How Hope football survived with late score to win MIAA opener
ADRIAN - After an outpouring of scoring the past three weeks, the Hope College football team needed to find the end zone in the fourth quarter to win its conference opener on the road.
The Flying Dutchmen scored two late touchdowns to push past Adrian College 30-21 on Saturday in the MIAA opener.
Trailing most of the game, Hope took a 23-21 lead following a 5-yard touchdown run from Chance Strickland.
The Hope defense held the rest of the fourth quarter and Strickland scored on another 5-yard run with 2 minutes to go to put the game out of reach.
The Flying Dutchmen improved to 4-1 and the Bulldogs dropped to 1-4.
Strickland opened the Hope scoring with a 13-yard touchdown run in the first quarter to tie the game 7-7. Caden Balkon added a 26-yard field goal just before the half and the Flying Dutchmen trailed 14-10.
The teams traded touchdowns in the third as Hope freshman quarterback Zach Trainor threw a 57-yard strike to Grant Holtzer to put Hope up 17-4, only to have Adrian retake the lead when Mark Lopez threw his third touchdown pass of the game, setting up Hope's fourth-quarter comeback.
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As a team, Hope rushed for 288 yards on 47 attempts. and had 211 yards through the air for 499 yards of total offense.
Adrian had 193 yards passing and 131 yards rushing. Hope's defense held the Bulldogs to just 5-of-13 on third downs and 0-for-3 on fourth downs.
Trainor was 16-for-28 passing with one touchdown and two interceptions. Elijah Smith had 134 rushing yards on 13 carries. Trainor and Strickland each had 78 yards rushing.
Defensively, Luke Palmer had eight tackles, while Cole Luhmann and Oatis Ackerman each had seven, Tyler Stezowski (Hamilton) had six and Sam Cochran (Zeeland East) had five.
Contact sports editor Dan D’Addona at Dan.D’Addona@hollandsentinel.com. Follow him on X, formerly known as Twitter @DanDAddona or Facebook @HollandSentinelSports.
This article originally appeared on The Holland Sentinel: How Hope College football survived with late score to win MIAA opener
