By Jim Henry
jhenry@joplinglobe.com
Two plays within a two-minute span midway through the second half summarized Missouri Southern’s frustration during its 23-0 homecoming loss to Washburn on Saturday afternoon.
The Lions, trailing 10-0 in the final minute of the third period, crossed midfield on Adam Hinspeter’s 19-yard completion to Stephen Poston — the Lions’ longest play of the game. But Washburn cornerback Freddie Lavan forced a fumble as he tackled Poston, and Brad Cole recovered for the Ichabods.
In the first minute of the last period, the Ichabods’ third-down snap was low, and as quarterback Jake Iverson reached to pick up the ball, the Lions’ Skyler Vandiver, who made a game-high 12 tackles, dived in an attempt to get the ball. Iverson’s helmet came flying off, and Vandiver was flagged for a facemask.
Instead of the Ichabods punting from their 33 into a 14 mph wind, they had a first down. Washburn punted four plays later, pinning the Lions at their 4.
“That was kind of the story of the day as a team,” Lions head coach Bart Tatum said.
Both teams exhibited strong defenses as the Lions netted a season-low 203 yards on offense and the Ichabods had 254 yards, their second-lowest total.
The Lions recorded eight tackles for loss, including 1.5 by both Vandiver and linebacker Dusty Bratzler.
The biggest difference, however, was Washburn returned two interceptions for touchdowns.
Cole, a wide receiver who’s been moved to outside linebacker because of injuries, grabbed a ball that bounced off MSSU receiver Fred Smith’s chest and returned it 30 yards for a score with 4:43 left in the first quarter.
Safety Casey Curran, who led the Ichabods with 10 tackles, returned a pick 58 yards for a touchdown and a 16-0 lead with 5:38 remaining in the game.
“Our defense played championship football,” Tatum said. “We gave up the late touchdown (on Justin Cooper’s 16-yard run with 1:37 left), but you couldn’t pin 10 points on our defense at the most. That’s a great effort against a good team like Washburn. There were 23 points on the board, but 14 of those were ours offensively.”
“Whenever you can get a shutout, it’s great,” head coach Craig Schurig said after Washburn’s first shutout since 2004. “Our defense has been playing well, and we’ve been riding that defense. The defense came up with big plays, plus we won the field-position battle.
Poor field position plagued the Lions from start to finish. The Lions’ five first-half possessions began at or inside the 20-yard line, and five consecutive drives during the second half started at the 10, 13, 2, 4 and 21.
“We started a lot of drives with a long field,” Lions wide receiver Johnny Johnson said, “whereas last week (in a 19-18 victory over Emporia State), we started drives on the plus side of the field. It looked like we weren’t getting anything on offense ... we’d get three first downs and self-destruct and we’d only be at midfield. If we started at midfield, we could be in field-goal range or getting ready to score.”
The Lions netted 20 yards rushing on 24 attempts as Hinspeter was sacked four times for minus-26 yards.
Hinspeter completed 25 of 45 passes for 183 yards, but 18 of his completions gained less than 10 yards, including eight for five yards or less.
“We have a lot of speed at the wide receiver position, and they came out playing a lot of cover-7, playing off our players,” said Johnson, who snared nine passes for 80 yards. “They didn’t want to give up the deep ball. We just took what they gave us, and we couldn’t really get it going.”
“We tried to stretch it, but we just didn’t have the appropriate schemes and/or people to do it,” Tatum said. “We tried to stretch it horizontally, we tried to stretch it vertically, and they were better than we were defensively to our offense.”
Cooper gained 109 yards on 21 carries while seeing extended action for the Ichabods. Brandon Walker, Washburn’s top running back this season, had 29 yards on 10 attempts and did not return after getting his leg twisted on a tackle in the pile on Washburn’s first play of the second quarter.
