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Call it a breakthrough. Call it a landmark win. Call it a culmination of the cliché ‘nothing to lose’ win.

But Maryville College’s 21-14 defeat of defending USA South champion Christopher Newport Saturday, a program first, was more than anything a taste of redemption for the Scots.

How exactly does redemption taste?

Like ice cream covered in chocolate sauce.

“It’s the first time that particular 8-hour bus ride home has been a good one,” said MC head coach Tony Ierulli. “We found a Dairy Queen about an hour down the road and I treated the guys to Sundays for that effort.”

Thoughts of those three-straight October losses aren’t gone, but the salve of an upset can certainly take away some of the sting.

“We were disappointed in how things worked out this year,” said Ierulli, who now owns a win over every team in the USAS. “But this gets us to where we can say we’ve made a big step forward with this program. They’ve been the big man on campus in the conference from the get go.”

In any given year Matt Kelchner’s Captains have too much offense, too much defense, too much confidence and even too much of the lucky bounces for Maryville to dominate the fourth quarter and leave POMOCO Stadium with victory. POMOCO is where aspiring title hopes generally go to die, and against the team that has won or shared six of the eight USAS titles, victory is of the moral acidic flavor, if at all.

CNU has lost only three conference games at home, ever. Yet despite a roster depleted by injury, Maryville made it four.

The Scots found a way to make it happen with a defense that seemed at home in the Captains’ backfield and an offense that rallied around adversity.

Preseason All-American running back Tunde Ogun was merely mortal against the Scots. After piling up 646 yards the last four games, and 225 last season against MC, the senior was held to a net gain of 55 Saturday. With Maryville’s comeback under way in the fourth, Ogun took the call for 11 of his 26 carries and on five of those never reached the line of scrimmage. When Joel Byars brought Ogun down behind the line on third down, it set in motion one of Maryville’s Highland Fourth Quarter Flings.

“I think they expected Joel to rush up field, but he read his key and really made a big play,” said Ierulli. “That was a senior three-year starter reacting well and making a big stop.”

On MC’s first snap — after the CNU punt and penalty — bruised and battered quarterback Tim Conner, who saw more mud and sky than receivers a week ago, had ample time to sling a 39-yard bullet to Sam McCord for the go ahead score.

The offensive line, mauled in the loss to Greensboro, only failed Conner twice against CNU and paved the way for Darrell Tate and Nick Moore, who filled in admirably for injury-absent, all-time leading rusher Rommel Hightower and produced 112 combined yards a week after a 32-yard effort against the Pride.

It was an effort that let the defense do what it had done so well Saturday — contain Ogun.

When CNU threatened to tie with 3 minutes remaining, Ogun got the call on third down at the MC 13 but ended up back at the 16 with the Scots Maurice Sheffield holding the football as the culmination for a Maryville defense that mustered 14 minus yardage stops and allowed just one third down conversion in the final stanza.

“Our whole defense yelled, ‘watched option’ on that play and maybe it distracted them,” said Ierulli. “The pitch went out and Ogun just kind of dropped the ball. It was the same situation last year where they ran that option for a touchdown.”

But on Saturday the bounces went Maryville’s way, the stops went Maryville’s way, the scoreboard went Maryville’s way.

Because the Scots, as a team, found once more, how to take the fight to the finish.

And enjoyed the sweet taste of victory.

IRONY: With Saturday’s win in Newport News, Va. the Scots finish the season 2-0 in the Old Dominion state, having won at Shenandoah earlier this year, but are just 1-3 in the Volunteer state heading into the season finale hosting Ferrum, which came out on the wrong side of a 34-28 triple overtime game with Averett.

Marcus Fitzsimmons is a sportswriter for The Daily Times who enjoys reader feedback and comments posted to this column on www.thedailytimes.com and on the www.d3sports.com message boards.