Troy University Athletics
Saturday, September 3
Troy, Ala.
5 p.m.
Troy University
1-0
57
vs
17
Austin Peay
0-1
1st
2nd
3rd
4th
F
Austin Peay
7
7
3
0
17
Troy
13
17
14
13
57
Team Stats
APSU
TROY
Total Yards
254
706
Pass Yards
161
323
Rushing Yards
93
383
Penalty Yards
23
153
1st Downs
13
29
3rd Downs
4
7
4th Downs
1
0
TOP
32:34
27:26
1st Quarter
APSU 0, TROY 6
TROY - Chunn, Jordan 48 yd run (Silvers, B. passfailed), 1 plays, 48 yards, TOP 0:07
APSU 0, TROY 13
TROY - Thompson, E. 3 yd pass from Silvers, B. (Kay, Ryan kick) 10 plays, 75 yards, TOP 2:59
APSU 7, TROY 13
APSU - Coleman,James 6 yd pass from Hays,Tommy (Gauna,Nick kick) 10 plays, 75 yards, TOP 4:30
2nd Quarter
APSU 14, TROY 13
APSU - Coleman,James 14 yd pass from Hays,Tommy (Gauna,Nick kick) 9 plays, 73 yards, TOP 3:53
APSU 14, TROY 20
TROY - Velez, Hiram 47 yd pass from Smith, Sawyer (Kay, Ryan kick) 4 plays, 75 yards, TOP 1:32
APSU 14, TROY 27
TROY - Silvers, B. 1 yd run (Kay, Ryan kick), 10 plays, 49 yards, TOP 3:06
APSU 14, TROY 30
TROY - Kay, Ryan 43 yd field goal 8 plays, 71 yards, TOP 0:55
3rd Quarter
APSU 14, TROY 37
TROY - Saleem, Ismail 49 yd pass from Silvers, B. (Kay, Ryan kick) 3 plays, 67 yards, TOP 1:15
APSU 17, TROY 37
APSU - Gauna,Nick 33 yd field goal 6 plays, 56 yards, TOP 3:12
APSU 17, TROY 44
TROY - Anderson, Josh 32 yd run (Underwood, B. kick), 8 plays, 63 yards, TOP 2:36
4th Quarter
APSU 17, TROY 50
TROY - Flakes, Andre 6 yd run (Underwood, B. kickfailed), 8 plays, 42 yards, TOP 2:53
APSU 17, TROY 57
TROY - Barker, Kaleb 50 yd run (Williams, C. kick), 6 plays, 87 yards, TOP 2:18
Game Leaders
Passing Leaders
Players Mentioned
RB
/ Football
CB
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RB
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RB
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LB
/ Football
CB
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LB
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/ FootballPhoto by: Kevin Glackmeyer
Troy Routs Austin Peay in Season Opener
9/3/2016 9:53:00 PM | Football
TROY, Alabama – Troy rushed for 383 yards, the most by a Trojan team since 2008, in a 57-17 victory over Austin Peay in the season opener for both schools Saturday evening in Veterans Memorial Stadium.
The Trojans (1-0) finished with 706 yards of total offense while holding the Governors (0-1) to just 254 yards, with only 37 yards in the second half. Troy's tally ranks as the third most in school history and the most since the Trojans racked up 721 yards at Tennessee in 2012.
The victory was Troy's 10 straight in home openers that double as season openers, while the 57 points scored were the most in a season opener since dropping 61 to open the 1996 campaign.
Jordan Chunn, who took the first play of the game 48 yards for a touchdown, finished with 161 yards on just 13 carries, while Josh Anderson added 68 yards on five carries. Brandon Silvers completed 20-of-27 passes for 229 yards and two scores, while true freshman Sawyer Smith was perfect on seven attempts for 86 yards – Smith's first career pass went for 47 yards and a touchdown to Hiram Velez.
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Tommy Hays completed 8-of-12 passes for 124 yards and two touchdowns to lead Austin Peay. He also rushed for 52 yards on 11 carries.
Stat of the Game
True freshman quarterback Sawyer Smith finished the game 7-for-7 for 86 yards and a touchdown. He became the first quarterback in Troy's FBS era to throw a touchdown pass on his first career attempt.
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Turning Point
Austin Peay took a 14-13 lead with 11:07 to play in the first half. True freshman quarterback Sawyer Smith came off the bench and following a 29-yard run by Jordan Chunn threw a 47-yard touchdown pass to Hiram Velez on his first career attempt. Troy outscored Austin Peay 44-3 from that point on.
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Quotable
"Offensively, Brandon Silvers really managed the game well," head coach Neal Brown said.
