SOUTH EUCLID, Ohio – One hundred ten points were scored in the Falcon Bowl on Saturday as the No. 5 Notre Dame College football team took down Fairmont State University.
 
It was a game filled with multiple big plays, by both the offenses and the defenses, as well as one that displayed how strong both programs are. Notre Dame was able to pull off a 61-49 victory, but the NDC Falcons trailed Fairmont State for 24 minutes and 24 seconds spanning across the second, third and fourth quarters before gaining its lead back.
 
No one was surprised by how competitive the game was.
 
"All the years I've been here it's been close games and great battles," senior defensive end Sha'haun Williams said. "When you have two programs this good collide it always ends close and it builds up the anticipation before every game."
 
But the way things went down so wildly shocked some.
 
"I would have never in a million years thought the score would be 61-49," said head coach Mike Jacobs. "I would have guessed it was going to be somewhere in the range of 21-17, where it has been the past few years. But that's how the deck shook out today. It shows that our players are willing to play a whole game and that they can persevere through some of those highs and lows that happen over the course of 60 minutes. It's a good building block.
 
"We talked all week that this game was going to be a series of big plays, we just didn't think there would be that many of them."
 
The game started off similarly to NDC's previous two contests this season as the opposing offense marched down the field to put themselves in scoring range. In the first two games of the season, Notre Dame was able to hold its opponents to a field goal. But Fairmont State finished its 75-yard drive with a touchdown to go up 7-0 early.
 
Less than two minutes later, NDC tied things up as Jaleel McLaughlin ran 42 yards to pay dirt for the first of what would ultimately be five touchdowns the sophomore scored on the day. Two plays later, McLaughlin would score his second.
 
Notre Dame's kicker, Tanner Harding, booted the ball downfield on the kickoff to start another FSU possession. Nik Cotton had other things in mind, however, and forced a fumble to give the ball right back to the home Falcons. With the ball at the FSU 12-yard line, McLaughlin ran it in to put Notre Dame up 14-7.
 
The game was off to a roaring start, but things settled down for a bit after that. Neither team scored for the next 12 minutes, the longest drought of the contest.
 
To kick start things back up, Fairmont State's Michael Porter intercepted a pass from Chris Brimm to give his team the ball near midfield. Like the turnover before it, there was just one play needed by the offense to score a touchdown. This time from 47 yards out as Khalik Hamlin mimicked the turnover-leading-to-a-rushing-touchdown pattern NDC had in the first quarter.
 
The game was tied 14-14, but not for long. After the kickoff, McLaughlin took the ball 75 yards to score yet again. The tie lasted just 12 seconds before Notre Dame was back up 21-14.
 
McLaughlin said after the game that whenever the ball is put in his hands he tries to score, but how he's been able to score so often at Notre Dame is credited elsewhere.
 
"What's crazy is, I went 75 yards untouched," McLaughlin said. "My offensive line is great and I want to thank those guys. The hole was so big, all I had to do was run forward. The boys up front work so hard. That's why I run as hard as I can because they deserve it. They deserve everything."
 
The game was back to the frenetic way it started. Fairmont State took its next possession 75 yards in eight plays to tie it up before its defense scored on a fumble recovery to go up 28-21. Siddiq Kanneh snatched the ball out of the air on the NDC fumble and returned it 17 yards to give the FSU Fighting Falcons the edge.
 
Fairmont State held its lead all the way into the fourth quarter before ultimately falling to Notre Dame.
 
The NDC Falcons were able to score before halftime on another big play. This time coming through the air. Brimm saw Marvelle Ross open downfield and hit him for a 55-yard touchdown pass. The point after was missed, however, to give FSU a one-point advantage.
 
Fairmont State, looking to answer, took the ball down into the NDC red zone on the next possession, earning a first-and-goal on the nine-yard line. But the 13-play drive ended with a huge sack from Sha'haun Williams that took the clock down to zero.
 
NDC trailed 28-27 at halftime.  
 
Again things slowed a bit as Fairmont State's 14-yard touchdown pass was the only scoring play in the third quarter. FSU now led 35-27 heading into the final 15 minutes of the game.
 
In those 15 minutes, 48 points were scored (34-14 in NDC's advantage to give the Falcons their victory). Fairmont State had not allowed a point in the fourth quarter so far this season, and you'd have to add up its last eight contests, dating back to last year, to get a total of 34 points allowed in the final quarter of its games.
 
