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Richmond puts away W&M 34-20, ends Tribe playoff hopes

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WILLIAMSBURG – Uncharacteristic mistakes, combined with Richmond’s cold offensive efficiency, ended William and Mary’s playoff push for the second consecutive season.

The Spiders took advantage of the Tribe’s comprehensive shortcomings for a 34-20 win Saturday in the regular season finale between the longtime rivals at Zable Stadium.

“I thought we came in here with purpose. That’s the bottom line,” said UR coach Danny Rocco. “Kind of on a mission, that mission is a go, and we were committed to winning this football game and we did the things we had to do.”

Richmond (8-4, 5-3 CAA) won the third consecutive game in the series and for the eighth time in the past 10 meetings. The Spiders also put themselves in position for an FCS playoff berth, when the 24-team field is announced Sunday at 11 a.m.

William and Mary (7-5, 4-4 CAA) lost to each of the ranked teams it faced, as well as Virginia Tech, as the Spiders dashed their postseason hopes for the second consecutive season.

The Tribe committed three turnovers, two of which Richmond turned into short-field touchdown drives. W&M receivers dropped a handful of passes in the second half that would have extended drives.

W&M’s patchwork defense, forced to play third-team cornerbacks due to mounting injuries, was unable to generate sufficient pressure on Richmond quarterback Michael Strauss.

“Obviously disappointed,” Tribe head coach Jimmye Laycock said. “But when you turn it over three times … (and) drop about six or eight or 10 passes. Defensively, we just didn’t make plays.”

The Spiders used a similar formula and achieved a similar result as last season. They passed well, ran effectively and controlled the clock.

Strauss completed 29 of 40 passes for 291 yards and two touchdowns, and was sacked only once. Seth Fisher rushed for 123 yards and two touchdowns, as the Spiders totaled 182 yards on the ground. They converted 9 of 17 opportunities on third down and had an 11-minute edge in time of possession. UR totaled 473 yards.

“Strauss I thought was very good tonight,” Laycock said. “We didn’t get people in his face. We knew that going in. If we don’t get people in his face, if we don’t disrupt him, if we don’t move him — not even flush him out of the pocket, but make him have to reset — we’re going to have a hard time. We knew that. I don’t think we did a good enough job at that, by any stretch.”

William and Mary quarterback Steve Cluley completed 14 of 24 passes for 240 yards and two touchdowns, with one interception. Mikal Abdul-Saboor rushed for 105 yards, but a rare fumble early in the fourth quarter set up Richmond at the W&M 17 and resulted in the clinching touchdown.

The Tribe came into the game leading the CAA in turnover margin, at plus-14. Richmond had committed 10 turnovers in losing its previous two games, but played cleanly Saturday and was plus-3 in turnovers for the game.

“We just made a couple mistakes, turnover-wise,” Cluley said. “Turnovers always kill us. I don’t think they had any turnovers. Missed a couple reads, a couple things here and there that kind of came back and bit us because we couldn’t get our defense to make a stop there at the end, to rely on them. It was on us to get points up on the board.”

Cluley connected with Sean Ballard for a pair of touchdown passes in the first half, a 60-yard bomb in the first quarter and a 6-yard score on 3rd-and-3 in the second quarter that tied the game at 17.

The rivals went back and forth for two-plus quarters before Richmond took control. John Carpenter’s second field goal tied the game at 20 early in the third quarter after a crisp drive inside the Spiders’ 10.

Richmond took the lead for good on the next possession, when Fisher went up the middle, cleared the line of scrimmage and chugged 42 yards for a touchdown.

From there, W&M’s offense pretty much ground to a halt. After generating 292 yards in the first half and the first drive of the third quarter, the Tribe netted just 28 yards on its last four possessions.

W&M won seven games, but hasn’t made the playoffs since 2010. The current four-year postseason drought matches the longest stretch between playoff appearances since the program gained traction in the mid-1980s.

“Not a lot of teams in William and Mary history have gotten seven wins,” defensive tackle Tyler Claytor said, “so we can have that as a plus, but it’s disappointing right now, seeing that we didn’t come home with the Capital Cup, we didn’t beat Richmond like we want to do every year.”

Fairbank can be reached at 757-247-4637