Two Burris Bombs Rescue Florida A&M from a 13-point Hole
Armand Burris caught four passes all day. Two of them went 88 and 89 yards for touchdowns, and Florida A&M beat Alabama State 28-27.
It did not look like that was coming. Alabama State had 14 points before its offense did much of anything: Gabriel Caison's field goal was blocked and returned 91 yards for a touchdown in the first quarter, and Omari Russell's 55-yard interception return made it 24-14 early in the third. Throw in a 1-yard Jamarie Hostzclaw run and a pair of Andrew Abu-Akel field goals, and the Hornets led 27-14 with 12:18 left in the fourth. Florida A&M had its own 36-yard Armond Parker run and a 19-yard touchdown pass to Jamal Hailey, and that was it.
Then Parker started throwing it deep. Burris scored from 88 yards with 11:13 left (the extra point was blocked, so 27-20), and with 6:03 to go he did it again from 89 yards, and Parker threw the two-point conversion to Tamez Young for the 28-27 lead. Two touchdowns, 177 yards, five minutes of game clock. There was no scoring after that.
The box score says Alabama State should have won it. The Hornets ran 54 times for 274 yards and finished with 381 total yards to Florida A&M's 386, which means the Rattlers got there on four catches' worth of big plays. Take away the two returns for touchdowns and Alabama State has 13 points against 28. Florida A&M threw two interceptions, one of them the pick-six, and Alabama State threw one.
Florida A&M improves to 1-3, Alabama State falls to 2-2. Parker was the top fantasy scorer of the week with 40.5 points, and Burris was right behind him at 37.6.