Rice Game Notes
9/19/2009 12:00:00 AM | Football
Sept. 19, 2009
- Rice captains for the Oklahoma State game were WR Toren Dixon, QB John Thomas Shepherd and DB Andrew Sendejo. Rice won the toss for the third straight week and deferred to the second half. Oklahoma State received the opening kickoff and defending the west goal.
- Defensively, Rice had four, first-time starters in the Oklahoma State game. Freshman Alex Lowry started at nose guard. Sophomore Matt Nordstrom made his first career start at linebacker. Junior Max Anyiam and freshman Phillip Gaines made their first career starts in the secondary.
- On offense, senior running back Jeramy Goodson made his first career start for the Owls. Goodson established new career highs with 11 carrires for 51 yards. His previous career marks were three rushing attempts in last year's Texas Bowl against Western Michigan and he twice rushed for 20 yards last year (at UTEP and against Houston).
- Travis Bradshaw forced a fumble after a Dez Bryant reception which Andrew Sendejo recovered. Later in the contest, Bradshaw recovered a fumbled kickoff return. Rice now has forced 90 turnovers since the 2006 season.
- His first two receptions went for negative yards, but Toren Dixon extended his streak of consecutive games with a reception to 29 straight contests. Entering the contest, Dixon's active streak ranked seventh nationally. Dixon finished the game with nine receptions for 120 yards. He moved to fifth on the Rice career reception list (120 catches), passing Ed Lofton (1973-75) and Doug Cunningham (1975-78).
- Dixon's 72-yard reception in the third quarter was a career long. He had a 50-yard reception against North Texas in 2008.
- Dixon posted his third, 100-yard receiving game when he snared a 17-yard grab in the game's final minute.
- Rice quarterback Nick Fanuzzi established new career highs, completing 16-of-28 passes for 182 yards. He also had a 23-yard run to set up a fourth-quarter score.
- Charles Ross' second-half touchdown runs (2 yards and 1 yard in the third quarter & 3 yards in the fourth) were the first of the freshman's career. Ross became the first Rice player to rush for three touchdowns since Quinton Smith against UCF in 2006.
- Senior tight end Taylor Wardlow set a career high for pass receptions with five grabs for 29 yards. He had four receptions against Baylor in 2007.
- Rice had a streak of 23 straight games with a passing touchdown come to an end in Stillwater.
- Cheta Ozougwu set a career high with eight tackles, including two for lost yards. His previous career high was seven stops against Memphis in 2007.
- Matt Nordstrom doubled his previous career high of two tackles against Army last year with four against Oklahoma State.
- Kyle Martens' 63-yard punt in the second quarter marked a career long. The punt was aided by a muff and the ball went out of bounds deep in Cowboy territory.
- Rice University's first offensive series ended with quarterback John Thomas Shepherd's first career punt. Out of the shotgun formation, Shepherd had a 49-yard punt inside the Cowboy 20. Shepherd went on to average 39.5 yards on two punts.
- Clark Fangmeier booted his 24th field goal in the second quarter (a 34-yarder), moving him into a tie for fourth with Clint Parsons (1987-90) on the Rice all-time list.
- Fangmeier moved into second on the C-USA career chart with his 160th point-after, moving past Stephen Gostowski of Memphis (2002-05). Jarod Tracy set the conference career record with 194 last season.
Players Mentioned
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