Football Returns to Ivy Play at Columbia - Dartmouth College Athletics

Saturday, October 24

New York, N.Y. / Kraft Field at Lawrence A. Wien Stadium

1:30 PM

Dartmouth College

Columbia

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10/22/2026 10:00:00 AM | Football

Game Six: Dartmouth (2-3) at Columbia (4-1) - Saturday, Oct. 24, 2026, 1:30 p.m.
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HANOVER, N.H. – The Dartmouth football team resumes Ivy League play on Saturday, Oct. 24, with a trip to New York City to face Columbia at Robert K. Kraft Field at Lawrence A. Wien Stadium. Kickoff is set for 1:30 p.m., and the game will be streamed on ESPN+.

Setting the Scene
Dartmouth owns the most Ivy League championships of any program, with 22, and has won a title in four of the past six seasons. The Big Green lead the all-time series with Columbia 74-20-1 and have won four straight, including a 49-3 victory last season in Hanover.

Dartmouth is 2-3 overall and 1-1 in the Ivy League. The Big Green opened with one-possession losses to No. 7 Lehigh (24-20) and (RV) Monmouth (31-28), beat Penn 14-10 in the Ivy opener on Oct. 3, fell 28-7 at Yale on Oct. 10, and rallied past Merrimack 27-21 on Oct. 17 in their final non-league game.

Columbia is 4-1 overall and 1-1 in the Ivy League under head coach Jon Poppe, who is in his third season. The Lions rallied from a 17-point deficit to beat Penn 28-27 on Friday, Oct. 16, on a 9-yard touchdown pass from Chase Goodwin to Bryce Coleman with 6:41 left. Columbia opened with overtime wins over Lafayette (40-34) and at Georgetown (20-17), lost 35-7 to Princeton in its Ivy opener, and won 41-28 at Marist. Goodwin has thrown for at least 277 yards in each of the Lions' first four games, and running back Griffin Johnson ran for 124 and 121 yards in the first two. Columbia is averaging 27.2 points per game and allowing 28.2. The Lions went 2-8 in 2025, and Saturday is their Homecoming game.

Sammy McCorkle, the Robert L. Blackman Head Football Coach, is in his fourth season at the helm in 2026. The Big Green won Ivy League titles in 2023 and 2024 under McCorkle.
Core contributors return throughout the lineup:

Saunier: The quarterback threw for 2,143 yards and nine touchdowns last season and rushed for 413 yards and a team-high 11 touchdowns. Through five games in 2026, he has completed 55 of 103 passes for 779 yards and five touchdowns. He added a 2-yard rushing touchdown against Merrimack.
Fisher and Lemon: Ky'Dric Fisher, the top returning pass catcher after posting 21 catches for 341 yards as a sophomore, has 15 catches for 266 yards and three touchdowns this season. Nick Lemon broke off a 63-yard run against Merrimack, the longest by the Big Green this season.
Keith: Harrison Keith, a Third Team Associated Press (AP) All-American last season, led the team with four interceptions as a junior. He had nine tackles and a team-high five pass breakups against Merrimack and leads the Big Green with 48 tackles on the season.
Linebackers and secondary: Steve Simpkins Jr. had a career-high 11 tackles and an interception against Merrimack, and Johnny Stephens added six tackles. No'Koi Maddox also had an interception.
Defensive line: Bruce Williams and Joshua Johnson combined for four sacks and 37 tackles as juniors last year. Against Merrimack, Johnson had a sack and seven tackles, and Williams had half a sack and six tackles.

Dartmouth rallied from a one-score deficit to beat Merrimack, 27-21, on Saturday, Oct. 17, at Buddy Teevens Stadium at Memorial Field. Merrimack led 14-7 at halftime and 21-14 after three quarters. Dartmouth scored all 13 of its fourth-quarter points on a 59-yard touchdown pass from Noah Trigueros to James Elliott and Owen Zalc field goals of 50 and 42 yards. Saunier opened the scoring with a 2-yard run in the first quarter, and Lemon's 63-yard run set up Trigueros's 1-yard touchdown that tied the game at 14 in the third.

