Fifth-Ranked JMU Defeats Elon Football

ELON, N.C. – The high-octane offense of the fifth-ranked James Madison Dukes jumped out to a 13-0 lead after one quarter as JMU defeated the Elon Phoenix 51-0 on Saturday, Oct. 17, at Elon’s Rhodes Stadium.

The Phoenix, which was playing its third consecutive top-20 opponent, fell to 2-5 overall and 1-3 in CAA Football action. The Dukes remained undefeated and now sit at 7-0, 4-0 on the year.

Quotable: “We’ve played three really good teams in a row and this is certainly amongst the best. You try to keep things in perspective. We basically had five series in the first half and three of those five series were pretty good series. We’ve just got to be able to execute over a period of time. The only way to really slow them down is to eliminate those big runs. We gave up too many big runs. It wasn’t just one area, it was a combination of a lot of things.” – Elon head coach Rich Skrosky

How it happened: After forcing an Elon punt on the first series of the game, JMU took over at its own 11-yard line. On third-and-one from the 20, Cardon Johnson rumbled 80 yards to put the Dukes on top. The PAT was blocked by Nick Groll to keep it a 6-0 contest. Later in the first quarter, the Dukes put together a 10-play, 48-yard drive that concluded with a four-yard touchdown run by Khalid Abdullah.

Abdullah and Johnson would both finish with two rushing touchdowns, the later running for 165 yards on 17 attempts.

Noteworthy: Rob Sullivan recorded Elon’s lone sack of the game, giving him six on the year and nine for his career; Those numbers rank fourth and sixth on the program’s FCS record list… Corey Mitchell led all players with 16 total tackles, his fourth double-digit tackle performance of the season… John Silas added 11 stops, the 10th double-digit output of his career… Tight end Zach Duprey set personal bests with three receptions for 54 yards… A total of 11 different players caught passes for Elon.

Up next: After a bye week next Saturday, Elon will return to action at 12 p.m. on Saturday, Oct. 31 at Stony Brook. That game will be televised by the American Sports Network.