CLEVELAND, OH – The visiting Johns Hopkins football team, which entered Saturday's season-opener at Case Western ranked 10th in the D3football.com Preseason Poll, jumped out to a 34-0 halftime lead and never looked back in a 54-14 win over the Spartans at DiSanto Field Saturday afternoon. This is the 11th straight season that Johns Hopkins has won its season opener.
After getting stopped at the one-yard line on their opening drive, the Blue Jays scored touchdowns on their next five first-half possessions to grab the 34-0 lead the half.
Ryan Stevens bookended the 34-point opening half with touchdown passes to senior Artie Collins that covered 43 and 10 yards. Collins took a screen pass down the sideline for the 43-yard score to open the game and then Stevens threaded one down the middle that Collins caught in traffic from 10 yards out to cap the half.
In between the two Collins scores, the Blue Jays got an eight-yard scoring run from senior Danny Wolf, an eight-yard touchdown reception from Quinn Revere and a one-yard score on a quarterback keeper by Stevens to account for their five first-half scores.
While the offense was efficiently operating a balanced first-half attack that saw it generate more than 200 yards passing (210) and 100 yards rushing (116), the Blue Jay defense held the Spartans to just 89 yards on 28 plays before the break; 26 of those yards came on one play. Only once did the Spartans threaten to score before the break, but a fourth-down pass into the end zone fell incomplete.
The Blue Jays tacked on 14 points in the second half with touchdowns receptions from Revere and freshman Geoff Schroeder that pushed the lead to 48-0 early in the fourth quarter. The Spartans got on the board with 10:58 remaining in the fourth quarter when Ian Kipp was flushed from the pocket and scampered 25 yards down the sideline for the score and Kipp added a two-yard scoring pass before Josh Polce caught the first touchdown of his Blue Jay career to close out the scoring.
Inside the Box Score – Johns Hopkins
• Stevens was 27-of-34 for 314 yards and five touchdowns and added 34 rushing yards and one score.
• Collins rang up career highs for receptions (7), receiving yards (103) and TD receptions (3).
• Revere posted the fourth multi-TD game of his JHU career as he was 7-59-2.
• Duncan Van Kouteren (8) and Jake Vall-llobera (7) paced the Blue Jay defense as they combined for 15 tackles and fueled
• The Blue Jay defense held the Spartans to just 136 yards of total offense through three quarters before Case tacked on nearly 180 yards and both of its touchdowns in the final 15 minutes.
• One year after posting 40 sacks, the Blue Jays got four in today's game, including three on consecutive plays in the third quarter.
Inside the Box Score – Case Western
• Kipp rushed for a team-high 54 yards and the one score and was 3-of-4 for 44 yards and the other touchdown.
• Antonio Orsini added 53 yards on the ground and Noah Coyne had four receptions for 46 yards.
• Dominic Sais led the Spartan defense with nine tackles. He was one of one of four Spartans with seven or more tackles on the day.
• The Spartans were just 3-of-13 on third down attempts and 1-of-3 on fourth-down.
Other Notes of Interest
• Today's game was the first ever between Johns Hopkins and Case Western.
• The Blue Jays are now 42-4 in the month of September dating back to 2010. Included in that is a 23-3 mark on the road.
• During the 11-game winning streak in season openers, the Blue Jays have outscored the opposition 477-194.
Johns Hopkins will return to action on Saturday, September 10 when the Blue Jays travel to Ursinus to take on the Bears in the Centennial Conference opener for both teams. Kickoff is set for 1 pm.
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