Continuing a drive from the third quarter, NDC converted on two big plays starting with a 24-yard pass from Brimm to Zaire Mitchell. That pass was followed by a reverse run by Ross that went 17 yards to the one-yard line. McLaughlin, set up perfectly, scored his fourth TD of the day. Jacobs decided to take the points with a point after kick attempt, and the Falcons remained behind by just one point (35-34).
 
Again, Sha'haun Williams came up big for Notre Dame. On the next Fairmont State possession, Williams had a strip sack to give the ball back to NDC. Rudy Ngougni picked it up, advancing it 11 yards to the FSU six.
 
"The defensive line all came together – coach Jacobs and coach [Shawn Chaffee] reminded us to stay in our rush lanes – and we knew one of us needed to come up with a big play and help the rest of the defense," Williams said. "It was a huge momentum play that set our offense up in great field position. As a defense, we know if we put them in good field position that they'll execute because we have so many talented players on that side of the ball."
 
Set up with just six yards needed, Brimm again found Mitchell. This time in the end zone as the 6-foot-7 tight end launched himself above two defenders to snag the football. The two-point conversion attempt failed, but NDC had gained the lead back (40-35) with just over 11 minutes to go.
 
"When I saw the ball go up, I did what I know how to do and got the rebound," Mitchell said. "I played basketball all four years of high school and used that experience to just jump up and grab it. I knew the defender was just focused on my ability to get my arms up, and he was trying to swat at the ball. But he didn't know where the ball was so I was able to go up and get it."
 
Not losing any momentum, the next FSU possession ended in a blocked punt, which was returned 25 yards for another NDC touchdown. Nathan Moore, who led NDC with 14 tackles on the day, blocked the kick allowing Dylan Spaeth to scoop and score, and put Notre Dame up 47-35.
 
"Coach [Tony Baldesare] called the play for our return unit to block the punt, and he always talks about firing off the ball because you could be the one to get the block," Spaeth said. "So I went off the ball as if I was going to block it, and everyone on the team did their jobs for Nate Moore to get there. Afterwards I got the ball and everyone did their jobs again to help extend the play and block for me to get into the end zone."
 
The Falcons traded a pair of touchdowns as FSU scored on the next drive with a 25-yard TD pass before the following NDC possession ended with a 25-yard TD run from McLaughlin.
 
McLaughlin scored his fifth touchdown of the game to put Notre Dame up 54-42. His five touchdowns broke both the Notre Dame program record as well as the Mountain East Conference record. He also became the first player to be responsible for 30 points in a game in MEC history.
 
McLaughlin rushed for 246 yards on the day to pair with his five touchdowns. In his 17th career game, the Marshville, N.C. native surpassed 3,000 yards becoming the first at NDC to do so in its NCAA DII history (and the fifth to do so in MEC history).
 
Again, he was quick to praise the offensive line.
 
"It means a lot because – I probably sound like a broken record – for 2,900 of those yards I was probably untouched with how good our offensive line is," McLaughlin said. "The credit goes to them."
 
Coach Jacobs gave some insight on the kind of player McLaughlin is and how he has been able to accomplish so much.
 
"Everything he does amazes me," Jacobs said of McLaughlin. "The thing I am most proud of is that you can point him out every day in practice as the guy that goes the hardest. He finishes every run, there's great attention to detail in everything he does, he's positive all the time, and he's always out there getting extra. He is truly our hardest worker and we see that day in and day out. When we get to game day, I'm happy he's someone else's problem at that point."
 
Things kept going in Notre Dame's favor as Jeremiah Boatner intercepted the ball on the next play, returning it 33 yards. NDC was stopped and forced to punt, but FSU muffed the return and Nik Pelligrino recovered the ball.
 
Vasean Davis then scored on a nine-yard carry before FSU had the final touchdown of the game on a 35-yard pass.
 
The game ended after a knee was taken by the NDC offense, and the crazy fourth quarter came to a stop.
 
Fourth-Quarter Possessions
 

Team	Time	Drive Ended
NDC	15:00	NDC Touchdown
FSU	13:25	NDC Fumble Recovery
NDC	12:40	NDC Touchdown
FSU	11:08	Blocked Punt Returned for NDC Touchdown
FSU	9:55	FSU Touchdown
NDC	8:47	NDC Touchdown
FSU	5:45	Interception
NDC	5:27	Punt, muffed by FSU, recovered by NDC
NDC	3:43	NDC Touchdown
FSU	2:12	FSU Touchdown
NDC	0:44	Time Expired

 
Next week will matchup the only two undefeated teams left in the conference. The Mountain East Conference Football Championship has never been won by a team with a loss.
 
Notre Dame travels to Urbana on Saturday, September 28, for a 1 p.m. kickoff as both teams look to improve on their 3-0 starts.