AMHERST, Mass. – Ross Comis completed 12-of-16 passes for 193 yards and three touchdowns, and UMass rolled up 466 yards of offense in the first half on its way to a 55-20 non-conference football victory over Georgia Southern Saturday at McGuirk Alumni Stadium.

Wesley Fields carried 12 times for 67 yards for Georgia Southern (0-6), while Kado Brown threw for 148 yards and ran for 53 yards and a pair of touchdowns. Mark Michaud had two receptions for 88 yards, and Malik Henry caught a 55-yard pass. Joshua Moon finished with 14 tackles.

Bilal Ally rushed for 116 yards and three TDs on 16 carries for UMass (1-6), and Marquis Young ran 13 times for 101 and a touchdown. Comis had 51 markers on the ground, and the Minutemen rushed for over 300 yards for the first time since November of 2015.

Andrew Ford completed 9-of-12 passes for 157 yards and a score, and Brennon Dingle caught four passes for 88 yards and a TD. Adam Breneman caught seven balls for 81 yards and a touchdown.

The story
The Eagles staked UMass to a 21-0 cushion less than eight minutes into the contest and never could recover. The game started well enough for Georgia Southern as Brown hit Michaud with a 71-yard pass, but Isaiah Rodgers knocked the ball out from behind at the UMass 3-yard line, where Jarell Addo recovered it for the Minutemen. It was one of four first-half turnovers for the Eagles.

UMass promptly drove 97 yards for the game's opening score. Comis connected with Breneman for a 16-yard gain and picked up 25 yards with his legs to set up a 1-yard touchdown pass to Breneman.

After the Eagles went 3-and-out, Comis connected with Andy Isabella for a 68-yard touchdown pass, and the Minutemen quickly led 14-0 midway through the quarter. A fumble on the ensuing kickoff return gave UMass the ball at the Georgia Southern 26, and Comis hit Jessie Britt for a touchdown on the next play.

Brown put the Eagles on the scoreboard on a 12-yard touchdown run with 4:02 left in the quarter. Fields rattled off a 26-yard run, and Brown had a 12-yard scamper to key the drive. 

UMass tacked on another touchdown on its next drive to dash any thoughts of a comeback by the Eagles. Comis threw to Breneman for a 14-yard gain and picked up 16 yards on a run. Ally capped the drive with a 19-yard run, and UMass led 28-7 at the end of the first quarter.

UMass went on to lead 48-17 at the break and finished the day with 670 yards of total offense. It was the most points allowed by the Eagles since giving up 55 to UMass in the 1998 I-AA National Championship game. The Minutemen had 11 plays of 20 or more yards and had three one-play scoring drives.

The Eagles were without starting quarterback Shai Werts, who was injured on the last play of the game last week.

Quotables
Head Coach Tyson Summers
On first play of the game
"It was a good example of what happened for the rest of the night. We had an opportunity to get out of the gate well. It was a good play call and executed well until the end where we didn't finish well enough. What should have been us being up 7-0 goes to not being able to get stops on third down to us being down 7-0, and we didn't do a good job of slowing them down the rest of the night."

On penalties
"A lot of the penalties are things we've talked about repeatedly and worked on in practice, but obviously they aren't getting cleaned up, and that's on me. We've got to do better."

Next up
The Eagles return to conference action against Troy next Saturday at 3:30 p.m., and the contest will be broadcast live on ESPN3.

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