Eastern Washington says goodbye to Efton Chism III, seniors in season-ending loss to Northern Arizona 30-18

FLAGSTAFF, Arizona – Aaron Best stood near the 30-yard line of Findlay Toyota Field after Eastern Washington’s season-ending 30-18 loss to Northern Arizona on Saturday and took turns hugging the seniors who walked up to him at Walkup Skydome.

The 2024 Eastern Washington football season will go down as another one with a losing record (4-8, 3-4 Big Sky), the program’s third in a row.

The loss to the Lumberjacks (8-4, 6-2) came about because the Eagles’ rushing attack that had been so good lately ground to a halt and because NAU’s offense busted a handful of big plays before putting together a long, late scoring drive that put the game away.

As Eagles safety McKel Broussard put it, this game went like so many other ones this season.

“Sometimes doing normal things is hard in the chaos of games,” Broussard said. “One play away. I think the whole season was one play away. It was the theme of the year. We’ve got to build on it and learn.”

Best’s job – under a contract that runs through the 2027 season – is safe, as EWU athletics director Tim Collins said on Thursday. But those hugs were still parting ones, as a number of key seniors – some who played more than 50 games for the Eagles – played their final game at Eastern.

“Record doesn’t indicate cohesiveness. Record indicates record,” Best said. “There was a lot of progression. For the best part of the year, we got better on offense. … We’ve got to be able to talk about being a respectable defense.”

What teams haven’t been able to do to Eastern this year is completely dismantle it. Except for a 49-16 loss to Nevada in September, Eastern has been in every other game this year.

Such was the case again Saturday. Until the final drive, the Eagles were always within a score – ahead or behind – of the Lumberjacks. The beginning of the third quarter went particularly well thanks to a safety by Matthew Brown and a career-long 67-yard touchdown reception for Efton Chism III.

That reception also secured him the program’s single-season receptions record, which had been held by Cooper Kupp (with 117) since 2016. Chism caught 13 passes for 119 yards in his final game (of 53) with the Eagles and finished the season with 120 receptions, exactly 10 per game.

“(The record) means a lot, especially when you look at all of his records,” Chism said of Kupp. “Half of them are untouchable ever in the FCS, especially career yards (6,464), career touchdowns (73). I don’t think those will ever be broken. So when I get one on him it feels pretty special.”

Eastern’s quarterbacks threw 27 passes and targeted Chism on 18 of them. Wesley Garrett also caught three for 38 yards, and Jett Carpenter caught one for a two-yard touchdown, his first score since the 2022 season.

That touchdown came in the second quarter and was the Eagles’ lone score during a first half in which they put up only 129 yards. It was a small fraction of their four-quarter output a week ago against Idaho State (704) when the Eagles scored 11 touchdowns on 11 possessions.

But the Lumberjacks, who hope to receive an at-large selection on Sunday into the 24-team FCS playoff field, showed that they are a leg up on the Bengals, especially defensively.

“That’s potentially the best defense we’ve faced all year from back to front,” Best said.

Against Eastern’s power run game, the Lumberjacks hardly budged. On Eastern’s 34 carries, it gained just 138 yards and didn’t score once.

Passing, the Eagles weren’t much more successful. Redshirt junior quarterbacks Kekoa Visperas (15 for 22 for 94 yards) and Jared Taylor (4 for 5 for 73 and two touchdowns) combined for Eastern’s second-fewest passing yards of the season, more only than the 155 they had in a 35-28 win over Sacramento State.

But against the Hornets, the Eagles were able to get their run game going (for 286 yards). They couldn’t against the Lumberjacks.

NAU, on the other hand, mostly hummed along offensively between loud, effective outbursts. It finished with 539 yards, while Eastern finished with a season-low 301.

The Lumberjacks’ first touchdown came on a classic flea flicker from quarterback Ty Pennington to receiver Kolbe Katsis, who was 10 yards behind the Eagles’ secondary by the time he caught the 75-yard touchdown pass.

Their second touchdown came on a wide receiver pass by Isaiah Eastman, who threw the ball 50 yards in the air to Tay Lanier for a 40-yard touchdown that put NAU ahead 14-7 before halftime.

“I think we were pretty keen on what they were doing and stopping what they were doing all year, and they had to pull those trick plays,” Broussard said. “They were the only thing they could hit us on, which is unfortunate that they waited 12 weeks.”

For the most part that was true. NAU finished 0-for-2 on fourth down as they opted against attempting long field goals.

But the Lumberjacks’ final drive was the real dagger. Ahead 23-18 after a six-yard run by Seth Cromwell and Eastern’s failed fourth-down conversion on the subsequent drive, the Lumberjacks converted on three third downs during a 12-play, 66-yard touchdown drive that chewed up six minutes and 29 seconds that the Eagles couldn’t afford to lose.

On the second play of the Eagles’ final drive, Visperas threw toward Chism in double coverage and Alex McLaughlin intercepted it, sealing the game.

Now the Eagles head into an offseason of self-assessment, to figure out how to get back to the highs the program most recently reached during a 10-3 season in 2021.

But on Saturday, the Eagles focused on saying the final on-field goodbye to their seniors.

“Right after the game it hits you, and then you’ve got all this family around and I’m crying,” Chism said. “You put a lot into this, and over the past four or five seasons you don’t really realize how much you’re putting in until it’s all done. I look back and I didn’t leave anything out there. I am so blessed to be an Eagle and I wouldn’t go back and change a thing.”