Eastern Washington’s offense goes quiet after halftime in 28-24 loss at SE Louisiana

From staff reports

HAMMOND, Louisiana – Given just four second-half possessions, Eastern Washington’s offense only mustered three points after halftime in a 28-24 nonconference loss at Southeastern Louisiana on a humid Saturday night at Strawberry Stadium.

The loss dropped the Eagles to 1-2 this season following an overtime loss last week at home to Drake. It wrapped up a home-and-home scheduling arrangement with the Lions after they made the trip to Cheney last year.

The Eagles gave up one point less than they did last year against the Lions – Eastern won that game 40-29 – but on Saturday their offense struggled on third down, converting 3 of 12 opportunities, and it finished with a season-low 333 yards.

“Our guys fought. We played (well) in all three phases,” EWU head coach Aaron Best said in a postgame radio interview. “We just didn’t play as well in the second half as we would’ve liked to on offense. When you hold a team to seven points in the second half and 28 (points) overall, we’re doing some really good things (on defense).”

The Eagles struggled to stop the run late in the game, something that was an issue last season but hadn’t been so much of a problem in the first two games this year.

Eastern took a 24-21 lead on Soren McKee’s 36-yard field goal early in the third quarter. Its defense answered with a fourth-down stop near midfield that gave the Eagles favorable field position with a chance to extend their lead.

But EWU’s next drive also ended in a fourth-down stop, and Southeastern then drove 54 yards, taking the lead on Harlan Dixon’s 23-yard touchdown run on the first play of the fourth quarter.

Southeastern attempted just 10 passes in the second half, content to run against EWU’s defense.

Trailing by four, Eastern’s offense reached the red zone with about 6 minutes left in the game on senior Efton Chism III’s 23-yard reception. It was the 254th of Chism’s career, moving him into second place on the program’s receptions list.

But on their next three plays the Eagles gained only 2 yards. On fourth-and-8 from the Lions’ 18-yard line, Kekoa Visperas overthrew Chism on a pass near the goal line.

The Lions answered by achieving five first downs to drain the final 5:22 off the clock. They finished with 253 yards on 47 carries. Dixon had 92 of those yards – and two touchdowns – on nine carries. Anthonio Martin Jr. rushed 28 times for 149 yards.

“They ran when they wanted to, and we just couldn’t quite put a wall up to keep them behind the sticks,” Best said.

Eastern scored the game’s first touchdown on a 7-yard rushing score by redshirt junior Malik Dotson, his first with the Eagles. Dotson scored again later from 1 yard out and finished with a team-high 11 carries and 47 rushing yards

Chism had seven catches for 83 yards. The Eagles played without injured senior receiver Nolan Ulm. Stepping into Ulm’s place in the lineup, junior transfer Noah Cronquist had four catches for 71 yards and the Eagles’ other touchdown, a 43-yard strike over the middle that tied the game at 21 with 33 seconds left in the first half.

“We have full confidence in our coaching staff and the players we have,” Cronquist said in a postgame radio interview. “We are going to go into every game thinking we can win.”

Eastern was also missing two other captains: senior cornerback Darrien Sampson and senior defensive tackle Jacob Newsom, both of whom left the game early last week against Drake.

Redshirt junior quarterback Jared Taylor, who missed last week’s game with an injury, ran just one time for 2 yards as the Eagles relied on Visperas to take nearly every snap at quarterback. Senior Michael Wortham ran once for zero yards and caught two passes for 16 yards.

Eastern’s 1-2 record – all against FCS teams – puts more pressure on the Eagles to do well in Big Sky play, which is two weeks away. Eastern wraps up nonconference play next weekend at FBS Nevada (1-3).

“We don’t need to regroup,” Best said. “We just need to play two halves of football together, and we’ll get that done sooner rather than later.”