On Saturday afternoon, the Brown football team (3–5, 2–3 Ivy) challenged Yale (5–3, 2–3 Ivy) on the road in New Haven, Connecticut. Capitalizing on the Bears’ four total turnovers, the Bulldogs posted over 500 yards of offense and clinched a demonstrative 56–34 win.
“We have to stick together,” Head Coach James Perry ’00 said in an interview via Brown Athletics after the game. “We can’t point fingers. We have a number of players who can play better than they did. I think I can coach better. There’s a lot of ways that we can correct some things.”
Coming into the matchup having scored only 28 first quarter points during the season, the Bears needed to start strong to contend with Yale’s explosive offense, which had totaled 61. But the Bears did little to rewrite the narrative, getting outscored 21-7 in the first fifteen minutes.
“Our slow starts have hurt us all year and I think that today was no different,” wideout Mark Mahoney ’24.5 wrote in a message to The Herald. “We continue to put ourselves in a position where we need to have a comeback to get back into the game, and sometimes we’re able to, but today a number of mistakes prevented us from closing the gap.”
Though the opening possessions featured a back-and-forth between the two offenses, with receiver David Pantelis scoring on a nine-yard touchdown strike for Yale, and Qwentin Brown ’26 rushing it in from one yard away to equalize, the game soon got out of hand for the Bears. Throwing back-to-back interceptions, the Jake Willcox ’24.5-led offense stalled out on consecutive drives. On the other end of the field, Yale’s offense pounced.
Relying almost exclusively on the passing game, Yale’s quarterback, Grant Jordan, connected with Pantelis eight times throughout the first quarter, racking up 135 yards and three touchdowns in the process. Scoring again only a minute-and-a-half into the second quarter on a quarterback keeper, the Bulldogs jumped to an early 28-7 lead.
“Yale played really well,” Perry said. “Especially Jordan. He had a fantastic game and executed very well. From a receiving perspective, Pantelisplayed very, very well. We were unable to contain those two guys today.”
Facing a 21-point deficit, the offense responded. Going on a 15-play, 84-yard drive, Willcox led the team down the field. At the one-yard line, Qwentin Brown subbed back in, taking his second carry of the game for his second touchdown of the day and ninth of the season. With that, the Bears drew back to within two scores, 28-14.
Following Saturday’s 32-completion, 273-yard passing performance, Willcox moved into the program’s number two position in passing yards with 6,858. The only player to outperform Willcox is none other than current Head Coach James Perry, whose 9,294 might never be topped. Willcox also ranks second in completions, with 664, and fourth in touchdowns passes, with 41 thrown.
Unfortunately, despite spurts of offensive success, the Bears were unable to lower Yale’s lead to below 14 points throughout the rest of the game. Three minutes before halftime, Yale scored on a 14-yard touchdown pass to Ryan Belk increasing their lead to 35-14. Though the Bears were able to kick two field goals — one immediately before halftime, the other coming out of the locker room — their six-point effort was overshadowed by a 23-yard touchdown strike by Mason Shipp, bringing the score to 42-20 six minutes into the third.
For the remainder of the game, the two teams traded scores. Late in the third, the Bears marched 75–yards down the field, before capping the drive off with a 33–yard touchdown to Mahoney along the left sideline. Slipping past his defender on a go–route, Willcox connected with his favorite target, Mahoney, who now has 419 yards and five touchdowns on the season.
In response, Yale launched a 75-yard drive of its own to pull away 49-26. Staging a last-ditch effort, the Bears attacked the end zone once more, this time spurred on by a 15-yard rushing touchdown by Stockton Owen ’25. But ultimately, neither time nor momentum were in Brown’s favor, and before time expired, the Bulldogs scored a final time, bringing the score to 56-34.
“We love playing at home,” Mahoney wrote about next week’s matchup against Columbia, the last home game of the season. “It’s the last time for all the seniors so we will be ready to go come Saturday next week. Starting the game well will be a major focus to create some momentum for the last couple games.”
To see if the Bears will succeed in building momentum, tune in at 12 p.m., either in person at Brown Stadium or on ESPN+.
“Our final home game of the season is a great opportunity,” Perry added. “We have to practice our butts off and make sure we put our best foot forward next week.”
Lydell Dyer is a Senior Staff Writer for the sports section. A sophomore hailing from Bonn, Germany, Lydell is studying nonfiction English and political science, and if he's not off "making words sound pretty," you can find him lifting heavy circles at the Nelson.
