Vizza shows progress in second career start | Denton Record Chronicle | News for Denton County, Texas

Vizza shows progress in second career start

10:19 AM CDT on Sunday, October 14, 2007

By Brett Vito/Staff Writer

North Texas head coach Todd Dodge expressed confidence that the best was yet to come from freshman quarterback Giovanni Vizza following the first start of his career last week against Louis-iana-Lafayette.

Vizza proved that for at least one week, his coach was right.

The freshman from San Antonio Alamo Heights threw for 202 yards, rushed for 66 and guided the Mean Green’s offense to one of its best outings of the season in a 31-21 win over Louisiana-Monroe on Saturday at Fouts Field.

“When we recruited Giovanni, we got what we would like to have in our offense — a quarterback who is accurate and is a distributor of the football,” Dodge said. “We would also like someone who can produce in the ground game. … He is warrior who will throw his body around a little bit.”

Vizza made several key plays running the ball, but might have made the biggest play of the night in the passing game when the Mean Green was pinned to its own goal line in the second quarter. UNT was hanging on to a slim 7-0 lead when ULM punter Scott Love dropped a punt inside the Mean Green’s 1-yard line.

UNT took a risk by calling a pass play on first down and saw it pay off when Vizza threw a short pass to wide receiver Casey Fitzgerald in the flat.

Fitzgerald spun out of a tackle and raced 99 yards for a touchdown that gave the Mean Green a 14-0 lead.

UNT had just 54 yards of offense in the first quarter before Vizza’s big pass play helped get the Mean Green on track.

Vizza showed that he had the ability to throw the ball last week when he torched Louisiana-Lafayette for 383 yards and three touchdowns. But a few mistakes proved costly for Vizza while he racked up the eighth highest passing yardage total in school history. Vizza tossed three interceptions and was sacked twice against ULL.

Those mistakes were part of the growth process after the Vizza replaced junior Daniel Meager in the starting lineup after the first four games of the season.

“I am definitely becoming more comfortable running the ball,” Vizza said.

Vizza also looked comfortable throwing the ball and running the Mean Green’s offense.

“Giovanni is very confident,” Fitzgerald said. “He is a good leader and keeps us on our toes.”

BRETT VITO can be reached at 940-566-6870. His e-mail address is bvito@dentonrc.com.

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