JACKSONVILLE, Fla. — Texas A&M running back Trayveon Williams might still be running if the Atlantic Ocean hadn’t served as North Carolina State’s last line of defense.
Williams ran in and around the Wolfpack for a Gator Bowl record 236 yards in the Aggies’ 52-13 whipping of N.C. State on Monday night at TIAA Bank Field. In typical fashion, Williams brushed aside any praise.
“It’s a special moment,” Williams said of setting multiple rushing records, all on one 93-yard fourth-quarter touchdown run. “But most important, we got that bowl win. The bowl win we’ve been kind of missing out on the last (few) seasons.”
Two plays into the Gator Bowl, A&M had scored more points than it did in its previous trip here 61 years ago.
The rest of the game’s 59 minutes went swimmingly for the Aggies too as they snapped a three-game bowl losing streak and won in first-year coach Jimbo Fisher’s first try.
“We’re learning to finish. That’s been one of the things we’ve emphasized, and we’ve learned to get better as the season went on,” Fisher said. “That’s something we’re continuing to grow on, so hopefully we can build on it.”
Williams turned in a career night along the way. He now has the school’s single-season rushing record with 1,760 yards, breaking Darren Lewis’ mark (1,692 in 1988) on the 93-yard run that lifted A&M to a 42-13 lead in the fourth.
Williams also wiped out another Lewis mark, breaking a tie for career 200-yard rushing games at A&M. Williams now has five such games.
The Aggies (9-4) played in Jacksonville for the first time since the 1957 Gator Bowl, a 3-0 loss to Tennessee in what turned out to be coach Paul “Bear” Bryant’s final game with the Aggies.
A&M wasted no time getting on the board this time around. On the second play from scrimmage, A&M sophomore quarterback Kellen Mond blasted 62 yards for a touchdown.
The Wolfpack (also 9-4) scored the next 13 points on a couple of field goals and a 9-yard touchdown pass from Ryan Finley to CJ Riley. But the Aggies grabbed back the lead in the second quarter on a 2-yard touchdown run by Williams and a stretching 6-yard touchdown catch in the back of the end zone by Kendrick Rogers.
A&M padded its 21-13 halftime lead when linebacker Tyrel Dodson stepped in front of a Finley pass and returned it 78 yards about four minutes into the third quarter.
“I studied a lot of film and saw they liked to run little slant routes to the sticks and stop — kind of a spacing route,” Dodson said. “So coach (Mike) Elko said, ‘If you see it, go get it.’ I went to go get it and ended up with a touchdown.”