Those Blue Hose keep rolling along

By MONTE DUTTON

Steve Englehart (Monte Dutton photos) Click here.

When football season started, hopes were high at Presbyterian College. The Blue Hose had improved from 1-10 to 4-7 to 6-6 in Steve Englehart’s first three years as head coach. They won their last four games in 2024.

Things were clearly looking up, but damn.

No one expected PC to beat Mercer and Furman. No one expected them to be 6-0 overall; a few envisioned 2-0 in the Pioneer Football League. No one expected the Hose to be ranked 19th in the coaches’ FCS poll or 21st in the one released each week by something called Stats Perform.

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PC doesn’t offer football scholarships. Most of the teams in FCS do. Another such school, Harvard (4-0), of which you may have heard, is 20th in the coaches’ poll and 18th in Stats Perform.

Presbyterian is battling Harvard so far for tops among the scholarship-deprived. In Cambridge, Mass., fans ask, “Who’s Presbyterian?” In Clinton, no one asks, “Who’s Harvard?”

The latest conquest was a 31-25 victory over Butler (4-3, 2-1).

Nathan Levicki Click here.

“It’s hard to win football games,” Englehart said, “and it’s really hard to win on the road. Butler was a really good opponent. … They had a really good game plan.

“They did everything they to really grind up the clock. Their quarterback (Reagan Andrew) was outstanding. Their offensive line was outstanding. They did everything they could to limit our possessions, and they did. The key to our win was that we were able to hold them to (four) field goals.”

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Stetson (2-4, 2-1 PFL) is next. The Hatters play the Hose on Saturday at 1 p.m. at Bailey Memorial Stadium. After losing to, among others, Harvard, 59-7, Stetson has recently defeated Davidson, 35-32, and Morehead State, 21-14. Presbyterian defeated the latter, 41-0. Stetson has won two league games in a row after losing 13 straight over three seasons.

Here in South Carolina, PC is already a phenomenon. Elsewhere, the Blue Hose are still flying under the radar, the FCS coaches and stats performers notwithstanding.

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On Monday, Englehart conducted his weekly media conference. The Advertiser’s John Clayton and yours truly shared the scoops. Each week he answers questions that are mostly variations of how in hell are you doing this?

The general answer is, “We’re good.” He was also peppered with questions such as, “Did you see a lot of friends and family at Butler?” (yes) and, “Did you go to Saint Elmo’s?” (yes). (Saint Elmo’s is a downtown Indianapolis steak house that also serves a mean shrimp cocktail.)

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Clayton has been on hand for our PC games so far. Yours truly has witnessed three. Both of us are fully cognizant of the miracle taking place in our midst. It’s been a treat comparable to Saint Elmo’s shrimp cocktail.

Butler dominated the middle portion of the game and led, 22-18, early in the fourth quarter. Then, on the first play after the third of Ryan Short’s four field goals, Collin Hurst hit Nathan Levicki on a 75-yard scoring toss, and PC launched its only long, time-consuming drive, capped by Zach Switzer’s three-yard rush with a minute left.

“Both teams played extremely hard,” Englehart said. “It was a well-fought victory for us on the road.

“Our kids kept fighting for 60 minutes. There’s just no give-up in our guys. … Our guys don’t seem to get rattled when games are close.”

So far, so fantastic.

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