The Big Green forced three takeaways in the second half: Maddox and Simpkins each intercepted a pass, and Ayo Adeniyi recovered a fumble. Dartmouth stopped Merrimack on downs at the Dartmouth 14 with 1:03 left to seal the win. Dartmouth did not commit a turnover and went 3-for-3 in the red zone. Myles Craddock carried 16 times for 62 yards, and Elliott had four catches for 96 yards.

The win followed a 28-7 loss at Yale on Oct. 10 and improved Dartmouth to 16-3 at home over its past 19 games.

With a Win on Saturday…

Dartmouth would improve to 3-3 overall and 2-1 in the Ivy League.
The Big Green would improve to 75-20-1 all-time against Columbia and extend their winning streak in the series to five games.
McCorkle would improve to 4-0 against the Lions.

Scouting Columbia
Columbia is 4-1 overall and 1-1 in the Ivy League under head coach Jon Poppe, who is in his third season. The Lions went 2-8 in 2025.

Columbia opened with a 40-34 overtime win over Lafayette and a 20-17 overtime win at Georgetown. After a 35-7 loss to Princeton on Oct. 3, the Lions won 41-28 at Marist on Oct. 9. On Friday, Oct. 16, they beat Penn 28-27 at Franklin Field after trailing 24-7. Two second-quarter interceptions led to 14 Columbia points before halftime, and Goodwin threw three touchdown passes to Coleman.

Goodwin has thrown for at least 277 yards in each of the first four games, with Coleman and Hayden Crow among his top targets. Johnson leads the ground game, and Hugo Merry handles the kicking. Columbia has scored 136 points and allowed 141 through five games. The Lions host Dartmouth before hosting Yale on Oct. 31. Dartmouth hosts Harvard on Friday, Oct. 30, at 7 p.m., so the Big Green will see the Crimson next.

Last Time vs. Columbia
Grayson Saunier ran for three touchdowns and threw for another as Dartmouth beat Columbia, 49-3, on Friday, Oct. 24, 2025, at Buddy Teevens Stadium at Memorial Field in Hanover, N.H. The Big Green led 21-0 after one quarter, 35-0 at halftime and 49-0 after three. Tyson Grimm returned an interception 75 yards for a touchdown on Columbia's opening possession, and No'Koi Maddox blocked a punt and returned it 15 yards for a score. Saunier, who completed 12 of 13 passes for 162 yards, scored on runs of 24, 13 and 1 yards and threw a 35-yard touchdown pass to Chris Corbo. Desmin Jackson added a 2-yard touchdown run, and D.J. Crowther rushed for 103 yards on 18 carries.

Dartmouth held Columbia to 271 total yards, and Caleb Sanchez completed 10 of 25 passes for 105 yards. Hugo Merry's 26-yard field goal with 5:13 left in the fourth quarter was the Lions' only score. Zyion Freer-Brown led the Big Green defense with 12 tackles. The 46-point margin was Dartmouth's largest since a 56-0 win over Columbia in 2013.

Sammy McCorkle Against Columbia
McCorkle holds a 3-0 record against Columbia as Robert L. Blackman Head Coach:

def. Columbia, 49-3: Friday, Oct. 24, 2025, at Buddy Teevens Stadium at Memorial Field
def. Columbia, 24-21: Saturday, Oct. 26, 2024, at Robert K. Kraft Field at Lawrence A. Wien Stadium
def. Columbia, 20-9: Saturday, Oct. 21, 2023, at Memorial Field

