Bulldog Football Ready To Kick Off 2005 Season Saturday As AIC Comes To Town For 3 p.m. Kickoff

GAME NOTES(pdf)  / Listen:  www.northeast10.org

The Bryant University football team, 4-5 in Œ04, opens its 2005 season this Saturday when the Bulldogs host A merican International at Bulldog Stadium. Kickoff is set for 3:00 p.m. with the late start scheduled to accomodate student move-in day at Bryant University. This will be the seventh meeting all-time between Bryant and AIC with the Yellow Jackets winning all six previous encounters. Last year, in Marty Fine¹s first game as head coach of the Bryant football team, AIC held on for a 15-7 win in Springfield, Mass. Two of Bryant¹s games vs. AIC have needed overtime including a thrilling four OT game at Bryant in 2000. The Bulldogs are 3-3 all-time in season openers 2-0 in home openers at Bulldog Stadium (17-7 over Southern Conn in Œ01 and 32-24 win over Pace in Œ03).

LOOKING AT THE YELLOW JACKETS:
American International, under the direction of 12th-year coach Art Wilkins (68-47), returns nine starters from last year¹s squad that posted a 5-4 record and finished fifth in the NE-10 standings. For the third time in as many seasons, AIC will have a different signal caller as Jared Corbin (Brooklyn, NY) is expected to start at quarterback this season. He¹ll have the option of handing off to speedster Marlon Beckles (Brooklyn, NY), who earned 2003 NE-10 Freshman of the Year honors and was named first team all-conference in Œ04 with 785 yards rushing.

Bryant - AIC Series at a glance:

1999 60-20 AIC @ Springfield
2000 44-36 AIC (4ot) @ Bryant
2001 23-14 AIC @ Springfield
2002 40-33 AIC (2ot) @ Bryant
2003 33-22 AIC @ Bryant
2004 15-7 AIC @ Springfield

THE COACHES
Bryant University coach Marty Fine enters his second season at Bryant with a 4-5 record after one year. Fine comes into this week with a 14-16 record at four-year schools (17-2 as coach at U.S. Naval Academy Prep). He was previously an assistant at Iowa State, Indiana, Colgate, Indiana State, Western New Mexico, and the head coach at Sonoma State (I-AA) where he was 10-11 in two seasons. Art Wilkins enters his 12th season at AIC and brings an overall record of 68-47 (.591) into Saturday¹s game. A 1972 graduate of Bucknell, Wilkins led AIC to a pair of Eastern Football Conference titles (1999, 2000) and served as an assistant coach at Bucknell, Penn State, Appalachian State, and South Carolina.

PEAKS NEARING MILESTONE
Junior running back Chris Peaks (Silver Spring, Md.) needs 68 yards rushing to reach 1,000 for his career. Peaks comes into today¹s game with 932 yards rushing. A transfer from Florida A& M University, Peaks had 633 last year for the Bulldogs and currently stands fourth all-time in school history with seven rushing touchdowns, 13 behind leader Andre McLeod¹s 20.

LAST YEAR VS. AIC
In his first game as a Bulldog, quarterback Charles Granatell passed for 218 yards but it was not enough as AIC pulled out a 15-7 win over the Bulldogs in the Œ04 opener. Granatell connected with Justin Kix with a 51-yard touchdown pass on just the fifth play of the game but that would be all the scoring on the afternoon for the Bulldogs. Chris Peaks had 51 yards rushing while Kix finished with a career-high 96 yards receiving. Andrew McLarty had 14 tackles - seven of which were solo stops - while teammate Greg Daniel added 11 tackles.

OCEAN STATE PLAYERS
The Bulldogs have 12 players that hail from the state of Rhode Island on this year¹s team: Lorenzo Perry (Providence / La Salle); Justin Benevides (Portsmouth); Luis Acevedo (Cranston); Kevin Manawonu (Providence / Country Day); Casey Factor (West Warwick); Damion Kindle (Warwick); Greg Daniel (Providence / La Salle); Chris Reels (West Warwick); Tshombe Lambert (East Providence); Gary Mallozzi (Smithfield), Rico Mallozzi (Smithfield); Joey Brito (Pawtucket);

NEXT UP
Bryant will hit the road for a pair of games over the next two weeks, starting next Saturday at Merrimack College and the following week at Assumption. The Bulldogs will return home September 24 to host Pace University on Homecoming & Reunion Weekend.

BULLDOG BITES
*  Chris Peaks needs just 68 yards to reach 1,000 for his career. He has three 100-yard rushing games in his career. 

* Charles Granatell set records for most yards passing (1,316); attempts in a game (32 vs. Bentley); Attempts in a season (213); Completions in a game (15 vs. Bentley); Completions in a season (102).

*Bryant is 3-3 all-time in season opening games, 2-0 when the season opener is at home € Bryant is 0-6 all-time vs. AIC 

* Bryant is 1-5 all-time vs. next week¹s opponent Merrimack; 6-0 all-time vs. Assumption

* This is Bryant¹s seventh season of varsity football (25-33 all-time) € Bryant¹s school record for wins is five set by the 2002 squad that went 5-6 and the 1999 squad that was 5-4

* Bryant had five players named all-conference in 2004, three of whom are returning (Peaks, Lajterman, Daniel)