Morgan State came into this Battle for Greater Baltimore looking for their first win against the Tigers since September 26, 2009. Towson came in off their dominating 27-7 win at Norfolk State last week.
Morgan got the ball rolling with a 38-yard field goal by Sahr Gbundema to go up 3-0 with 4:55 left. 15 seconds later Towson answered on a 96-yard kickoff return by Lukkas Londono to push the Tigers ahead 7-3.
In the second quarter, the Tigers increased their lead to 14-3 on a 66-yard pickoff return by Towson’s Brodie with 13:54 left in the second quarter. Bears quarterback Kobe Muasau tried to throw a pass as he was trying to avoid being sacked. But after he threw it, Brodie was right there to pick the ball off at the Towson 34 and ran it all the way back for a pick six. That was one of the Bears’ three turnovers on the evening.
Morgan answered on a five-yard touchdown pass from Muasau to Lowe with 9:24 left to cut the deficit to 14-10. Then on the next possession the Bears took the lead on a three-yard touchdown run from Jason Collins Jr. to take the 16-14 lead. The two-point attempt was stopped by the Tigers with 3:02 left.
Towson (2-0) took back the lead on Kemarrion Battles’ two-yard touchdown run on his second effort in the play with 1:20 left to help the Tigers go up 21-16.
On MSU’s next possession, the pass from Muasau to Collins at the 2 was dropped with an open endzone looking at him with 6:50 left in the third quarter. Next, the field goal attempt by Gbundema went wide right with 6:45 left. MSU missed a golden opportunity here.
The Bears defense stopped Towson on the next possession. Then Morgan (0-2) drove all the way to the Towson two. Muasau nearly lost the ball on a run to the two when the ball fell out of his hand and then it bounced right back to his possession to avoid certain disaster at that point. On the next play, Collins ran it in the endzone from two yards away to give MSU a 22-21 advantage. The Bears’ attempt for two was unsuccessful with 4:22 left.
Then Towson drove all the way to the Bears’ 18-yard line, draining the clock to under 60 seconds remaining. However, Tigers quarterback Andrew Indorf threw an 18-yard fade to the back shoulder of John Dunmore in the endzone for the game winning touchdown with 24 seconds left.
Next week, while the Tigers head to College Park to challenge Maryland, the Bears travel to Toledo to challenge the Rockets and look for their first win of the season.
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