Boston College beats Bowling Green 55-24 behind Matt Ryan's 4 TD passes
BOSTON - The midpoint of the season became the high point for Boston College.
So far.
After two unimpressive wins, the seventh-ranked Eagles showed again they can dominate by beating Bowling Green 55-24 on Saturday behind Matt Ryan's four touchdown passes and the defense's four interceptions late in the first half.
Boston College is 6-0 for the first time in 65 years and has a chance to match their highest ranking in 23 years.
They want more, starting with the Atlantic Coast Conference title.
"It's a good start. That's all it is," Matt Ryan said. "We expect to compete for conference championships and that's the goal. If you do that, bowls take care of themselves."
Bowling Green coach Gregg Brandon knows the Eagles deserve to be in a big one.
"That might have been the best team, arguably, that we've ever played since I've been coaching here," said Brandon, who lost to No. 1 Ohio State last year 35-7 and became coach of the Falcons in 2003.
Matt Ryan is one of the best quarterbacks he's ever faced.
The fifth-year senior finished 24-for-32 for 312 yards before Chris Crane took over on BC's first series of the fourth quarter. For the season, Matt Ryan has thrown 15 touchdown passes and five interceptions.
"It was pretty good," first-year coach Jeff Jagodzinski said. "He was 13-of-14 at one point and that one we couldn't hold onto to. Matt was on today. He was pretty sharp."
The Eagles weren't nearly as sharp in beating Army and Massachusetts in their previous two games. Those followed an impressive 24-10 win at Georgia Tech.
There was nothing questionable about Saturday's rout as Boston College scored 38 straight points after Tyler Sheehan's 6-yard pass to Freddie Barnes with 8:55 left in the half cut BC's lead to 14-10.
Less than seven minutes later, it was 38-10 as the Falcons pass-happy offense backfired when BC picked off four passes in the last six minutes of the half. Two were returned for touchdowns - 65 yards by Jamie Silva on one of his three interceptions and 7 yards by Nick Larkin - and another led to a career-long 45-yard field goal by Steve Aponavicius.
The Eagles were well on the way to their 16th straight home victory.
"I just made some poor mistakes and bad throws," said Sheehan, a first-year starter. "They had a lot of answers for what we were doing. They had a lot of blitzes we weren't expecting."
Jagodzinski praised his defenders' ability to go after the ball.
"I told them they're going to throw the ball 50 times and you're going to get 50 chances," he said.
The half ended with BC leading 38-10, with Andre Callender scoring three touchdowns.
The big plays kept coming against Bowling Green (3-2). On the seventh play of the second half, Matt Ryan hit Justin Jarvis along the right sideline and the wide receiver sprinted for a 71-yard touchdown.
Matt Ryan threw two scoring passes in the first half, covering 51 and 14 yards to Callender, that gave BC a 14-3 lead. His final touchdown pass with 3:25 left in the third quarter covered 14 yards to Brandon Robinson as BC went ahead 52-10.
Anthony Glaud replaced Sheehan and threw a 32-yard touchdown pass to Barnes early in the fourth quarter.
The Eagles began the 1942 season with eight straight wins and finished at 8-2. They've gone unbeaten three times, the last in 1940 when they went 11-0 and won the Sugar Bowl.
In 1984, they were ranked as high as fifth when Heisman Trophy winner Doug Flutie led them to a 10-2 record and a Cotton Bowl win.
The Eagles have been at home for three straight weeks. Next up will be two straight road games against Notre Dame and Virginia Tech.
Both teams came out throwing.
Sheehan completed 7-of-10 passes on the Falcons' opening drive, but they settled for a 40-yard field goal by Sinisa Vrvilo for their only lead. Sheehan went 27-for-43 for 275 yards with one touchdown and five interceptions.
"It was a spotlight that he was really fired up to be in and I think he forced some things that created those turnovers," Brandon said. "We took ourselves out of it before we had a chance to get in it."
Updated October 6, 2007
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