Inside the Patriot League · preview

William & Mary finally plays a team that can't run it

Fordham is 1-4. Their only win this season is the 52-27 they hung on William & Mary at Zable on September 19.

Every other team Fordham has played has beaten them, most of them comfortably. That is the single hardest fact about the Tribe's season and there is no way to write around it.

The number that has defined them will not be tested

Rushing yards allowed by William & Mary, in order: Villanova 157, Delaware State 174, Lehigh 366, Fordham 428, Duke 286. At 5.2, 5.3, 7.2, 9.3 and 7.7 a carry.

Holy Cross cannot do that. Their rushing totals this season are 78 against Lehigh, 66 at Colgate, 40 at Miami of Ohio, 155 against Yale and 121 at Lafayette. That is 1.9 a carry against Colgate and 2.1 against Miami. Only the Yale game cleared four yards a carry.

So Saturday is the one week all season the Tribe get to face an opponent who cannot attack them where they are weakest. That cuts both ways. It is their best chance to win a game, and it is close to worthless as a measurement of whether anything has been fixed.

What does get tested

Holy Cross throws it, and David Lynch has been productive doing it: 313 yards against Lehigh, 264 at Colgate, 230 and four touchdowns at Lafayette last Saturday.

That Lafayette game is the one to study, because it is the only one they have won and the reason is not complicated. Lynch threw four touchdown passes and Holy Cross did not turn the ball over once. Lafayette turned it over three times. Holy Cross scored 20 points in the first quarter and held on.

The turnover line runs through their whole season. They gave it away three times against Lehigh and three more at Colgate and lost both. They have committed one turnover total in the three games since.

The other side of it

Holy Cross has its own problem, and it is the mirror image of William & Mary's. Yale threw for 454 yards on them two weeks ago.

Winston Watkins has been the least of the Tribe's worries all year. He went 19-of-26 for 286 and two touchdowns in the loss to Fordham, 18-of-22 against Lehigh, and 10-of-17 with a touchdown at Duke in a game where nothing worked. If William & Mary is going to win a shootout, they have the quarterback for it.

What they do not have right now is a running game. They ran 29 times for 17 yards at Duke. That is 0.6 a carry. Andrew King had 122 against Fordham and was not the leading rusher in Durham.

What is actually at stake

Both teams are 1-2 in the Patriot League. William & Mary beat Villanova and lost to Lehigh and Fordham. Holy Cross lost to Lehigh and Colgate and beat Lafayette.

Lehigh is 5-0 and is not coming back to the field. Colgate and Richmond are both 4-1. The race William & Mary is actually in is the one for third, and a home loss to a 1-4 team would end that conversation.

The Tribe have four home games left and this is the first of them. Georgetown comes on October 24, Lafayette on November 7, Bucknell on November 14. Richmond closes the season in Richmond on November 21.

What a good day looks like

Win the turnover battle. Lynch has thrown six interceptions this season, and five of them came in the first two games, including three in one afternoon at Colgate. He has been a different quarterback since, with one interception in three games and none at Lafayette. The version of him that shows up decides this.

Run it well enough to be a threat. Not 200 yards. Enough that Holy Cross has to respect it, because 17 yards on 29 carries at Duke is how an offense becomes one-dimensional against a defense that already knows what is coming.

And take the points. William & Mary has scored 7, 20 and 27 in its three losses. Holy Cross has allowed at least 30 points in every game it has played, so 20 will not be enough.

Kickoff is 3:30 at Zable Stadium. We will be there, in the press box and on the field.