Inside the MEAC · recap
Opening weekend around the beat: the Hornets survive, everyone else rolls
The Breakdown Media Team
Published
Opening weekend on the beat: two shutouts, one escape act, one international incident that ended up in Charlottesville, and one comeback we already wrote about. Here's the sweep.
Delaware State 41, Stony Brook 34
The Hornets opened Thursday night and needed every minute of it. Stony Brook came back on them late, and it took Sean "Deuce" Weston Jr.'s 16-yard go-ahead touchdown run with 1:53 left — plus a final Stony Brook incompletion — to get Delaware State out at 1-0.
DeSean Jackson is now 9-4 as a college head coach, and the way this one went matters to us specifically: this is the team visiting Williamsburg on Saturday, and The Breakdown will be at Zable Stadium for it. A team that wins shootouts and survives late pushes is a very different preview subject than one that cruises. More on that later this week.
Hampton 45, Virginia-Lynchburg 0
The Pirates did exactly what you're supposed to do with an overmatched opponent: end the suspense early and empty the bench. A 45-0 shutout gets Hampton to 1-0 without much to overreact to in either direction — the schedule gets real soon enough.
Virginia 34, NC State 8
This game was supposed to make history in Rio de Janeiro — the first college football game in South America — until the logistics collapsed and the whole thing got relocated to Scott Stadium. So instead of a neutral-site experiment, Virginia got a home ACC opener, and they treated it like a gift. Transfer quarterback Beau Pribula won his debut going away, 34-8.
For our purposes: that's the same Virginia team hosting Norfolk State on September 11, and an FBS program that just handled a conference opponent by 26 is a taller order than it looked in July. Fresh preview to come — the one we wrote in August aged out of usefulness the moment the quarterback battle settled.
Already covered
William & Mary's down-ten-with-a-minute-left heist at Villanova got its own piece — the onside kick, the tying touchdown, the 45-yarder at the gun, all of it. And Norfolk State's 56-0 blackout-night shutout of Winston-Salem State is written up separately too, with the Norfolk derby preview coming Wednesday.
One weekend in, the beat is a combined 5-0. That won't last. Enjoy it.