Fresno State Beats CS Long Beach and Wins Championship in PCAA

It was the best football game Fresno State Coach Jim Sweeney said he had ever seen, and he won it Saturday night, along with the Pacific Coast Athletic Assn. championship and a trip to the California Bowl.

“There was no better football played today in the country,” Sweeney said after the undefeated Bulldogs beat Cal State Long Beach, 33-31, before 15,240 at Veterans Stadium.

The game was filled with great passing, great running and, said Sweeney, “tremendously big plays,” but it came down to two missed field goals by Long Beach’s David Caylor in the last two minutes.

Caylor had set himself up to be the hero by making one of the biggest plays of the night.

The 49ers had rallied from a 17-7 deficit to trail by only 33-31 when Caylor put them on the brink of victory when he recovered his onside kick on the Fresno 49-yard line with 4:36 left in the game.

Long Beach moved to the 24 and with 1:43 to play, Caylor lined up to try a 41-yard field goal that could have kept second-place Long Beach alive in the conference race.

The ball sailed wide of the goal posts.

With five seconds left, Caylor got another chance, but his 54-yard attempt, which was within his kicking range, was short.

Long Beach quarterback Doug Gaynor survived six sacks and completed 21 passes for 354 yards and ran for 2 touchdowns.

But the Long Beach defense could not stop Fresno’s balanced attack, which featured the relentless running of tailback James Williams (176 yards and 3 touchdowns in 30 carries) and several big passes from quarterback Kevin Sweeney to split end Stephen Baker.

The elusive Baker caught 6 passes for 214 yards and a 47-yard touchdown for Fresno, 9-0-1 overall and 7-0 in the PCAA.

But Long Beach’s Sheldon Gaines made the night’s most electrifying play. His 97-yard kickoff return at the end of the third quarter capped an 18-point period and cut the Fresno lead to 30-25.

But Williams and Baker couldn’t be stopped. They set up a 41-yard field goal by Barry Belli that gave the Bulldogs a 33-25 lead.

Gaynor drove the 49ers 74 yards for their final touchdown.

Long Beach Coach Mike Sheppard didn’t blame Caylor for the defeat. He blamed himself.

“Our team got out of hand in the second quarter,” Sheppard said, alluding to personal fouls the 49ers committed in that period when they were outscored, 17-0.

Personal fouls had plagued the 49ers earlier this season. “I thought we had that problem taken care of,” Sheppard said.

Still the 49ers (6-5, 4-2) regained their composure and put a stirring comeback behind Gaynor, a Fresno native, and fullback Mark Templeton, who caught seven passes for 77 yards.

But in the end, after all the big plays, all Gaynor and his teammates could do was watch two field-goal attempts miss and a season come up short.