“I’m like the one who didn’t live up to expectations,” he said quietly.
But wait!
He wasn’t talking about what just had transpired on the field.
He was one of Marauders’ few bright spots in an afternoon marred by self-inflicted miscues that helped drop CSU to 0-3 on the season.
Davis, a redshirt freshman defensive lineman from Southfield, Michigan, spent more time in the backfield with Benedict’s two quarterbacks Saturday than did any of the Tigers’ running backs.
He had three sacks and chased the South Carolina school’s quarterbacks out of the pocket several more times, including once straight into the arms of linebacker Domonique Davis II, who got the sack and would finish the day with a team-leading 11 tackles.
But it was Mathias Davis who was the one-man wrecking crew against a Tigers’ massive offensive line that boasted four players who were 6-foot-2 to 6-foot 5 and weighed 310, 330, 340 and 390 pounds.
Davis is listed as 6-feet and 239 pounds, but he said that gave him an advantage Saturday: “They were big…and slow. I could slip under them and around them using some of the moves my coach has been teaching me since spring.”
So what about not living up to expectations?
It was a bit of exaggerated, self-demotion that put him on one of the lower branches of his lofty football family tree.
“I’m from a big football family,” he said. “ESPN did an article on us once and called us ‘The Big Ten Family.’”
- His grandfather, Travis Davis, was a sack master for Michigan State in the late 1980s. As part of George Perles’s “Gang Green Defense,” he won All-Big Ten honors three years in a row and in 1987 he set a Spartans’ record that still stands when he had five sacks in a 13-7 victory over Ohio State at the Horseshoe. A fourth-round draft pick of the Phoenix Cardinals in 1990, he played for the Miami Dolphins and Indianapolis Colts and briefly signed with the Cleveland Browns.
- His dad, Maurice Smith-Davis, was a high school star at Howland High in Warren. In 2002, his senior season, he ran for 1,329 yards and 15 touchdowns as a running back and registered 53 tackles and six sacks as a linebacker. He played linebacker at Michigan State and then Youngstown State.
- One uncle, De’Veon Smith, also played at Howland High where he was a finalist for Ohio’s Mr. Football. As a running back at Michigan, he led the Wolverines in rushing as a sophomore and junior and later played briefly for the Miami Dolphins and was with the Washington Redskins.
- Another uncle, Lance Davis, was a linebacker at Wisconsin.
Although unmentioned in this litany of football feats, the highest praise in the family could easily go to Mathias’s grandmother, Audreanna, who was just 14 when she gave birth to Maurice.
She worked fast food jobs to help support him and went back to school to graduate. Later in life she provided for her three boys by working two jobs – driving a bus during the day and working as a nurse’s aide at night.
Same old, same old
Regardless that he’s playing NCAA Division II football, Mathias seems to have inherited both family traits: football prowess and a work ethic.
He led Southfield A&T to the 2023 Division I state title in Michigan when he scored two touchdowns as a running back and had seven tackles for a loss as a defender in the title game against Belleville at Ford Field.
And yet, he said Central State was his only college football offer.
“I’d say I’ve been more of an unsung hero,” he said. “I had a real bad ankle sprain and the ligaments in my foot were messed up my senior year. I missed eight games.
“I did get back for the playoffs, but by then a lot of (college programs) had their (recruits) already lined up.”
He said CSU’s previous coaching staff noticed him when they were recruiting one of his teammates.
He played sparingly in two early games last season and then was redshirted.
This season there’s a mostly new coaching staff – led by head coach Tony Carter, a former NFL defensive back – and there are 55 new players, many coming via the transfer portal.
It was hoped the complete makeover would lead CSU to its first winning season since 1995, the year it won the NAIA national title for the third time in six seasons.
But Saturday was the second straight game the Marauders were held scoreless. A week earlier they lost at Tuskegee, 33-0
“It’s the same old, same old,” Carter said after Saturday’s game. “We’ve basically made the same mistakes three weeks in a row. They’re self-inflicted.
“We have a talented team, but we just don’t know how to win – yet.”
Bright future
Saturday, Benedict got its lone touchdown when CSU punter Abdoul Sawadogo mishandled a low snap near the goal line and under a heavy rush tried to kick the ball away, only to send a weak grounder a few yards to Benedict’s Isaiah Stephens, who ran it in for a touchdown.
CSU’s other miscue came in the third quarter after the Marauders had gone on an 80-yard drive down the field to the Benedict one yard line.
Four plays earlier, CSU’s starting quarterback, Qeanu Campbell-Caldwell, was knocked out of the game with a rib injury following a late hit that drew a 15-yard personal foul on the Tigers.
He was replaced by 6-foot-6 back-up Tison Hill, a starter late last season and in the opener this year.
On fourth and one from the one, Hill tried to extend over the goal line on a scrum of a play, but the Tigers knocked the ball from his grasp and recovered in the endzone.
Add in two more turnovers by the Marauders – a fumble and an interception – and you have Carter’s scenario for the loss.
CSU did manage a rushing attack with Dai’Vontay Young, out of Dunbar High, and Jaden Bossie combining for 117 yards on 22 carries.
Along with Mathias Davis and Domonique Davis II, CSU got some notable defensive efforts from linebacker Remello Eafen (sack) and defensive back Justin Harris (interception.)
Although Mathias Davis was the standout, he said his parents weren’t at the game and instead were in Las Vegas, where they watched unbeaten Terence Crawford upset Canelo Alvarez for the undisputed super middleweight title in front of a crowd of 70,482 at Allegiant Stadium late Saturday night.
Carter did see Mathias’s efforts up close and was pleased:
“He’s been playing well every game this season and has been giving us a great pass rush. He has a bright future here.”
Turns out he’s more than living up to expectations.
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