THE University of New Hampshire football team suffered a major blow before it took the field against Minnesota in what turned into a 44-7 loss on Saturday.

Ryan Carty, 29 and in his sixth year as a Wildcat assistant coach and first as offensive coordinator, did not make the trip.

Carty was in a Seacoast area hospital and is there today.

“He’s still getting tests,” said head coach Sean McDonnell on Sunday afternoon. “They’re trying to confirm what’s going on. He had some stroke-like symptoms and he’s been going through a battery of tests as they try to figure it out.”

Carty was stricken on Wednesday while working in the football offices at UNH and was taken to the hospital.

“It’s scary,” McDonnell said. “Scary and sad. He’s a 29-year-old guy in good health. He works hard and works out. He’s fit. These kinds of things knock you back. It shocks you.”

What happens next is unclear.

“I talked to him this morning and they’re still doing tests and he talked about more tomorrow,” McDonnell said. “We don’t know exactly what’s going on.”

UNH did not comment on Carty’s situation before the game and went about making adjustments for how it would fill in for the coach’s absence in play calling and other aspects of the game.

Assistant Artie Asselta has worked with quarterbacks in the past and will help with that and McDonnell said he will be doing more with the offense, too.

McDonnell said he talked with Carty only briefly about the Minnesota game.

“Right now, the farthest thing from our minds for all of us with him is football,” McDonnell said. “We want Ryan to get healthy. In typical Ryan fashion, he was wishing he could be there and wanted to be there, but he’s got to get himself healthy before he does anything.”

It was difficult, McDonnell said, playing without Carty.

“It was tough for the kids, tough for everyone,” he said. “Ryan’s a good guy. He’s one of us. He’s a big part of this program. The confidence in him was great after Holy Cross (a 39-17 win in UNH’s opener). It was his first big shot He did a great job. Everyone feels for him. Everyone loves him.”

______

REDSHIRT freshman starting quarterback Sean Goldrich is expected to miss at least two weeks with a right shoulder injury that is similar to one he had when he first got to UNH.

Goldrich got hurt after a run on the team’s second offensive play on Saturday.

Andy Vailas, a sophomore out of Bedford and Bishop Guertin of Nashua, played the rest of the Minnesota game and will start this Saturday’s at home against Central Connecticut, McDonnell said.

Senior James Brady, who has been dealing with tendinitis, is ready to go and will back up Vailas.

Vailas led the offense to a Chris Setian 5-yard touchdown run that cut Minnesota’s lead 9-7 with 2:58 left in the first period.

On his next play, Minnesota quarterback MarQueis Gray faked a handoff and broke through the line of scrimmage and outraced the defense 75 yards to score.

“Football’s all about momentum,” said junior defensive end Cody Muller, who had one of three UNH quarterback sacks and also recovered a fumble. “They had it off that run. We had it as soon as we scored and thought we were going. They cut us on a big one, some missed assignments.”

The Wildcats had 106 yards of offense in the first quarter. They had 125 in the next three quarters combined. The 231 yards of total offense was their lowest total since putting up 84 in a 46-7 playoff loss at Villanova that ended their 2009 season.

Gray’s big run knocked the Wildcats back.

“It took a little life, but we’ve just got to bounce back and keep going,” Muller said. “We’ve got to forget about the play and move on and make the next one.”

Now they’ve got to forget about the game and move on to Central Connecticut, which 0-2 with a 35-14 loss to Lehigh on Saturday and a 49-17 loss to Stony Brook in its opener.

______

CROSS COUNTRY COACH Jim Boulanger expects Maine, Vermont, Albany and Boston University for Friday’s pre-conference meet over the school’s College Woods course.

The America East championships are scheduled for Oct. 24 at UNH.

BU, which is leaving America East for the Patriot League, will not be allowed to compete in the conference championships.

Binghamton, Stony Brook and Albany will be among the contenders for the title on the men’s side, Boulanger said.

Senior Cory Sinotte and sophomore Sam Gagnon, both former standouts at Manchester Central, led UNH in its opening meet against Providence. Sinotte was fourth and Gagnon sixth.

“They and our other guys did their homework over the summer,” Boulanger said. “It was probably our most consistent summer in a while. We’re the unknown in the conference and we’re better than we were last year.”

______

The volleyball team won two of its three matches in the Holly Young Invitational — beating Holy Cross and Central Connecticut before falling to William & Mary — to improve to 4-6.

The Wildcats are at Bryant on Tuesday.

Allen Lessels covers UNH athletics for the New Hampshire Union Leader and Sunday News. He may be reached at alessels@unionleader.com.