By Dave Johnson
W&M Athletics

As the shadows grew longer at Zable Stadium Saturday afternoon, William & Mary trailed Richmond by seven points with 1:21 remaining. Out of timeouts, the Tribe needed to cover 73 yards to either win or force overtime.

Sparked by collective poise and one of the greatest catches you'll ever see, W&M put together an epic drive and scored on the final play of regulation. But the two-point conversion failed, and the Spiders held on for a 27-26 win in the Capital Cup.

It wasn't the result or the season the Tribe had hoped for. But everything was left on the field.

"I (have) an immense amount of pride in those guys," W&M coach Mike London said. "It's a devastated locker room right now, but in that locker room are guys who are going to become CEOs, company presidents, entrepreneurs and guys who will have a chance to play on Sundays.

"When you can collaborate and coach and hopefully be an influence on guys like that, it makes it all worth it."

With no timeouts at its disposal, the offense used every one of those 81 seconds. Quarterback Darius Wilson completed 3-of-4 passes for 55 yards. The play everyone will remember was Hollis Mathis' remarkable, how-did-he-get-that-foot-down, 31-yard reception on the right sideline.

Mathis, mind you, came here as a quarterback and started as a true freshman. But a shoulder issue resulted in him becoming more of a "slash" player who lines up just about everywhere on the offensive side.

On this play, he set up wide right with Richmond cornerback Trae Tomlinson across the line of scrimmage in single coverage. Mathis ran down the right sideline, with Tomlinson step-for-step, and leapt at the 34-yard line for a 50-50 ball — although the odds didn't look nearly that good.

The initial call was incomplete, which was met with immediate disapproval from the William & Mary sideline. But a quick glance at the replay showed that Mathis did come down with his right foot inbounds --you only need one in college.

Did he have possession? The replay showed he did.

After a five-minute review, the call was reversed. An amazing effort became an amazing catch. It was Mathis' sixth reception and gave him 106 yards, both career highs.

"Hollis Mathis is a fantastic individual, a great teammate," London said. "'Put me in the game, coach, I'll play anywhere, do anything I need to do.' Today, he proved he can go get the 50-50 ball. He's a really, really good football player.

"He's a great person, too. I love him and I believe he's going to be one of the guys who comes back and wants to win a championship."

Mathis has career highs of 204 yards passing, 127 yards rushing and 106 yards receiving. In 34 games, he has accounted for 19 touchdowns — nine rushing, eight passing and two receiving. 

W&M was still 34 yards from the end zone with 32 seconds remaining. A scramble by Wilson on the next play gained nothing as he got out of bounds with 25 seconds left. On the next play, he threw 16 yards to tight end Trey McDonald, who got to the sideline at the Richmond 18 with 15 seconds to go.

Two plays later, the Tribe was at the Richmond 10-yard line with three seconds left. Wilson's pass for Mathis fell incomplete in the end zone as time expired, but interference was called on Tomlinson. By rule, that placed the ball at the 2-yard line for an untimed down.

Time enough for offensive coordinator Christian Taylor to dig in his bag of tricks.

Wilson lined up not behind center but wide right. Taking the snap was running back Malachi Imoh, who in the first quarter had a 63-yard run to set up a field goal. This time, he sold the run by taking a couple of steps to his left behind his blockers and tight end Colton Turner.

Imoh then threw a jump-pass to a wide-open Turner in the end zone. It was Imoh's second career touchdown pass — his first came last season against Delaware.

"The final drive, (Mathis') catch, all those things were indicative of that never-quit attitude," London said. "I'm proud of the guys for how they played and how they never quit."

As for the decision to go for the win and not overtime, London took the blame -- although had it worked, he likely wouldn't have taken the credit.

"That's on me," he said. "I've got to live with that. But I can't say enough about the guys who played out on the field."

With a 6-5 finish, the Tribe had a winning season for the third consecutive year. That had only happened twice before since Y2K. But, of course, that wasn't the prime objective coming into the season following last year's CAA championship.

"When you become highly competitive, which I want us to do, you want to think about championships," London said. "The quest for winning championships is something we want to be a normalcy around here. You can be at an academic school and you can compete for championships. That's the bar.

"There was a great Hall of Fame coach before me (Jimmye Laycock) who spent a lot of years doing a lot of good things for this school, and I just want to be able to carry the torch with all the alumni who played here and have gone on to do great things in their post-football lives. You acknowledge the accomplishments, but we're going to chase championships."