Well-rounded play seals win for football - Offensive improvement is added to Hopkins' solid defensive, Blue Jays easily win, 24-0

The Johns Hopkins football team marched confidently in unison, igniting a wave of applause from the throng of clamoring students.

Slowly, one by one, the players began to dance.

Not wanting to back down in front of the large crowd of student-athletes and fans at Friday night's pep rally, members of the football team took up Athletic Director Tom Calder's challenge to get on stage and perform a cheer. Partially imitating the previous performance by SLAM, a Hopkins dance team whose name stands for "Stop! Look at Me!", the team broke into a (hopefully) spontaneous routine of clapping, stomping and swaying.

Fortunately, in their game the following afternoon against Randolph-Macon College, the Blue Jays proved that they had the right moves when it mattered. The win was a two-step for the Jays, who were dominant on both defensive and offense, blanking the Yellow Jackets with a 24-0 win.

"Our defense has played really great in the first two games," said head coach Jim Margraff. "They've been pretty banged up, but we've had some younger guys really step up."

After two games, the Blue Jays' defense has allowed only seven points, having shut-out Randolph-Macon and defeated the University of Rochester in the season-opener, 9-7. The defense, which allowed only 145 yards and eight first downs this week, was anchored by junior defensive end Brian Nickel, whose six tackles and 1.5 sacks earned him the Centennial Conference's Defensive Player of the Week.

"I couldn't be happier with how we played as a team this week," Nickel said. "The defense as a unit just played great. We shut them down from the start of the game."

"It's nice to know that we have a defense that can come up with a shutout like that," said senior quarterback Zach DiIonno

The victory improved Hopkins' September winning streak to 13 games, with their last loss in September being a 50-27 defeat at the hands of Bridgewater (Va.), on September 21, 2001. The Jays have now won 21 of their last 24 games.

The biggest improvement for Hopkins came from their offense, which struggled in the season-opener, but exploded for 483 yards against Randolph-Macon. The Jays were led by DiIonno, who had 23 completions in 35 attempts, and senior running back T.J. Lyons, who rushed for 102 yards in 15 carries.

"Offensively, Zach and T.J. played real well, and the offensive line really helped them out. [Freshman offensive lineman Matt] Hintz stepped up and did one heck of a job," Nickel said.

Hopkins got on the board early, with an 80-yard drive that culminated in a three-yard run for a touchdown by Lyons just over four minutes into the game. A 36-yard field goal by junior kicker Ben Scott with 38 seconds left in the second quarter gave the Blue Jays a 10-0 lead at halftime.

Hopkins' offense was able to hold onto the ball for over ten minutes during the third quarter, and was able to add onto his team's lead with a one-yard dive into the end zone, making the score 17-0.

With 13:07 left in the game, sophomore running back Phil Roberts put the game out of Randolph-Macon's reach with a 41-yard run to score his first touchdown as a Blue Jay, giving Hopkins a 24-0 lead. Roberts ended the game with 7 carries for 58 yards.

"Our offense got off to a slow start in our first game of the season, but this week they showed a lot of improvement," said Margraff. "But they still have a ways to go."

Margraff cited injuries as being the main problem his team will need to face in upcoming games, especially next week, when the Jays will play away against the strong Carnegie Mellon. The Tartans have outscored their first two opponents 65-16 this season.

"We have a fairly inexperienced offensive line this season, and they need some time to build cohesiveness," he said.

Despite what appeared to be an impressive showing on both sides of the field for Hopkins, DiIonno shared Margraff's belief that there is still plenty of room for improvement.

"It's nice being able to put up numbers that look good, but still we need to improve on some of those little errors," he said.