Delaware Blue Hens at North Carolina A&T Aggies: What to know
All the important names and facts as Delaware makes first and likely last trip to North Carolina A&T for second game of the 2024 season Saturday
A pair of fourth-down conversions have keyed Delaware as it has taken early command in its CAA football opener at North Carolina A&T today.
The Blue Hens converted a fourth-and-2 from their own 33 on the game’s opening series, with Marcus Yarns getting three yards.
Yards scored on another 3-yard run as the Blue Hens closed a 10-play, 75-yard march to take at 6-0 lead at Truist Stadium in Greensboro. Nate Reed’s extra-point try was wide.
Yarns had 40 yards rushing on the series.
The Aggies did reach the Delaware 42 on their first possession and then being forced to punt.
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The Blue Hens then benefitted from an Aggies offsides infraction on a fourth-and-1 at the UD 46, continuing what became a 9-play, 89-yard scoring drive.
Jo’Nathan Silver carried 1 yard for the TD, as he had stepped in for the hobbled Yarns, as Delaware went up 12-0 with 3:26 left in the first period. Silver came up inches short after a 2-point pass from Ryan O’Connor.
O’Connor has begun the game 7-for-8 for 103 yards passing with six different receivers.
Alterations up front
Delaware’s veteran offensive line will have its second change of personnel after the Blue Hens and North Carolina A&T kick off this afternoon at Truist Stadium in Greensboro.
Steven Demboski will get his first career start at center in the Coastal Athletic Association opener for the Hens and Aggies.
Delaware (1-0) beat North Carolina A&T 21-6 last season at Delaware Stadium in the Aggies’ first year as league members, in which they finished 1-10 overall and 0-8 in conference games. They are 1-1 this year, losing at FBS Wake Forest and beating Division II Winston-Salem State.
Fourth-year starting center and team captain Brock Gingrich injured his knee in Delaware’s 48-17 season-opening win against Bryant on Aug. 29. Demboski stepped in and earned coach Ryan Carty’s postgame praise.
“He’s good enough to be a starter in this league, and he’s proven that over the course of practice,” Carty said then.
The coach repeated his faith in Demboski this week, saying he exhibited the proper diligence despite not being a starter the last two years.
“Dembo played really well in the second half of the game,” Carty said. “Another kid that I’m really proud of, the way that he has progressed.”
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It will be the second change for the Blue Hens up front.
Anwar O’Neal, the highly regarded redshirt freshman from Middletown, started at right tackle against Bryant. That had been a surprise, as Delaware had All-CAA fifth-year senior Fintan Brose there. It now appears Brose will be redshirted, which does allow him to play in four games, in his final year of eligibility and saved for next year’s move to Conference USA in the NCAA Football Bowl Subdivision.
Delaware could actually elect to do the same with Gingrich by pursuing a medical waiver, which is regularly granted, and keeping him sidelined.
The 6-foot-3, 300-pound Demboski is from Hillsdale, New Jersey, and starred on both sides of the football at Pascack Valley High. He is a third-year sophomore, having redshirted in 2022 and getting in five games last year.
“The thing that goes understated at times,” Carty said, “is how well people are working in the background. How hard they’re working so that they’re ready when their chance comes. That’s something you don’t see until it happens. … He did a really nice job over the last year and a half at becoming somebody who is not gonna be serviceable in there. He was gonna be pushing for one of the starting jobs in the front five.”
Contact Kevin Tresolini at [email protected] and follow on Twitter @kevintresolini. Support local journalism by subscribing to delawareonline.com and our DE Game Day newsletter.
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Publish date : 2024-09-14 05:25:00
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