Cougars take commanding lead at halftime

Cougars increase lead at half

BYU scored a pair of touchdowns in the second quarter to take a 24-7 lead into halftime over UNLV at Sam Boyd Stadium.

The Rebels got their only points of the game on a Deante’ Purvis kickoff return early in the second quarter.

Harvey Unga is picking up where UNR’s rushing attack left off against the UNLV defense. BYU’s junior running back ran for 111 yards and three touchdowns in the first half. Max Hall also had a good half for the Cougars, completing 13 of 18 passes for 174 yards.

BYU posted 307 yards of offense to just 131 for UNLV. The Rebels managed just 29 yards on 10 rushing attempts. Omar Clayton completed 11 of 17 for 93 yards, but threw two bad interceptions. The Cougars will also get the ball to start the second half.

Time for Canes

Deante’ Purvis ran back a kickoff for a 94-yard touchdown after the Cougars went ahead 17-0 early in the second quarter.

Canes, a fast-food restaurant specializing in chicken fingers, has a promotion that gives free chicken fingers to everyone in attendance if UNLV scores a touchdown on a kickoff return. Canes probably thought they were safe offering the promotion. The Rebels hadn’t scored on a kickoff return since Len Ware did it in 1999.

Short-lived momentum

UNLV was able to momentarily get back in the game on the Purvis kickoff return. BYU quickly took back control of the game when Harvey Unga broke a tackle at the line of scrimmage and cruised to a 52-yard touchdown that put the Cougars back up by 17 less than two minutes later.

Small victories

BYU was forced to punt with 2:28 left in the first half. Ordinarily, that wouldn’t be worth a mention. It was, however, the first time UNLV had forced a punt in two weeks. UNR never had to punt last week and the Cougars went nearly the entire first half without having to kick it away.

Wasted opportunity

UNLV had a chance to get back within two scores about midway through the second quarter. The Rebels had a very good drive going, but Omar Clayton missed a wide open Ryan Wolfe over the middle and the pass was intercepted by Scott Johnson. UNLV was inside the 20-yard line at the time and a score could have been very significant.

Moving Up

Ryan Wolfe moved into second place on the all-time Mountain West Conference receptions list with a grab late in the second quarter. He has 251 catches in his UNLV career, just 12 shy of the record held by former San Diego State receiver J.R. Tolver.