CASTLETON, Vt. — For the first time in school history, Christopher Newport University has opened a football season with five consecutive victories, handling Vermont State University-Castleton, 69-7 Saturday afternoon. The New Jersey Athletic Conference (NJAC) game in front of 2,049 at Dave Wolk Stadium improved the 21st-ranked Captains to 5-0 overall and 2-0 in the NJAC, while the Spartans fell to 2-3 and 0-2. The victory extended the Captains' school-record winning streak to ten games dating back to last season.

"It's always exciting to do things that haven't been done in the history of the program, for guys to put a stamp on doing something different," Head Coach Paul Crowley said,. "We all have bigger goals coming up."

All ten CNU possessions against Castleton ended in touchdowns, three from senior running back Gunner White, who carried 13 times for 115 yards. White is the first Captain to surpass the 100-yard
mark this season and extended his school record of career TDs to 45. The Captains totaled 333 yards on the ground. Freshman Drevyon Tharrington had 68 yards on five carries, junior Zavier Kennedy 52 on nine rushes, and junior quarterback Cooper Meads 38 on four totes. Tharrington, who was the NJAC Offensive Rookie of the Week the past two weeks, and Kennedy each scored twice.Freshman Melvin Lowe (2 carries, 19 yards) also had his first career score.

"Coming out of last year, a lot of teams made a concerted effort to to stop the run game," Crowley continued. "That allowed for a lot of those big throwing games we've had already here. It's always good to remind people, we can still run the football."

Junior quarterback Connor Barry, who entered the game fourth nationally in Division III with 373.8 yards of total offense per game, had only 14 pass attempts, completing ten for 138 yards before getting substituted for midway through the third quarter. Barry had touchdown throws to tight ends Fred Cowell and Jason Viernes.For Cowell, a freshman, it was his first career touchdown.

CNU dominated defensively, holding Castleton to 3.8 yards per play and registering 12 tackles for losses. Junior defensive end Connor Estrella had six tackles, 2½ behind the line of scrimmage. Senior
cornerback Yasir Geter also registered six tackles.

The only thing slowing the Captains were penalties—11 for 107 yards.Six of Castleton's 11 first downs were the result of CNU penalties, including three in the first quarter.

"You can make an argument, it wasn't the best start," Crowley said. "I thought we did some uncharacteristic things early, especially on the defensive side of the ball, giving them some life with penalties. That's not very clean football. Even some of the stuff we're doing offensively, missed assignments or pass protection, wasn't very good in that first half. Overall, I thought we came out and played like we were asleep a little bit, obviously, our talent was able to overcome that today, but we need a much cleaner effort as a football team going forward."

Because of the score, Crowley was able to substitute liberally in the second half. Nine different Captains had at least one carry, and eight CNU players had a reception. Twenty-eight players had at least a tackle.

"There were a lot of young guys getting the opportunity to go out there and play, particularly on the defensive side of the ball," Crowley said. ""We played 12 offensive linemen, and that kind of experience will help us in the long haul."

Saturday's matinee on a sunny and cool day was the first meeting between the schools. Vermont State-Castleton is a first-year member of NJAC.The Captains return home next Saturday to host the Cougars of Kean University (1-4, 0-2). It will be homecoming and Hall of Fame weekend, with the kickoff set for 1:00 p.m. at TowneBank Stadium.

"We'll be excited to get back to TowneBank and playing for our home crowd," Crowley said. "It feels like it's been a while."