ORONO – With third-string quarterback Jon Meczywor making his first career start due to injuries to starter Jake Eaton (knee) and backup Chris Legree (shoulder), nobody on the University of Maine sidelines knew how effective he would be in Saturday’s Division I-AA playoff-clinching 31-14 football win over New Hampshire.

So the Black Bear defense, spearheaded by the dominant play of its swarming line, made Meczywor’s job easier.

The defense limited the Wildcats to 179 total yards, 91 of which came on UNH’s second drive of the game, and registered five sacks by five different linemen.

The 10-2 Black Bears held UNH to an average of 2.3 yards per play and a 7-for-21 performance in third-down conversions. Atlantic 10 rushing leader Stephan Lewis, who entered the game averaging 111.9 rushing yards per game and 5.0 yards per rush, gained just 33 yards on 20 carries and sophomore quarterback Mike Granieri completed only 13 of 38 passes for 143 yards.

“Their defensive line did a real good job. They put a lot of pressure on me,” said Granieri, who was forced to rush several throws. “They have a great team.”

“We knew we had to put pressure on their quarterback to win the game,” said Maine sophomore defensive end Marcus Walton, who had one of the sacks and had two tackles for losses. “We knew we had to step it up regardless [of who started at quarterback for us].”

“We practiced real hard during the week to make sure we dominated [the line of scrimmage],” added Walton. “We knew we had the Atlantic 10 championship on the line and the chance to further our season. If we lost, it was the end of our season. We wanted to help our seniors have a better season. We prepared well and it showed.”

Eaton said the Bears’ defensive line is impressive.

“Those guys are fast, big, and athletic and they play with a lot of heart and a lot of passion. They’re tenacious.”

“I haven’t seen a better front four this year that I played against,” Eaton added.

Nose tackle Dan Joslyn led the Bears in tackles with seven and four of those were for losses.

Defensive end Brendan Curry was in on five tackles, two for losses; defensive tackles Pat Pa’u and Mark Stetson were involved in four tackles each and three of those eight were for losses; and two of end Dennis Dottin-Carter’s tackles were for losses.

Brian Mann was the other of the four rotating defensive ends and Amos Hall backed up Joslyn at nose tackle.

“After their touchdown drive, we slowed down the blitz part of things in our package,” explained Maine coach Jack Cosgrove. “We basically played a lot of zone coverage with the occasional blitz.

“We received a great effort up front. It came down to us feeling like we were better than New Hampshire, man-to-man, up front. We thought we could beat them on the pass rush with just four of our guys involved.”

“If you’re a linebacker, you want that defensive line in front of you, I’ll tell you that,” said Maine linebacker Stephen Cooper. “They’ve been great every week.”

The special teams also came through in two important instances.

Curry recovered a fumbled punt in the first quarter to set up a Mike Mellow field goal which cut the lead to 7-3 and freshman linebacker Jermaine Walker blocked a punt early in the fourth quarter which gave Maine the ball at the UNH-17.

“I wasn’t expecting it to open up like it did,” said Walker. “Once I saw it open up, I turned on the speed and I got there [to block it].”

Four plays later, Meczywor threw a 6-yard TD pass to Danny Fusco to extend the lead to 24-7.

“That’s how our team has always done it all year,” said Curry. “It hasn’t been one person, not the offense, not the defense, not the special teams. It was a combination of all of those and it showed today.”