Eastern’s last stand: Penguins end Eagles’ march
There will be no trip to Chattanooga, Tenn., for Eastern Washington University this week. No national championship. No nine-game winning streak to close its wildly successful football season.
Instead, the Eagles will spend the first few days of Christmas break trying to figure out how so much could go so wrong at such an inopportune moment.
Plagued by turnovers, botched opportunities and the sudden disappearance of its proud running game, Eastern let its chance to play for a national title slip away Saturday, falling to Youngstown State 25-14 in the semifinals of the NCAA Division I-AA playoffs at Albi Stadium.
The loss dropped the curtain on the careers of 15 EWU seniors and a season that had been rife with magic moments.
The winningest Eastern team in history finished 12-2 and a week earlier than expected, mainly because the magic on this day belonged to Youngstown State (12-2), which will play for its fourth national championship of the 1990s when it faces McNeese State - a 23-21 semifinal winner over Delaware - in next Saturday’s I-AA title game in Chattanooga.
The Penguins sent most of those in a shivering crowd of 8,529 home in silence by forcing Eastern, a team that had valued the football as highly as any throughout the season, into five turnovers.
They turned one of those into a touchdown when defensive end Mike Stanec raced 73 yards for a second-quarter score after picking up a fumble by Eagles’ quarterback Harry Leons. And they used two others, a fumble and an interception, to stop Eastern twice at their own goal line.
“Turnovers were the difference,” said EWU coach Mike Kramer, whose upbeat demeanor in the postgame interview area seemed to be masking deep dismay. “There’s something guttural about a (game) like this. In the semifinals, if you can’t hold serve - which means not turn the ball over - you’re going to get beat.”
The significance of the turnovers was amplified by the fact that the Eagles had turned the ball over only 16 times in their 12 victories.
“Maybe it was just time for us for all the turnovers to happen,” rationalized senior linebacker Justin Guillory, who led the Eagles with 16 tackles. “But you have to credit their defense. They fly around and knocked our guys around. The ball is going to pop out sometimes.”
Every turnover hurt, but none as much as Leons’ fumble, which resulted in Stanec’s long run and a 14-0 Youngstown lead. Leons, who later sparked a determined third-quarter Eagles comeback, seemed to be on his back and down after being sacked near the Penguins’ 25-yard line. But no whistle sounded and Stanec raced untouched to the far end zone.
“It’s unbelievable,” said YSU coach Jim Tressel, whose Penguins have now forced 15 turnovers in their three playoffs wins. “Someone always rises up and makes a play. Our kids are hitting so hard, we knocked the ball loose and Michael was right there.
“When I saw their linemen chasing him, I thought we had a chance.”
Youngstown, which scored its initial touchdown in the second quarter on the first of Adrian Brown’s two scoring runs, punctuated Stanec’s return with Mark Griffith’s 41-yard field goal later in the quarter and was ahead 17-0 before Eastern could get its offense untracked.
With career rushing leader Rex Prescott unable to break anything against the push of the Penguins’ defensive line, Leons went to the air and - with the help of Maurice Perigo’s 83-yard punt return - all but erased the 17-point deficit by the middle of the final period.
Leons, who threw for 278 yards, hit Joe Mitchell with a 10-yard pass that gave Eastern its first score late in the third quarter. The Eagles defense made one its few three-and-out stops on YSU’s next possession and Perigo made it 17-14 by juking the first cover man on the ensuing punt and breaking his long return.
Another three-and-out defensive stand gave Leons another chance with almost 11 minutes left. He drove his team to YSU’s 8 before throwing an ill-advised pass that hit Penguins safety Jake Anderson right in the numbers just inside the end zone.
Anderson returned the ball to the 16, and the Penguins, behind the running of Brown, launched a 67-yard drive that stalled at EWU’s 25 but ate up 6-1/2 precious minutes.
Eastern did nothing when it got the ball back. Brown, a sophomore backup who finished with 187 yards on 20 carries, then added a meaningless touchdown on a 21-yard run with 44 seconds remaining.
Brown, who broke a 70-yard run to set up his first touchdown, carried six times on the drive that decided the issue. The Penguins, who rushed for 272 yards, pounded the ball at the left side of Eastern defensive line, which was manned by Big Sky Conference defensive player of the year Chris Scott and Steve Mattson, another all-conference pick.
“Sure, I was making tackles,” said Guillory, who was playing behind Scott and Mattson, “but it was 5, 6, 7 yards downfield. That shows you what kind of push their offensive line had. I give them credit. They really brought it to us.”
Eastern missed a great chance to gain the initiative after the Penquins muffed the opening kickoff - a squibber - and Brad Packer recovered at the YSU 37. Five plays later, on second down from the 10, Leons hit Mitchell near the 5. Mitchell tried to cut between two defenders, but had the ball jarred loose and Youngstown’s Dwyte Smiley recovered in his own end zone.