Easton Messer totaled 179 receiving yards and two scores as the Owls built a 31-point cushion, surviving a late rally by the Midshipmen to secure the American Conference opener.<\/p>\n
Sep 13, 2026<\/p>\n
at<\/p>\n
12:37 am ET<\/p>\n
\u2022<\/p>\n
1 min read<\/p>\n
BOCA RATON, Fla. (AP) Caden Veltkamp threw five touchdown passes for Florida Atlantic<\/a>, Collin Rogers kicked a program-record 60-yard field goal just before halftime, and the Owls held off Navy<\/a> for a 38-30 victory on Saturday night in an American Conference opener.<\/p>\n Veltkamp hit Easton Messer with a 76-yard touchdown pass in the opening minute of the game. Navy answered with Braxton Woodson’s 48-yard touchdown run before the Owls scored the next 31 points, including Rogers’ 60-yarder, for a 38-7 lead with 2:39 left to play in the third quarter.<\/p>\n Jackson Gutierrez then threw a pair of touchdown passes for Navy, and with a safety, pulled the Midshipmen within 38-22. Gutierrez broke loose on a 49-yard touchdown run with 1:46 remaining, but the Owls recovered the ensuing onside kick to seal it.<\/p>\n Veltkamp was 27-of-32 passing for 386 yards. Messer caught two touchdown passes and finished with eight receptions for 179 yards. Kelby Valsin added eight catches for 115 yards and a score. Dominique Henry and AJ Johnson also had TD catches for Florida Atlantic (1-1, 1-0).<\/p>\n Gutierrez completed 6 of 12 passes for 100 yards for Navy (1-0, 0-1). Woodson was 3-of-11 passing for 47 yards with an interception. The pair combined for 19 carries and 171 yards with two touchdown runs.<\/p>\n Navy: At UAB on Sep. 25.<\/p>\n Florida Atlantic: Hosts Florida International on Saturday.<\/p>\n —<\/p>\n Sign up for Top 25 poll alerts here. Visit the Top 25 here and see AP\u2019s full college football coverage here.<\/p>\n \n Copyright 2026 STATS LLC and Associated Press. Any commercial use or distribution without the express written consent of STATS LLC and Associated Press is strictly prohibited.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Easton Messer totaled 179 receiving yards and two scores as the Owls built a 31-point cushion, surviving a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":398440,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[143,28,9944,30,29,6785],"class_list":["post-398439","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-florida","tag-college-football","tag-florida","tag-florida-atlantic-owls","tag-florida-headlines","tag-florida-news","tag-navy-midshipmen"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398439","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=398439"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398439\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/398440"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=398439"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=398439"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=398439"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}