Bowling Green vs Toledo Recap and Takeaways 2024

Bowling Green Reclaims Battle of I75 Trophy!!!

    It was a perfect Saturday for college football. Two bitter rivals separated by only 25 miles. The best rivalry in a conference practically unaffected by conference realignment in my entire lifetime. Two teams on even playing fields despite Toledo's domination throughout the 2010s. The Rockets were 9-0 against the Falcons when in came Scot Loeffler. A man DETERMINED to make this a true rivalry again. He is now 3-3 in the Battle of I75. In 2019 he shocked the world with a win as 27.5 point underdogs at home, at the Doyt in year 1 (the last Saturday game of this rivalry as well). 14.5 point underdogs in 2022, the Falcons won to finally end a 7 season bowl drought. Now just 2.5 point underdogs and the win is not any less sweet. BG came out hot, never trailed, and came up with an overall psychically imposing win over our heated rival. 

Recap

1st Quarter

    This game started off hot for both teams. The Orange and Brown defense forced a 3 and out with a sack on the very first play by Ali Saad and Avi McGary. The BG offense then scored in just 5 plays. On 3rd down, Coach Loeffler dialed up a WR sweep with Jamal Johnson, a trend of VERY crafty play calling we would see the entire game. Terion Stewart would punch in the score as his running carried the offense down the field. The Rockets responded in kind with a perfectly balanced drive down the field to tie the game up 7-7. After trading 3 and outs, BG would go 54 yards where another crafty play would see a fake sweep, shovel pass inside to Harold Fannin for an acrobatic score as he would break a tackle and dive in (see picture above). Toledo would then move the ball until BG's defense would tighten up, forcing a 54 yard field goal which they would make, ending the 1st quarter 14-10 Falcons. 

2nd Quarter

    The Falcons responded with another nice touchdown drive. Again, it came from very crafty classic Scot Loeffler play calls. Connor Bazelak showed off his wheels on the QB option game and Jamal Johnson had a WR sweep counter up the middle for long gains. Then, Lucian Anderson came in and faked a QB sweep and then threw a long gainer to Harold Fannin. It was a mix of absolute masterful play calls which ended in 2 year captain Levi Gazarek's first touchdown! He lined up at fullback and scored on a play action pass. Toledo would respond in fast fashion, as BG's pass defense was horrendous looking in the entire 2nd quarter. Toledo was seemingly moving with ease while the defensive line was allowing nothing on the ground. Then a BG punt saw the Rockets driving back down the field down just 21-17 until Jordan Oladokun had a beautiful pick six to extend the Falcon lead 28-17. The half would end 28-20 as Toledo would get a field goal with n time left. 

3rd Quarter

    The 2nd half started off scary. BG would punt and then Toledo would score a long 64 yard passing touchdown, failing the 2 point play to make the score 28-26. At this point it seemed the Rockets had all the momentum aside from the pick six last quarter but the BG offense revived itself to get 3 points as Rahkeem Smith rakced up a bunch of yards from Bazelak to set up a quality Zach Long FG from 44 yards out. The Orange and Brown pass defense then locked in, the run defense kept dominating and the Rockets never scored the rest of the game. BG would hit another field goal and the 3rd quarter would end 34-26.

4th Quarter

    The 4th quarter was perfect so I will sum it up quick. Jordan Oladokun got another interception and the Falcon offense marched down the field behind our big three of Fannin, Stewart, and Bazelak before Rahkeem Smith scored on another crafty jet sweep dialed up by Coach Loeffler. The BG defense got ANOTHER stop and the Falcons ran out the clock. 41-26 winners in the game of the year.

Takeaways

    What is there to say. Coach Loeffler is a big time coach who seems to pull rabbits from his hat in big game. BG looked pretty mediocre in the close Akron win, terrible on offense against NIU, and against Kent the offense left a lot of points on the board. The one constant in all those games and the ODU loss was the defense being really strong and the offense not finding any rhythm. Then in the biggest game of our season, our heated rival, our straight competition for a MAC Championship, Coach Loeffler finds 34 points from an offense that could not crack 10 against NIU or 30 against hapless Kent and Akron. The multiple option runs from Bazelak, the crafty runs by Jamal Johnson and Rahkeem Smith were beautiful. Terion Stewart had another great game and the offensive line (mostly Burns, Fatukasi, Pabst, Padgett, and Wollschlaeger) had their best conference game by far. They truly beat up Toledo's D line. Our big 3 all scored in Fannin, Stewart, and Bazelak but then other guys stepped up in this massive game. Malcolm Johnson continues to be our main WR, Smith and Johnson continue to contribute as well as Captain Levi Gazarek finally find the end zone. 

    The defense was awesome, Oladokun, CJ Brown, Ed Rhambo started locking up the secondary. Brock Horne and Joe Sipp were strong run stuffers from the backer spot. The D line of Ali Saad, Chace Davis, Evan Branch-Haynes and Anthony Hawkins probably deserve the game ball along with the entire D line because they were fantastic the entire game after the first drive. Our trenches psychically beat up Toledo, on their home field, and it was awesome to watch. 

    

    BG checked off all 3 Scot Loeffler boxes. The Falcons out rushed the Rockets by over 100 yards, won the time of possession and won the turnover battle 2-0. That formula always leads to victories and this one truly erased last year's debacle in my eyes. Coach Loeffler is now a VERY impressive 3-3 against Toledo and BG is now 3-1 in MAC play. MAC Championship hopes are VERY alive, bowl hopes are very alive, and getting to 7 wins for a second straight year is very much on the table which would signify another winning season for BG. Now the challenge is to follow this massive win up with good practices going into an off week as MACtion truly starts the final 4 games. I hope we see a lengthy contract extension coming for Coach Loeffler as clearly the kids love him, the fans love him, he has greatly improved our team and the attendance has been even better than that of a lot of games under Clawson and Babers. There was A LOT of orange and brown in that stadium on the road to watch a magical game that as an alumni, fan, and current Army officer brought back so many amazing memories when I see my team win our rivalry game like that. Ay Ziggy!!!