Alabama State Takes Care of Bethune-Cookman in Home Win

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Alabama State had a great bounce-back victory against Bethune-Cookman 38-24 this past Saturday. Offensively, the Hornets showed more aggression in attacking downfield. Quarterback Ryan Nettles threw his first touchdown passes of the season with two while running back Jacory Merritt rushed for two touchdowns as well. The defense as a whole stepped up a lot this game with three fumble recoveries, four sacks, and seven pass breakups. Irshaad Davis recorded his first interception of the season along with five tackles and a fumble recovery. The Hornets dominated the time of possession with 36:13 minutes compared to Cookmans 23:47 minutes. Putting up 38 points is what you need to do to stay competitive in this conference.

With teams like Alabama A&M, Prairie View in the SWAC, scoring points can’t be stressed enough. Today, Alabama State can say they can do that. They had solid consistent defensive play in shutting down Bethune-Cookman’s ability to run the football with the Hornet offense moving the ball down the field and scoring touchdowns, not field goals. Nettles looked very comfortable in the pocket with his accuracy improving greatly and threw more down the field passes going 23 for 41, 260 pass yards, and two touchdowns. Unfortunately, Nettles had two interceptions also but they were not costly. One was towards the end of the second quarter when he was attempting to move the offense down the field and was picked off on a sideline route to preserve time since the Hornets had no timeouts left. The second one was simply a bad read. But these mistakes are no cause for alarm. Nettles showed that he is more than capable of making plays with his arm and his legs. He also rushed for 29 yards on four rushes in some key moments where his great decision-making kicked in.

Other offensive contributors like Merritt and wide receiver Jeremiah Hixon had all-SWAC caliber games. Merritt rushed for 43 yards on 15 carries for two touchdowns. Just watching the film you can see his vision improving in finding the right holes. As for Hixon, he leads the team in receiving yards with 100 on just seven catches and a touchdown. His yards after catch or YAC has improved as well with 53 this game. When asked what part of Hixon’s game he wanted to improve on he simply stated his YAC. “Coming into this season I wanted to work on my yard after the catch, my YAC. I want to get it more and more until somebody can’t stop me”.

Alabama State has FAMU next week in Tallahassee, Florida as they prepare for another road matchup.