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"He did not make a bad decision until late in the second quarter and that's a big change from last year. I'll just leave it at that. I thought he managed the game well and I thought our tempo was really good when we pressed the gas. I thought he threw the ball down the field probably better than he has at any point in his career."
Stat Geek
Troy has averaged 39.0 points and 455.9 yards over the last seven games … the Trojans averaged just 19.8 points and 305.7 yards of total offense over the first six games of the 2015 season.
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Up Next
The Trojans hit the road for the first time of the 2016 season and the task will be a tall one as they travel to No. 2 Clemson. Kickoff is scheduled for 11:30 a.m. (CDT) and the game will be televised live on the ACC Network and ESPN3.
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Troy Head Coach Neal Brown Quotes
A great night for college football. What a game. We've missed it. I thought our students showed out in big support and I'm very, very appreciative of them. We've spent a lot of time out on campus this week and they showed up and we appreciate them. Hopefully they will continue to do so. We have a football team that's playing hard.Â
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We're going to get better. There was some good. Defensively, we did a good job of getting off with three-and-outs most of the second half. We've got a lot of people experience. Melvin Tyus played a lot of snaps in the secondary, which was good. We needed it. We rotated five corners through there. Jawon McDowell, Blace Brown both played a lot of snaps. Doug Salter and Tron Folsom. Defensively, we played every defensive lineman we had so that was good. The negative defensively is in the first half we just did not do a very good job with our eye discipline. And I think some of that is that we've got older guys, four senior linebackers and two seniors at defensive end, that played tight and tried to force some things. As we get into the season they'll relax. I know they will. Doc Dillard and Junior [Gnonknode] are going to relax.
The ugly part of it was the penalties on both sides. I've got to go back and look at it before I can really talk about it. For sure there was one late hit on the sideline that we don't condone. A couple of those I'll get some insight from the officials. They did a nice job, they did a really nice job. The (Southeastern Conference) crew was here tonight and I thought they did a really nice job officiating the game.
Offensively, Brandon Silvers really managed the game well. He did not make a bad decision until late in the second quarter and that's a big change from last year. I'll just leave it at that. I thought he managed the game well and I thought our tempo was really good when we pressed the gas. I thought he threw the ball down the field probably better than he has at any point in his career. Our running attack I thought we did a good job getting movement up front, better than we did at any point last year. Jordan Chunn is ready to have a big year. You saw Jabir Frye and some of these young guys we've been talking about. We played a lot of guys and I thought we had 17 [positions] that were two deep. They probably played closer to 20 in their first game action. So that was very positive.
The negatives right there was penalties. I was disappointed we didn't get that fourth down. I was trying to run some clock, but that was probably the one negative offensively. Our ball security has got to get better. We fumbled a punt. Special teams were sharp, we didn't have to do a whole lot. That initial swinging gate, they made a nice play. Brandon [Silvers] didn't make a nice throw, but they made a nice play. Our special teams were sound. I thought we did a really nice job on kickoffs.Â
That being said, it's a win. I'll say this too, Will Healy is doing a good job at Austin Peay. It showed at times tonight that they're much improved so he's going to get that program going. A lot of positive energy right there. They have nothing to be ashamed of. I thought they competed. They're doing some really sound things schematically on offense and defense so my hats off to them.
Austin Peay Head Coach Will Healy Quotes
"You're never okay with a loss, I mean, I think we played a great football team today and I think Neal Brown does a phenomenal job.  He's got a great staff.  He'll have a great year.  I think they've got dynamic playmakers on both sides of the ball and their team speed is really good.  The Troy program is definitely headed in the right direction and I think Neal is the reason why.
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"I thought we did some decent things in the first half.  You know, obviously they made some really good halftime adjustments.  We kind of stalled out on offense a little bit.  I think you're trying to establish something, you know?  You're trying to establish something, trying to make sure your guys play extremely hard no matter what the situation is.  So we'll try to go back and look at all the positives and see what we did in the first half and try to continue to grow on that.  Try to get some guys healthy.  I'm always proud of them, but it was obviously a tough challenge from the outset and we didn't get enough plays to give ourselves a shot in the second half or even keep it close. "
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"We were down 24-13 [in the second half].  Is that right?  Down 24-13 with the ball on the 16-yard line or so and we throw a pick and we've got to do a better job of making sure we don't lob those things up, but that was a turning point.  But I thought even after that our guys kept coming back and responding and playing hard and that's something we've got to establish as an expectation, not something that we pat them on the back for, so it's time to establish the little things and then it's about this year much more than this game, so we'll try to find the positives and continue to progress."
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PODCAST - Kaleb Canales
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