CMS Football Earns Last-Second 16-7 Win over George Fox

CLAREMONT, Calif. - Rich Brutto broke a 7-7 tie with a 47-yard field goal with one second left, and Calvin Miller intercepted a lateral on the ensuing kickoff and returned it for a touchdown to tack on six more points, as the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps football team prevailed in a defensive battle with George Fox 16-7 on Saturday afternoon at Zinda Field.

With the win, CMS moves to 2-0 on the young season, after defeating Chicago 24-15 on the road on Sept. 2, while George Fox slips to 1-2 with the loss. 

Brutto's 47-yarder was a career-best and came just minutes after he barely missed wide left from the left hash mark on a go-ahead field goal from 31 yards with 1:30 to play. That drive was set up by a key interception from Kirby Baynes, who picked off a George Fox pass one play after Nash Wylie intercepted a pass for the Bruins on the CMS 44-yard line to give his team a short field to work with.

After Brutto's miss, George Fox was unable to get a first down after gaining eight yards and punted for the 12th time in the game, with CMS starting on its own 48 with 48 seconds left. Walter Kulhenkamp completed a 12-yard pass to Daniel Rosenberg to get the ball to the George Fox 38, then completed a three-yarder to Roman Ramirez and ran for five yards to the Bruin 30. An incomplete pass set up 4th-and-2 at the 30, and Brutto was called on to attempt a 47-yarder, and made it with room to spare. 

The clock said 0:00, but the officials put one second on the clock, and Samuel Brewer squib-kicked it to the George Fox 20-yard line. The Bruins attempted a multiple-lateral return, but Miller was there to intercept the second lateral and return it 21 yards to close out the scoring. 

CMS trailed 7-0 at the half and didn't have much going offensively until Kuhlenkamp ran up the middle and broke several tackles before escaping down the right sideline, with an escort from Rosenberg on the final block, to score from 65 yards and tie the game up at 7-7 with 2:44 left in the third.  

Tarius Hamlin killed one fourth-quarter drive when he batted down a third-down pass, and Caleb Chang and Emmett Thomas King III combined on a tackle for no gain on 3rd-and-1 to stop another before Baynes had his key interception to help set up the Stags for the win. 

Kuhlenkamp finished with 95 yards on the ground on eight carries, including his 65-yard touchdown, while Anderson Cynkar led the receiving corps with seven catches for 86 yards. 

Defensively, King led the way with nine tackles, including a sack for a loss of 11 and another tackle for a six-yard loss. Connor Cryan broke up two passes to go with his four solo tackles, and Harry Zhou had three tackles and a sack. 

CMS will be back in action next week when it opens SCIAC play with a home game against Cal Lutheran at 1 p.m.