Rutgers’ Greg Schiano, Howard coach explain testy postgame exchange after last-second TD (2024)

Rutgers had the game in hand, but it did not take its foot off the pedal.

With seven seconds remaining in their season-opening meeting with Howard on Thursday, holding a 38-7 lead over their visitors, the Scarlet Knights had the ball at Howard’s 11-yard line. The victory was clinched long ago, the starters were resting on the bench after a successful day, but head coach Greg Schiano’s team elected not to take a knee and run out the clock.

Backup quarterback Ajani Sheppard took the snap and handed it off to freshman running back Antwan Raymond, who broke two tackles en route to an 11-yard touchdown run as the clock expired. Moments later, when Schiano and Howard coach Larry Scott met at midfield for the traditional postgame handshake, there appeared to be a testy exchange between the two.

Neither Scott nor Schiano shared what was said, but a person who overheard the exchange told NJ Advance Media that Scott told Schiano to “have some class.” Soon after, players from both teams barked at each other as the Bison left the field and the Scarlet Knights headed to the student section to sing the alma mater.

Scott later admitted to having an issue with Rutgers going for the touchdown on the final play.

“Yes, a little bit,” Scott said. “The frustration obviously mounted. I think things can be done a little bit better. He may have had his feelings about it, and I had mine. I think we’re two competitive people. In that situation, I would have chose to handle it a little bit differently. I can’t speak for him. I have a lot of respect for Coach Schiano, what he’s done and what he’s been able to do. But we’re both competitors and in that situation, a little bit of frustration came out because I thought it could have been handled differently.”

Schiano returned the compliment, saying he has “a lot of respect for Coach Scott” and thinks he “does a great job with his program,” but said that “everybody sees things a little differently.”

“You see it through your lens,” Schiano said. “You watched the game. You saw it. You can draw your conclusions. I’m very comfortable with the way we handle our team, that I handle our team, and if I wasn’t, I’d tell you that too.”

Schiano insists the Scarlet Knights were not running up the score, noting they would have used one of their two remaining timeouts.

“Guys practiced all training camp,” Schiano said. “They deserve to play. There was no running it up. If it was running it up, you don’t use timeouts when you have the ball. You let the game end.”

On the previous drive, Howard called a timeout when facing a 4th-and-1 at its 14-yard line with 77 seconds to play. Schiano insists his decision to go for the score “wasn’t retaliatory.”

“We were going to run plays,” he said. “We bring a team in here to play us. We bring them here. We bring them in, we’ve got to win and we’ve got to get reps. And they were there, we took them.”

Asked about the postgame confrontation between both set of players, Schiano said there was “chippiness the whole game.”

“That wasn’t the first time,” he said.

The Bison were flagged for unnecessary roughness for a late hit on running back Kyle Monangai, while Schiano was flagged for unsportsmanlike conduct for confronting an official after a non-call on a potential defensive pass interference.

“There needed to be some control grabbed of that game a few times,” Schiano said.

Rutgers players who spoke following the game insisted they did not see much from the postgame kerfuffle, but they chalk it up to the emotions of the game.

“That’s football,” quarterback Athan Kaliakmanis said. “I try to stay away from that stuff, but it’s going to go like that. That’s how the game is, it’s going to get chippy. When you get a bunch of people who love to play and are aggressive and you chop, it’s going to get chippy.”

Scott did not exactly agree.

“I don’t think (the postgame reactions are) typical,” the Howard coach said. “I think that’s frustration. Our guys, we pride ourselves on being who we are, our character matters to us and how we handle ourselves. Yeah, sometimes it may get a little chippy, and some of that may be natural from a competitive standpoint, but in the end, we know how to control our emotions. We talk about that all the time, that’s important to us and who we represent. ... We make sure every time we get an opportunity to, we’re going to try to do the best we can to stay in character and represent it very well.”

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Brian Fonseca may be reached at bfonseca@njadvancemedia.com.