NORFOLK—Dennis Brown ran for three touchdowns and passed for two more yesterday to lead Norfolk State to a 46-6 victory over Hampton. Brown was 18 of 21 for 229 yards and threw scoring passes of 71 and 4 yards to Chris Bell, who finished with five catches for 108 yards. Brown set a school record by completing 85.7 percent of his passes.

LYNCHBURG—Late in the fourth quarter late night, a lake had formed along the Liberty sideline. Standing water was several inches deep and covered nearly the length of the sideline. So imagine just how waterlogged the football must have been when Flames quarterback Tommy Beecher tried to dig Liberty out of a third-and-long hole trailing by a touchdown.

William and Mary football coach Jimmye Laycock didn’t really address the topic of a letdown against Central Connecticut State last week. The Tribe upset Virginia 26-14 in its opener. While Laycock thought his team played “OK” against Central Connecticut State, it was able to roll 33-14. “Well, we went back and practiced,“ he said. “I don’t know if we did anything different than we would have done if we had not won at Virginia. . . . I thought our guys handled it very, very well.

R.J. Archer threw two touchdown passes and rushed for another score to lead William and Mary to a 33-14 victory over Central Connecticut State on Saturday night. Archer was 9 for 16 for 129 yards and one interception for the Tribe (2-0), which scored on four of its five first-half possessions. Sophomore running back Jonathan Grimes had 80 yards on 19 carries and became the first player in Tribe history to reach 1,000 career rushing yards in 13 games.

West Virginia’s Jock Sanders makes a fingertip catch in the third quarter against Liberty in Morgantown, W.Va. The Mountaineers won 33-20. MORGANTOWN, W.Va.—Jarrett Brown ran for one score and Tyler Bitancurt kicked four field goals to lead West Virginia past Liberty 33-20 yesterday. West Virginia won its sixth straight season opener and improved to 10-0 against Football Championship Subdivision opponents since 2000.

TODAY’S  STATE GAMES
  Where: Foster Stadium
(cap. 10,000), Lexington
  When: 1:30 p.m. Tickets: $20 reserved, $17 general admission, $10 youth/student
  Radio: WLEE (990), 1
  Records: Season opener
  Facts: VMI beat Robert Morris 40-13 in the only meeting in 2007. The Colonials, 5-6 a year ago, have 18 starters returning and are picked to finish fifth in the Northeast Conference. VMI has won its past four openers.

LYNCHBURG - A former assistant coach at Liberty University is returning to the Lynchburg school as its head men’s basketball coach. Dale Layer was introduced yesterday as Liberty’s eighth basketball coach. He succeeded Ritchie McKay, who moved to Charlottesville to join Tony Bennett’s staff at the University of Virginia. Layer returns to Liberty after serving there as an assistant for the 2007-08 season. He was an assistant at Marquette last season.

Liberty pulls out title win Hammond-led Flames capture NCAA tourney bid HIGH POINT, N.C. - Rachel Hammond scored 13 points, and Liberty needed a late defensive stop to extend its dominance of the Big South Conference, beating scrappy Gardner-Webb 51-50 in the title game yesterday to claim its 12th NCAA tournament berth in the past 13 years.

Guard Seth Curry scored 30 points and Liberty turned back Gardner-Webb 88-77 last night in the first round of the Big South tournament in Lynchburg. Liberty (22-10) took control early as it ran out to a 22-4 lead on a 3-pointer by Kyle Ohman with 13 minutes left in the first half. The Flames led 37-14 on Anthony Smith’s free throw with 6:30 remaining in the first half.

LYNCHBURG One night last fall, Seth Curry and two of his teammates walked back to their dorm at Liberty University after going to see a movie. Suddenly, a man popped out of the darkness and asked Curry for his autograph. The guy held an oversized action shot of Curry. “My cousin loves you,“ he said. An autograph seeker? This never happened to him before. To his dad? Sure. To his brother? All the time now. But Curry was just a few games into his freshman season and didn’t expect this type of attention.

The BracketBuster organizers Monday night announced five college basketball games featuring six Virginia men’s teams.

Just in case the ball didn’t come loose, Dinwiddie defensive tackle Corey Marshall tried to stay in position to wrap up the Liberty-Bealeton running back. But he was focused on the football in Shaheem Jones’ hand.
SLIDESHOW: Dinwiddie advances to state title game

Jennings was voted the league’s offensive player of the year and Rocco the coach of the year after Liberty went 5-0 in conference games, yet missed out on an at-large berth for the Football Championship Subdivision playoffs. Gardner-Webb linebacker Jeffrey Williams was named the Big South defensive player of the year. Stony Brook running back Edwin Gowins was voted the top freshman, and VMI’s Jacob Rochester earned scholar-athlete of the year honors.