Villanova is eager to reclaim its spot near the top of the FCS ranks. Next step, New Hampshire

Call it the “Battle of the Wildcats.”

Villanova travels to New Hampshire for its next conference matchup on Saturday (1 p.m., FloSports), coming off a 31-24 win over William & Mary at home. The Wildcats are looking to get back on the right trajectory after slipping from No. 6 in the FCS poll to as low as No. 22 after a conference-opening loss to Monmouth two weeks ago.

Two Wildcats earned CAA Weekly Honors for their performance last weekend. Ja’Briel Mace earned CAA Player of the Week for his role on special teams, while Shane Hartzell, the team’s senior linebacker, earned CAA Defensive Player of the Week.

Mace, the sophomore running back, found a hole on the opening kickoff of the second half and returned the ball for a 100-yard touchdown. It was the “spark,” according to Mark Ferrante, that the team needed to pick up a victory against William & Mary.

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Villanova has relied heavily on its running game through the first four games of the season. Sophomore running back David Avit has two consecutive games with 100 or more rushing yards and three touchdowns.

The Wildcats have rushed for eight touchdowns while passing for four.

Last weekend, though, Villanova showed flashes of a passing attack that can turn it into a two-way offense.

Pat McQuaide threw for a silent 194 yards, completing 18 of his 25 attempts. The graduate quarterback recently surpassed 5,000 career passing yards and displayed his ability to improvise against William & Mary, rolling out of the pocket on multiple occasions to extend the play.

In FCS play, McQuaide is averaging 275 passing yards per contest. He has become comfortable with his main target, graduate wide receiver Luke Colella. The Princeton transfer had a career-high nine receptions in Villanova’s loss to Monmouth.

Against William & Mary, Colella hauled in a team-high six catches for 88 yards. Early in the first half, Colella displayed his ground speed, taking a jet sweep for 15 yards and a first down.

Ferrante stressed the need to clean up penalties after the team’s win over William & Mary. In the first half alone, the Wildcats gave up 74 yards on eight penalties.

But Villanova finished the game with a total of 11 penalties for 91 yards. Defensive offsides and offensive false starts accounted for the majority.

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Villanova’s 259 penalty yards this season are currently tied for 64th in FCS.

“I like to see us play a little cleaner,” Ferrante said during this week’s CAA coaches meeting. “We still had too many penalties that either stopped a couple of our drives or allowed William & Mary to sustain a few of its drives, especially early on in the game.”

Hartzell wrapped up William & Mary’s quarterback for a game-sealing sack.

He was named the CAA Defensive Player of the Week for his team-high 10 tackles (seven solo) and two sacks. Hartzell had four tackles for a loss, totaling 18 yards.

He leads the Wildcats with 34 total tackles (19 solo).

“He is just a really good linebacker,” Ferrante said. “He can slip blocks. He can take blocks on and then shed blocks. He can identify what’s happening and shoot those gaps to maybe get those [tackle for losses].

“Through his film study, he can probably narrow things down once he sees the formation they’re in, to one or two things that might be coming at him as opposed to trying to defend a whole playbook every single play.”

Junior linebacker Turner Inge has 19 total tackles (11 solo), second only to Hartzell. Graduate linebacker Richie Kimmel saw his first action of the season after missing the first three games due to injury. He had three tackles (one solo) and one pass breakup.

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