No. 25 Tulane routs Navy 35-0 to clinch a spot in the AAC championship game

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No. 25 Tulane routs Navy 35-0 to clinch a spot in the AAC championship game

2024-11-17 05:38 Last Updated At：05:40

ANNAPOLIS, Md. (AP) — Makhi Hughes ran for 82 yards and two touchdowns, and No. 25 Tulane locked up its spot in the American Athletic Conference championship game by romping to a 35-0 victory over Navy on Saturday.

Darian Mensah threw for two TDs and ran for another as Tulane (9-2, 7-0, No. 25 CFP) guaranteed a championship meeting on Dec. 6 against No. 16 Army, which was idle Saturday. A victory there would bring a second league title in three years following a 23-year drought.

"It's unbelievable," first-year coach Jon Sumrall said. “It's such a testament to our administration, our fan base, our alumni. Everybody at Tulane has decided we want to be good at football. And we can be as good as we want to be. We can go as far as we want to go with this."

Sam Howard intercepted a pass and recovered a fumble for the Green Wave, who preserved their second shutout and held an opponent to single digits for the fourth time this season.

Tulane outgained Navy (7-3, 5-2) 358-113 on a gusty day and knocked starting Midshipmen quarterback Blake Horvath out of the game with a rib injury.

“With him, the package is just so expansive," Sumrall said of Horvath. “It's a lot of football to defend. When he goes out, I don't want to say it's simpler, but the other guy didn't quite do as much of the package.”

The Midshipmen were shut out for the first time since a 15-0 loss to Army in 2020.

“Not that we were killing it when Blake was out there, but it certainly hurt to lose him,” Navy coach Brian Newberry said. “He's a good player, but it's next-man-up mentality around here.”

Hughes averaged only 3.7 yards on 22 carries — well below his 5.7 average entering Saturday — but had several important physical runs.

His longest, a 14-yard TD on a third-and-11 draw play, stretched it to 14-0 with four minutes left in the first half.

Then he carried it eight times on a 13-play, 65-yard TD drive to open the second half, burning 8 minutes, 45 seconds to put the contest out of reach. The last of that march was a 1-yard plunge to make it 21-0, coming on a second effort after he was met behind the line of scrimmage.

“I just had to use my full strength to get in that end zone,” Hughes said.

Mensah completed 10 of 14 passes for 138 yards and ran for 57 more. Both touchdown throws came in the fourth quarter from short-yardage situations.

Tulane: This was a more impressive win than the offensive stats will indicate. After going three-and-out on their first two drives, the Green Wave scored on three of their next four possessions, each on drives of more than 60 yards.

Navy: The Midshipmen will wonder what might have been had Horvath not picked up an injury that began troubling him late in the first quarter and officially ruled him out in the third. He was his team's best rusher before his exit, gaining 25 yards on five carries.

A dominant road win against a good team with an unorthodox offense would appear likely to keep Tulane in the rankings for a second consecutive week.

Tulane: Hosts Memphis next Saturday.

Navy: Visits East Carolina on Nov. 29.

Get poll alerts and updates on the AP Top 25 throughout the season. Sign up here. AP college football: https://apnews.com/hub/ap-top-25-college-football-poll and https://apnews.com/hub/college-football

Venezuela releases from prison some of the thousands detained after presidential election

2024-11-17 05:33 Last Updated At：05:40

TOCUYITO, Venezuela (AP) — Venezuela's government on Saturday released some of the thousands of people who were detained during and after deadly protests that followed the July presidential election. The disputed results have earned officials, including President Nicolás Maduro, international scorn.

The individuals left prison a day after the attorney general, who is loyal to the ruling party, announced the review of 225 cases linked to the aftermath of the election, which Maduro and opposition candidate Edmundo González both claim to have won. Tearful reunions took place outside prisons in various cities.

The Venezuelan-based nongovernmental organizations Penal Forum and Venezuelan Prison Observatory announced the prison releases on X. The former confirmed the release of at least 70 people, while the latter said the government freed the individuals under certain conditions, which it did not explain further.

Members of the armed forces escorted down a pedestrian bridge those who were released from the prison in the northern Venezuela city of Tocuyito. Some of the detainees kneeled and raised their arms after going down the stairs. Two detainees helped a third one who could not walk on his own and later collapsed into the arms of a relative as they sobbed.

“My son, thank you, Lord, thank you!” a woman said as she hugged her son with one arm and lifted the other to the sky.

Images shared on social media by the Venezuelan Prison Observatory showed women tearfully hugging loved ones outside another prison in the South American country. The organization described the releases as a “victory” and demanded that all who remain in prison for their roles in the election and activities in its aftermath be freed.

Maduro’s government has come under heavy criticism for the election’s lack of transparency and the repression unleashed in its aftermath, including the arrests of political leaders, lawyers, poll workers, election volunteers and protesters, both minors and adults.

The protests erupted after Venezuela’s electoral authorities declared Maduro had won the July 28 contest and alleged they could not publish precinct-level results because their website had been hacked. At the same time, the main opposition coalition announced it had secured vote tally sheets from more than 80% of the electronic voting machines used across the country, published them online and declared that its candidate, González, had defeated Maduro by a landslide.

The government’s arrest tally included about 2,200 people. Government officials, including Attorney General Tarek William Saab, have strongly defended the detentions, but earlier this week, Maduro called on Saab and judges to ensure “justice” in the event that a case “needs to be rectified and reviewed.”

In September, independent United Nations human rights experts issued a report accusing Venezuela’s government of intensifying the use of its “harshest and most violent” tools of repression following the disputed July election. The report, commissioned by the U.N.-backed Human Rights Council, denounced rights violations including arbitrary detentions, torture and sexual and gender-based violence by the country’s security forces that “taken as a whole, constitute the crime against humanity of persecution on political grounds.”

Several countries, including Venezuelan allies, have called on Maduro and his government to free from prison arbitrarily detained people and to release detailed election results.

Garcia Cano reported from Mexico City.