VILLANOVA, Pa. – With the No. 2 and No. 5 teams, both tops in the Atlantic 10 facing off in a mid-October battle of the unbeaten, sporting fate would dictate that an extraordinary play would decide the game.

That was the case Saturday as Massachusetts (7-1, 5-0 A-10) downed Villanova (6-1, 4-1 A-10) 19-14, thanks to the nimble work of sophomore Shannon James, who picked up a fumble by backup quarterback Marvin Burroughs and scored the winning touchdown in front of 9,125 at Villanova Stadium.

The play capped off a game that had everything – reversal of fortune, hard hitting, and even some history, thanks to a 97 – yard pass from Umass quarterback Jeff Krohn to Jimmie Howard, the longest pass in A-10 history, and the longest play from scrimmage in UMass history. Howard’s reception also eclipsed the 82 – yard Krohn-to-Jason Peebler connection against New Hampshire on Oct. 4 as the longest pass in the history of Minuteman football.

In one of the stranger sequences in recent memory, Burroughs fumbled the snap with 2:08 remaining, the ball rattled off legs at the line of scrimmage, and ended up at James’ feet. James scooped up the loose ball and took it 39 yards for the touchdown, with the Umass bench erupting into celebration. The Minutemen became so exuberant, in fact, that coach Mark Whipple was visibly upset, and when a flag was thrown for excessive celebration, Whipple fired his headset into the ground.

Despite the penalty, and a failed two-point conversion attempt, the Maroon and White held on to the five-point lead, and senior Mike Ziccardi punctuated the effort with a sack on Burroughs with less than a minute to go.

“Shannon James did a really good job, because he got beat on a couple of things at the end of the half,” Whipple said, by way of referring to a 5 – yard touchdown completion by ‘Nova starting quarterback Joe Casamento to John Dieser. “He was the one who kind of made a mistake, got beat up by Dieser, and he just hung in there and made a huge play at the end of the game … somehow the kids just found a way to get it done, so credit those guys.”

“All I could think of is ‘god is with us,'” said James, recalling his thoughts as he rolled down the sideline to the winning score, “that’s the only thing that crossed my mind.”

Casamento came out of the game midway through the third quarter, clearly hampered by a shoulder injury that had him laboring from the outset, and resulted in two interceptions.

Villanova took the lead with 6:26 remaining on a well-executed, 54 – yard drive. Burroughs’ 32 – yard pass to a leaping John Dieser put the Wildcats on the UMass 7 – yard line. After two rushes failed to gain any significant yardage, the Minutemen seemed to have ‘Nova settling for a field goal when James Ihedigbo reached around Dieser to knock down a pass in the endzone on 3rd-and-Goal from the 6 – yard line. But the Amherst native was called for pass interference, setting up a 2 – yard scoring run by Terry Butler to make it 14-13 Villanova.

After going 0 – for – 2 on field goals – both within his range – with a missed extra point last week against Hofstra, freshman Michael Torres hit a 28 – yard kick with 3:03 left in the second quarter to give the Minutemen a 10-0 lead.

The Wildcats struck back quickly though, when quarterback Joe Casamento found John Dieser alone in the endzone on a deep slant to cut the UMass lead to three, where it stayed through the end of the half.

Torres added a 36 – yard field goal with 9:23 remaining in the third quarter to put the Minutemen up 13-7.

After a sloppy first quarter for both squads, the Minutemen broke out in a big way, and created some history in the process. A false start penalty pushed UMass back to its own 3 – yard line, but on the following play, Jeff Krohn connected with Jimmie Howard on a skinny post route. Howard slipped out of the clutches of a falling Jeremy Morgan, and took it 66 more yards to the endzone for the record-breaking 97 – yard recepttion.

On the next UMass drive, Krohn attempted to burn the left side of ‘Nova’s secondary a number of times, but the only gain came on the first attempt, when Morgan blatantly interfered with Howard on a near-identical route to move the ball 15 yards up.