Senior Day Photo Gallery
CLINTON, S.C. - The Presbyterian College football team capped its 2011 season by giving its seniors a season finale to remember on Saturday, cruising to a 45-14 win over visiting Charleston Southern on Senior Day.
PC ends the year at 4-7 overall and 3-3 in Big South Conference action, marking the best record since 2008 and the best Big South Conference record in program history. The result also gives the Blue Hose their first back-to-back wins since the 2008 season. Charleston Southern ends its year at 0-11 and 0-6 in league play.
A season-high 45 points and 516 yards of total offense helped PC to victory. The Blue Hose took a lead on their opening series and never looked back, building on a 24-7 lead at halftime for a 45-14 win.
Junior running back Lance Byrd (Jacksonville, Fla.) led all rushers with 18 attempts for 133 yards on the ground and a touchdown. The day moved him to 910 rushing yards on the season and put him 51 yards shy of hitting the 2,000-yard mark for his career. Seth Moreland (Conway, S.C.) also ran for a touchdown as well, going for 48 yards. The Blue Hose end the season with 1,932 rushing yards, the highest mark in the Division I era.
Sophomore quarterback Ryan Singer (Dunedin, Fla.) racked up 212 yards passing and two touchdowns by going 12-for-20 through the air. He also picked up a rushing touchdown. Senior quarterback Brandon Miley (Wilmington, N.C.) completed both of his two passes on the day for 79 yards.
Two PC receivers went over 100 yards on the day as Michael Ruff (Whitmire, S.C.) caught five passes for 116 yards and Jeremiah McKie (Simpsonville, S.C.) hauled in four passes for a career-high 116 yards as well. The feat marked the first time any Blue Hose receiver cracked the 100-yard barrier since Ruff tallied 122 yards in last year's season opener against Wake Forest.
Defensively, Donnelle Williams (Starke, Fla.) led PC with six solo tackles and four assists for 10 total. Derren Evans (Lawrenceville, Ga.) also contributed seven solo stops and an assist while Xavier Boatwright (Manning, S.C.) and Josh Polk (Lithonia, Ga.) each brought down a Charleston Southern quarterback for a sack.
Justin Bethel (Blythewood, S.C.) ended his PC career with three solo tackles to extend his Big South Conference record to 199 in his four years. He also intercepted his seventh career pass and fourth of the season. Matthan Burton (Temple, Ga.) registered five tackles and an interception as well.
Antarius Terrell (Covington, Ga.) returned an interception for his second touchdown.
Charleston Southern quarterback Malcolm Dixon led the team in passing with 79 yards on four completions. Keelyan Bryant led the team on the ground with 49 yards. Running back Teddy Allen threw for a touchdown and ran for one.
PC put the Buccaneers in a hole early, finding the end zone on its first drive. Ruff and Byrd set up a Miley pass that hit McKie for a 44-yard completion that put the Blue Hose one yard away from paydirt. Byrd cashed in from there and PC led 4:14 into the game, 7-0.
Byrd punished the Buccaneer defense the next time he touched the ball, streaking for a 68-yard run on the first play of PC's next possession. Two plays later, Singer ran in for a three-yard touchdown to extend PC's lead to 14-0 with 4:47 left in the first.
Charleston Southern cut the lead in half on their next series. A 21-yard pass to Chase Jones and a 52-yard completion to Carson Leshin put Teddy Allen in position to punch it in from two yards to make it 14-7 heading into the second quarter.
PC took three points back early in the second quarter on a 37-yard Aaron Mayes (Blythewood, S.C.) field goal following a Bryan Shepherd (Ellenwood, Ga.) fumble recovery deep in Buccaneer territory.
The Blue Hose forced a punt and made quick work of its next possession. On PC's second play of the drive, Singer connected with Ruff over the middle out of playaction and the redshirt junior outran the defense on his way to a 65-yard touchdown completion. The score gave PC a 17-point lead it would take into halftime, 24-7.
PC wasted little time scoring after halftime, taking two plays again to strike paydirt. After a three-yard completion to Byrd, Singer threw a long pass to McKie and the freshman refused to go down, carrying two Charleston Southern tacklers into the end zone to give PC a 31-7 lead early in the third quarter.
The Buccaneers answered with a six-play, 86-yard drive that ended with running back Teddy Allen's 34-yard pass to Corvaughn Archie. The score moved Charleston Southern back within 17 with 3:45 left in the third, 31-14.
Each side swapped possessions but the PC defense would give the Blue Hose their next score. After PC turned the ball over on downs on the Charleston Southern six-yard line, Terrell picked off a Richard Mounce second-down pass and ran it back 15 yards for his second career touchdown. The points extended PC's lead to 38-14 midway through the final period.
PC's defense held the Buccaneers scoreless in the final quarter and the Blue Hose tacked on one more touchdown in the final minute. A six-play, 73 yard drive ended with Moreland scampering for 16 yards to give PC a 45-14 lead that would stand as the final score.