Keith Named A Week Seven NEFW Gold Helmet Award Recipient
Harrison Keith is a week seven recipient of the New England Football Writers Association Gold Helmet Award, presented by the Jack Grinold/Eastern Massachusetts Chapter of the National Football Foundation. Keith recorded nine tackles and a team-high five pass breakups in the Big Green's 27-21 win over Merrimack on Saturday, Oct. 17, at Buddy Teevens Stadium at Memorial Field. He also helped break up the pass that Steve Simpkins Jr. intercepted at the Merrimack 24 in the fourth quarter. That turnover set up an Owen Zalc field goal. Dartmouth finished the game with three takeaways in the second half and held Merrimack on downs at the Dartmouth 14 with 1:03 left to seal the win. Keith's five pass breakups are the second-most by an FCS player in 2026.

Elite Company for Saunier

Career passing yards: 3,455, ninth in program history after passing David Gabianelli '87 (3,424) against Merrimack. He needs 955 to pass Derek Kyler '21 (4,409) for eighth. Dalyn Williams '16 holds the record at 7,458.
Career completions: 285, ninth. He needs 78 to pass Kyler for eighth. Williams holds the record at 620.
Career completion percentage: .625 (285-for-456), third behind Kyler's .693 and Williams' .627, and just ahead of Alex Park '14 (.622).
Career total offense: 4,223 yards, ninth in program history. He needs 16 to pass Mark Johnson '90 (4,238) for eighth. Williams holds the record at 8,952.
Single-game passing yards: 407 vs. CCSU (2025), tied for fifth in program history.
Season passing yards: 2,143 (2025), eighth all-time.
Season completions: 183 (2025), seventh all-time.
Season rushing touchdowns: 11 (2025), tied for ninth all-time.
Career rushing touchdowns: 21, tied for sixth all-time.
Points in a season: 60 (2025), tied with Yale's Josh Pitsenberger for the Ivy League lead that year.

Saunier Among Active FCS Players
Saunier ranks 28th among active FCS players in passing efficiency (135.51), 31st in total offense (4,223), and 47th in total offense per game (168.9).

Weekly Honors For Stephens
Johnny Stephens was honored as the Ivy League Defensive Player of the Week on Monday, Oct. 5.

Weekly Honors For Zalc
Zalc was named a semifinalist for the 2026 Campbell Trophy on Thursday, Sept. 24. He has been named Ivy League Special Teams Player of the Week eight times in his career, most recently on Oct. 19. His eight weekly awards are tied for the second-most by an Ivy League player, behind only Brown's James Perry and Yale's Kurt Rawlings, who each earned nine.

Zalc in the Record Book

Single-season field goals: 17 made on 21 attempts (2023), a program record. The Ivy League record is 19, by Princeton's Chris Lutz in 1988. Zalc's 17 ranks fourth in league history.
Single-season field goals in league play: 14 in 2023, the Ivy League record. Penn's Andrew Samson had 13 in 2008.
Career field goals: 43 made on 65 attempts, a Dartmouth record. That is tied for fourth in Ivy League history with Penn's Andrew Samson. He needs 9 to tie and 10 to pass Brown's Steve Morgan (2004-07), the conference record holder with 52.
Career points-kicking: 230, first on Dartmouth's career points-kicking chart, with 101 of 103 extra points and 43 field goals. He passed Harvard's Jake McIntyre and Brown's Sean Jensen (229) against Merrimack and ranks No. 5 in Ivy history.
Career points: 230, second all-time in program history behind Myles Lane '28 (307).
Longest field goal: 54 yards vs. Harvard (2024), tied for the Ivy League record.

Zalc Among Active FCS Players
Zalc is tied for second among all active FCS players in field goals (43), ranks fourth in field goals per game (1.23), eighth in extra points – kicking (101) and tenth in career points (230).

Some of the Nation's Longest Punts
Luke Armistead's 77-yard punt against Yale was the second-longest punt in program history and the fifth-longest punt by an FCS player in 2026. Armistead now owns two of the longest punts by an FCS player this season, with his 74-yarder against Penn currently tied for ninth.