Notre Dame College pulled off a dramatic, come-from-behind victory over Army on Sunday, scoring three second-half tries from Marcus Tupuola, Cory Graham, and Corben Williams to win 31-26 at home in South Euclid, Ohio.

Facing a 14-point deficit, the Falcons' rally hinged on three key moments that snatched the road triumph from the Black Knights.

1) The Maul That Wasn't

In the first half, Army mauled over two tries and scored another right after a nicely executed lineout and maul. Notre Dame College had no answer to that maul (actually, the answer is, stop committing penalties that lead to lineouts, but we digress) until the second half. 

That's when the NDC coaches told their players to just have one defender tackle the ball-winner in the lineout. You need two defenders for there to be a maul, so just one guy sacking the jumper is just a guy making a tackle. The Falcons did this here, and nullified Army's best scoring weapon.

As a bonus, NDC's defensive pressure forced a knock-on, and that was that.

2) Graham Puts The Pressure On

With a scrum deep in NDC territory, Army once again had a scoring opportunity -- a chance to put the game away. But Cory Graham, who has played mostly flyhalf for NDC the last few years, was playing scrumhalf for the Falcons. He dove from an onside position and knocked the ball loose, forcing a turnover.

Notice how quickly Graham gets up to chase the play down and force the knock-on.

3) The Game-Winner

The most important passing connection in rugby is the pass from a scrumhalf to his kicker when they're backed up. You have to get this right. However, this poor pass from Army -- which didn't have enough leg drive and not enough eye contact -- dropped at kicker Jon Kim's feet. Kim tries to kick it and Williams blocks it and scores.

Both teams made mistakes -- NDC opted to tap and run on a penalty near the end of the game and knocked on, almost ruining a game-winning chance. But Army could have, and really should have, put this game away if it had not committed these execution errors. 

But all praise to Notre Dame College for forcing these mistakes.