Eagles cruise after big early lead

The Central Washington football team was in the wrong place at the wrong time: Woodward Field on Saturday night.

Eastern Washington, smarting from a pair of disappointing season-opening losses, took out its frustrations on the Wildcats to the tune of 39-8. Most of the damage took place in the first 15 minutes, 13 seconds when the Eagles soared to a 36-0 lead, delighting the crowd of 6,425.

“We did a lot of good things out there, but one thing we have to work on is working for four quarters,” junior quarterback Erik Meyer said after hitting 13 of 16 passes for 288 yards and two touchdowns. “We were 0-2, we did have something to prove.”

The Eagles (1-2) piled up 491 yards, 416 in the first half, and allowed Central (1-3) 313, 199 in the second half.

“Overall very happy with the win, very happy we came out real strong,” Eastern coach Paul Wulff said. “I thought we executed extremely well in the first half on both sides of the ball and on special teams. After we got a large lead we didn’t handle it very well.”

But it was a positive, considering they were outscored 30-0 in the first half of the opener and 21-0 in the first quarter last week.

Saturday’s game degenerated after that impressive start and became a comedy of penalties. Eastern was penalized 18 times for 203 yards, one penalty and 3 yards short of tying the Big Sky Conference records.

“Last week we had two penalties the entire game, the first week we didn’t have very many (six) and all of a sudden this happened,” Wulff said.

In addition to Meyer, the running game added 191 yards, led by the 92 Darius Washington picked up in the first half.

The Eagles also had 217 yards on returns of punts, kickoffs and interceptions (by Gregor Smith and Ryan Phillips), highlighted by Eric Kimble’s 76-yard punt return for a touchdown.

“They executed and made plays and we didn’t,” Central coach John Zamberlin said, “defensively and offensively.”

With the way the Eagles started, the game was over after the first play, a 58-yard touchdown pass from Meyer to Craig McIntyre. Between the snap and throw, Meyer handed the ball to Washington, who handed to Kimble, who flipped it back to Meyer. By then McIntyre was running alone behind the Wildcats defense.

“The goal was to be the first one to come out and throw the punch and we did,” Meyer said. “That was one of our first practice plays on Monday. … We didn’t know when we were going to run it, but we knew it was going to be a first-possession play. When we came out and got the call, pretty cool.”

Wulff knew it was going to be the Eagles’ initial play in the refurbished stadium. Eastern won the coin flip and elected to receive the opening kickoff, setting up the flea-flicker by setting up the return to the left side.

“I knew it was the first play when we drew it,” Wulff said. “We knew we had a chance to do it and we wanted to start off right. We had a new stadium, a new environment and we wanted to see if we could get a big bang.”

Even the first extra point was part of Eastern’s near-flawless start. After a high snap, holder Chris Peerboom, the backup quarterback, rolled right and then found kicker Skyler Allen alone on the left side for the two-point conversion.

By the end of the first quarter it was 29-0. Reggie Witherspoon had a 22-yard touchdown run less than four minutes in, and then with less than 5 minutes gone Kimble had his punt return. Washington capped Eastern’s next possession with a 3-yard TD run.

A good measure of Central’s success on offense was courtesy of Eastern penalties, mostly the result of being aggressive. The Wildcats had 51 yards and three first downs, two by penalty. Eastern had 255 yards.

The onslaught continued in the second quarter when Meyer connected with Richmond Sanders for a 41-yard score on the second play, making it 36-0 before the offense stalled out.

When Central finally scored, on a 7-yard run by Emilio Iniguez with 4:52 left in the third quarter, the Wildcats had 186 yards of total offense and Eastern had 158 yards in penalties.

CWU’s freshman quarterback Dan Lapinsky finished 26 of 49 for 216 yards.

Iniguez rushed for 105 yards but the Wildcats netted only 107.

The Eagles begin Big Sky Conference play next week when Idaho State (1-2) visits for another 6 p.m. game.

“We have to make sure we get better and really address the fact that when we get into league games, we have to play for four quarters and execute four quarters,” Wulff said. “We’ll stress that this week.”