'Embarrassing'
RENO, Nev. — A season which began with bowl hopes ended with a thud for the Idaho Vandals, who were trounced 56-3 by Nevada on Saturday in their season finale before 10,027 at Mackay Stadium.
Idaho finished 2-10 overall, 1-6 and dead last in the Western Athletic Conference. The Vandals lost nine of their last 10 games and beat just one Football Bowl Subdivision team all season.
“I’m very disappointed in how we ended the season,” fifth-year Idaho coach Robb Akey said. “I don’t like the won-loss record. This is embarrassing to me.”
Idaho athletic director Rob Spear, speaking on the postgame radio show, called it an “unacceptable performance.”
Backup quarterback Tyler Lantrip passed for 340 yards and four touchdowns for Nevada (7-5, 5-2). Starting in place of the injured Cody Fajardo, Lantrip completed 24 of 31 passes.
The Vandals marched within field goal range twice in the early going of their Western Athletic Conference football game against the Wolf Pack and the defense was steady throughout the first quarter. But, Idaho missed field goals to end both drives.
“The way things started,” Akey said, “I thought we’d have a chance. Then we didn’t get the stops made. We didn’t play well on offense.”
And the wheels fell off.
After Trey Farquhar’s 48-yard field goal attempt hit the upright, Nevada took a 7-0 lead with 20 seconds left in the first quarter on a 6-yard TD run by Lampford Mark. A little more than five minutes later the Wolf Pack made it 14-0 on a 63-yard pass play from Lantrip to Aaron Bradley, who caught the ball near the line of scrimmage before finding an opening down the right sideline to score with 9:58 to go in the opening half.
The Vandals finally scored on Farquhar’s 19-yard field goal after they drove to the Nevada 2 before stalling, cutting the deficit to 14-3. Tyler Lantrip went to Bradley again — this time with a 15-yarder — to push the Wolf Pack out to a 21-3 advantage with 2:37 before halftime. Nevada made it 28-3 with 10 seconds left in the half when Lantrip found Tray Session with a 28-yard scoring strike.
Mark rushed for 104 yards and a touchdown for the Wolf Pack, which had 587 yards of total offense.
For senior Kama Bailey, who had 26 rushing yards and 43 receiving yards, it was a painful way to end the season — and his Vandal career.
“We were moving the ball,” he said. “We just weren’t finishing. This is not how we wanted to go out.”
Gary Walker had 11 tackles for Idaho and Tre`Shawn Robinson had nine tackles, which includes one sack, 1.5 tackles for loss and a forced fumble.