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| Joey Stutzman had a big day in UW-La Crosse's come-from-behind win against UW-Oshkosh. d3photography.com file photo by Ryan Coleman |
UW-La Crosse scored the final 23 points of the game to rally from a two-touchdown deficit and knock off UW-Oshkosh, while Linfield rolled a ranked opponent, Cortland registered a big Empire 8 win, Carnegie Mellon knocked off a ranked opponent and many, many people made it to Whitewater, Wisconsin, on Saturday.
No. 9 UW-Oshkosh took a 21-7 lead at UW-La Crosse, but the No. 20 Eagles righted the ship in the second half and pulled away to a 30-21 victory. UW-La Crosse held the ball for all but 10:22 of the second half. The most epic of those drives was the one in which the Eagles took the lead, as La Crosse went 50 yards in 17 plays, burning up 7:43 of the fourth quarter and ended in a short Ryan Beirne field goal. So when the Titans (3-1, 1-1) got the ball back and faced fourth-and-1 at their own 34, they went for it, and Kobe Berghammer's sneak was stuffed, turning the ball over. La Crosse put the game away on a drive that was basically all Joey Stutzman. Stutzman finished with 32 carries for 156 yards and three touchdowns in the win. It's the first time UW-La Crosse has started WIAC play 2-0 since 2017.
Linfield roared out to a 35-0 halftime lead and the No. 7 Wildcats cruised, rolling past No. 18 Whitworth 42-7. The Pirates managed a late touchdown against Linfield backups to avoid the shutout. Wyatt Smith threw for four touchdowns and ran for another and Connor McNabb ran for a touchdown and caught a touchdown pass in the win. Travis Swanson had two tackles for loss, two pass breakups and one and a half sacks for the Wildcats.
No. 3 UW-Whitewater drew the ninth-largest recorded crowd in NCAA Division III football history, and they saw the Warhawks take it to UW-Platteville as the home team moved to 5-0 with a 65-21 victory. A crowd of 15,406 fans was recorded, the first game with 11,000 or more fans since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic. Three of the top 10 games in Division III football attendance are UW-Whitewater home games. Six are Johnnie-Tommie games and the other is the 2019 Cortaca Jug game, played at MetLife Stadium, a game for which 45,161 tickets were sold. The Warhawks (5-0, 2-0 WIAC) piled up 630 yards of offense, including 296 on the ground and 334 through the air, and Max Meylor threw for a career-high 313 yards on 22-of-27 passing with four touchdowns.
Cortland scored the game's final 31 points, 28 in the second half, and the No. 19 Red Dragons remained unbeaten with a 31-10 win over visiting Brockport in Empire 8 action. Brockport led 10-0 and kept Cortland off the scoreboard and the offense off the field for most of the first half. The Golden Eagles drove 75 yards on the game's first series, capped by Jala Coad's 4-yard TD run, to take a 7-0 lead, and Nate Wigent hit a 30-yard field goal with 3:01 left in the second quarter to extend the guests' lead. Cortland, which entered the game averaging more than 50 points per game, had its first three series end with an interception and two punts. Following Wigent's field goal, the Red Dragons began a drive on their own 16-yard line. The Red Dragons converted a pair of third downs, then picked up 15 yards on a pass interference penalty and 33 yards on a deep pass from Brees Segala to Derek Cruz to set up first and goal at the Brockport 6-yard line. Following three incomplete passes, one of which was almost picked off in the end zone, the Red Dragons settled for a Nick Guglielmo 23-yard field goal with 23 seconds left and Cortland trailed 10-3 at halftime. The Red Dragons shifted their offensive approach on the first possession of the third quarter to feature more planned rushes by Segala, and his scramble helped him find Ky'Sawn Veale for a 45-yard touchdown to tie the game at 10-10 and help the Red Dragons start to pull away.
Tre Vasiliadis ran for 163 yards and two touchdowns and Carnegie Mellon picked off three passes and got a special teams score as well in rolling past No. 24 Westminster (Pa.) 34-10. Carnegie Mellon outgained Westminster 329-267 while holding the Titans six yards rushing. A snap over the Westminster punter's head sailed into the end zone and Tartan freshman Parker Owens scooped the ball up for the touchdown to make the lead 21-10.
Blaine Hawkins threw for 503 yards, more than half of them to Tanner Schminke, as Central took it to Coe 55-21. Hawkins broke the school record, one he set just three weeks ago, and did so by halftime, by which time he had 428 yards. Hawkins finished 32-for-43 passing with six TDs and no interceptions, which Schminke caught 12 passes for 255 yards and three scores.
"Tanner had a great day," coach Jeff McMartin said. "He made a lot of big catches and had some great runs after the catch. We're not a team that people can just focus on one guy to shut down. You have to give Blaine Hawkins a lot of credit. He's great about getting the ball to the right people, against the right look. And he's not locked in on one receiver. He's got a lot of weapons out there to get the ball to and an offensive line that gives them time. That's all you can really ask for."
No. 10 Delaware Valley scored 42 straight points and ran away from King's for a 48-15 home victory. Daquan Bohannan threw for four touchdowns and ran for two more, and Michael Nobile had three and a half sacks for the Aggies.
Top-ranked North Central had little trouble with the team with which it was sharing first place in the CCIW. The Cardinals scored the first 33 points of the game and scored touchdowns on seven of their first eight possessions, rolling past Carthage 64-13. The Firebirds (3-2, 3-1) have losses to the No. 1 and No. 3 teams in the country, and have averaged 53 points per game in the rest of the games. North Central (5-0, 4-0) gained a season-high 353 passing yards while running for 286 and owning a nearly 15-minute advantage in time of possession. Luke Lehnen completed 18 of 25 passes while also running for 30 yards on eight carries in the win.