The University of Maine football team took the opening kickoff against strong Football Bowl Subdivision team Toledo Saturday night and strung together an impressive drive culminating in a 29-yard field goal from Patrick Leonard.
That would prove to be the highlight of the evening for the overmatched Football Championship Subdivision Black Bears.
The Black Bears were victimized by the big play as junior quarterback Logan Woodside threw four touchdown passes, including three covering at least 64 yards, and the Rockets cruised to a 45-3 victory at the Glass Bowl.
The Toledo defense stifled the Black Bear offense after that opening drive, and UMaine also hurt itself with penalties at inopportune times. UMaine was penalized eight times for 65 yards.
Toledo, which went 10-2 a year ago and beat No. 24 Temple University 32-17 in the Boca Raton Bowl, improved to 2-0 while the Black Bears fell to 0-2.
Woodside threw touchdown passes of 85, 64, 21 and 89 yards as the Rockets answered UMaine’s field goal with 45 unanswered points.
Toledo racked up 516 yards of total offense, including 329 passing yards, while UMaine was limited to 235 with just 65 passing yards.
Woodside completed 13-of-25 passes.
UMaine senior quarterback Dan Collins, after an impressive performance in a 24-21 loss to FBS team UConn, really struggled after the first drive.
After completing four of his first five passes on the drive for 37 yards, he wound up completing just five of 20 the rest of the way for only 28 yards. His longest completion was 14 yards.
Collins had completed 19-of-33 passes for 269 yards against UConn.
“Toledo put a lot of pressure on Dan,” said UMaine first-year head coach Joe Harasymiak. “They’re a very talented team. Credit to them.
“We didn’t execute well on either side of the ball, and we took way too many penalties,” added Harasymiak.
UMaine had eight possessions in which it failed to pick up a first down.
Harasymiak said Toledo’s uptempo offense created some one-on-one matchups and the Rockets were able to capitalize on them.
He also indicated that he felt his team got worn down by the Rockets as the game progressed so they weren’t as physical as they had been earlier in the game.
Toledo took the lead for good on its first possession when Woodside hooked up with Corey Jones on an 85-yard connection in a third-and-nine situation.
UMaine had a golden opportunity to strike back when James DeMartini’s punt hit Toledo Kadar Hollman and Jeremy Salmon fell on the ball at the Toledo-35 yard line.
But the Black Bears could only gain four yards and turned the ball over on downs when senior quarterback Collins’ fourth-and-six pass intended for running back Zaire Williams fell incomplete.
The Rockets put together a 51-yard march that resulted in Jameson Vest’s 31-yard field goal.
After another DeMartini punt, Woodside hooked up with Cody Thompson for a 64-yarder to make it 17-3 with 3:29 remaining in the half.
After linebacker Sterling Sheffield picked off a Woodside pass during the opening drive of the second half, UMaine moved the ball from its own 33 to the Toledo 40 where it was facing a third-and-six.
But a 15-yard personal foul penalty assessed to tackle Jamil Demby pushed UMaine back to its own 45 and made it a third-and-21 which Maine was unable to overcome.
The Rockets then erupted for three touchdowns in a span of 3:26 later in the quarter to sew up the victory as Woodside tossed a 21-yarder to Michael Roberts, Ronnie Jones returned a punt blocked by Thompson for a 27-yard touchdown and Woodside found Jon’Vea Johnson for an 89-yarder.
Art Thompkins added a two-yard touchdown run late in the fourth quarter.
“The blocked punt was a heart-breaker,” said Harasymiak.
Kareem Hunt was Toledo’s leading rusher with 66 yards on 15 carries. Toledo rushed for 187 carries on 33 attempts for a 5.7 yards-per-carry average. Jones and Roberts each had three catches to pace the Rockets.
UMaine rushed for 170 yards on 42 carries, which was a marked improvement over the 40 yards on 19 carries the Black Bears mustered against UConn, and Harasymiak said he was encouraged by the play of his running backs.
Darian Davis-Ray rushed for a game-high 67 yards on 11 carries for UMaine. Williams, making his UMaine debut after transferring from Temple and sitting out last week’s game because of a compliance issue, gained 52 yards on 15 attempts. Marquise Adams and Jordan Dunn had three catches apiece to lead UMaine.
Linebackers Ja’Wuan Woodley and Jeremi Powell were in on eight and seven tackles, respectively, to pace Toledo while UMaine linebacker Christophe Mulumba Tshimanga led all tacklers with 10. Safeties DeAndre Scott and Jason Matovu were in on eight apiece.
DeMartini averaged 44 yards per punt on his 10 punts.
UMaine has next weekend off and will play its home opener and its first Colonial Athletic Association game against James Madison at noon Saturday, Sept. 24.