Green-White Scrimmage

UNOFFICIAL GREEN-WHITE STATS
Rushing
Jason Bash 11-58
Hudson Smythe 9-36
Mike Fritz 3-28, 1 TD
Tom Bennewitz 4-26
Milan Williams 4-23, 1 TD

Receiving
Phil Galligan 6-83, 1 TD
Ryan Fuselier 3-55, 1 TD
Jason Bash 3-28
Brendan Holm 1-15, 1TD

By Bruce Wood
www.biggreenalert.com

Hanover -- The goal, Dartmouth coach Buddy Teevens said on the eve of Saturday's Green-White scrimmage, was to turn his players loose in a game-like situation and see who made plays.

To his satisfaction, a lot of them did just that in the White team's 21-14 win over the Green, with wide receiver Phil Galligan pushing White quarterback Josh Cohen for the unofficial MVP award.

A 5-foot-11, 175-pound freshman from Moraga, Calif., caught six passes for 83 yards and the day's first score. Galligan, who did not catch a varsity pass last year but led the jayvees with 17 catches for 280 yards, also went the length of the field to chase down Casey Frost at the 1 after Frost had returned an interception 94 yards.

"Galligan did a great job," said Teevens. "I don't know how many he had but he had most of them. He had a lot of catches. He's got real good quickness. He moves around a lot. ...

"(He's) a great effort player. He's got some speed and quickness. ... He'll be a guy that will figure in. He really competed. We moved him up on the depth chart as time progressed and he'll be a guy who will challenge everybody in the fall."

Galligan deflected that kind of praise on his teammates. "With (Jason) Bash running so well (11 carries for 58 yards) it helped open up the pass. He did a great job. The quarterbacks looked good and we're looking pretty good at receiver, too. We had a lot of great plays by receivers."

Cohen, another competitor, was on field for just 13 snaps in the first half and 21 official snaps in the game. But after going three-and-out on his first three possessions, he helped the White team score touchdowns on the second three, finishing the day 9-for-12 for 124 yards with two TD's.

Tom Bennewitz and Mike Fritz shared QB duties for the White team, completing 16-of-26 throws for 177 yards and running for a combined 54.

"(They) made it a hell of a lot more competitive today in game situations," Teevens said of the quarterback derby. "Bennewitz, we saw that last year. Fritz had a broken thumb so we didn't have a chance to watch him a year ago. So there's three guys that executed offensively.

"The other two have got a little more mobility and they made some plays. From Josh's perspective, at the tail end he had to make a bunch of throws. We were a little conservative with him early on. A lot of runs and 3-and-out, 3-and-out. When we opened it up he made a few throws. There were a couple errant ones but he's good enough to make all those throws. They'll all be talking and all be amped up coming into the fall."

A couple of receivers who served notice they will be heard from were Ryan Fuselier, who caught three balls for 55 yards and one touchdown and fellow wideout Brendan Holm, who soared for a 15-yard TD pass.

"(Fuselier) has been very, very steady for us," said Teevens. "Giving what we were seeing defensively, some of the perimeter guys were more open than the interior guys. But as a big, tall guy, the 'Fargo' or the fade in the end zone was important -- to go up and get that. He blocked well as well. So a lot of unselfishness, which was nice to see."

Dartmouth might have the tallest receiver corps in the league next year with Fuselier and Holm at 6-5 and rower-receiver Zack Cable close to 6-6.

"(Holm's) been fun to watch," said Teevens. "He's new to the system so he's a little unsure, but you see the raw athleticism. Once he learns ... . The other kid is Cable. Zack made a big catch and turned up the sideline. Those guys didn't know anything about anything three weeks ago. So in a short period to go and play regular, we're helping ourselves with big guys."

Not all the receiver highlights were catches. Andrew von Kuhn brought a smile to Teevens' face during the limited special teams plays.

"(Von Kuhn) stoned one of our guys," the coach said. "Just knocked him out. (He's) very physical. That's what we are looking for. Who can go down and execute? Who stays in their lanes? We saw enough (special teams) to say it was productive."

On the running side, Bash impressed with his quickness, Milan Williams with his moves, Hudson Smythe with his hard running and Andrew Seidman with his toughness.

"(The run game was) sporadic," Teevens said. "We hit some and missed some. I thought the running backs -- you saw (Williams) zip, zip zip. He's a tough guy to bring down. I thought Bash was consistent. And Conn Smythe ('I call him that after the old hockey award,' Teevens said) really showed some lean and intuitiveness to find some plays.

"And then Andrew Seidman came out with a broken finger. They wrapped it all up and he had to carry with the left hand but he played."

Teevens was pleased by the performance of the offensive line -- which played for both teams -- and saw much he liked on the other side of the ball as well.

"Defensively we've got to continue to get off blocks," he said. "We got caught on occasion but (Mike) Rabil and (Brian) Osimiri inside did some things. Max Copello was on the field a bunch. And there were 80-some snaps. He just learned a bunch playing against (Preston) Copley and some of the other guys. And Rich Cummings played a little bit. (Matt) Dratch played a bit. We've got to improve in that area, obviously. We had some practice doing it today."

The big play in the secondary was turned in by Frost, who picked off a pass at the plus-four, broke to the right side and was a step away from a touchdown before Galligan ran him down. Williams got the score two plays later by banging into the left side of the line, bouncing outside and then running over a defensive back at the line.

Galligan's length-of-the-field dash to catch Frost called to mind when Buffalo's Don Beebe chased down Dallas' Leon Lett in the 1993 Super Bowl, although Frost wasn't hotdogging a la Lett.

"I was just running behind him hoping I'd get to him," Galligan said."At first I thought there was no way but he may have (tired out) at the end and that was my chance. I just dove for the legs and hoped I got him right before he made it to the end zone."

No question, there were rough spots. The kicking game struggled. The run game was improved over last year but not overpowering and there were still too many problems with the snaps.

But all in all, Teevens was pleased.

"The thing I was encouraged by was the competitiveness on both sides," he said. "We had guys who hadn't played together in the past and it all worked out really well. It was nice to see it go right down to the wire and nice to see a winning drive at the end.

"A couple of good lessons; the Green team dominated through the course of the afternoon and then the White offense, when they needed it (after a big turnover -- Casey Frost gets an interception and goes about 80 -- (came through). Phil Galligan doesn't stop; chase him down and makes a tackle. And the rest is history."

Because I was the "official" unofficial statistician, I couldn't get down to the field and shoot any pictures so ... . Here's the postgame handshake, at least.
The afternoon concluded with a well-attended cookout where there was plenty of food, a good thing judging by the size of some of the incoming recruits on hand.