UM-Western trounces Lights, 38-7

By Carl Hennell of The Montana Standard - 11/07/2004

DILLON — It was hard to single out which side of the ball was more dominant for the University of Montana-Western football team Saturday against Montana State Northern.

Sophomore quarterback Travis Blome passed for 275 yards and three touchdowns on just 10 completions, senior running back Josh Shrum ran for 95 yards and a touchdown on 14 carries and the Bulldogs' defense limited Northern to just six first downs in the second half en route to a 38-7 Frontier Conference drubbing of the winless Lights.

After Northern's sophomore quarterback Kyle Samson engineered a 15-play touchdown drive to start the game and sophomore defensive tackle Mike Tryon recovered a fumble on Western's first play from scrimmage, the Bulldogs blocked a field goal attempt and went on to score 38 unanswered points.

With 2 minutes, 7 seconds remaining in the first half, Western receiver T Artis made a great adjustment to get in front of freshman cornerback Marc Samson and break a 7-7 tie. In one-on-one coverage, Artis recovered from behind Samson to catch a 48-yard touchdown pass on the 13-yard line and run it in the rest of the way.

Northern's ensuing two-minute possession ended at the Western 1-yard line when Don Saisbury stretched for a touchdown while being knocked out of bounds with eight seconds left. He sretched and left the ball inbounds on the ground so the game clock ticked to halftime. The Northern Lights tallied five first downs in that drive, and five in their opening drive, but managed just 10 the rest of the game as the Bulldogs' defense contained Kyle Samson's option attack.

Samson finished with 80 yards rushing on 23 carries and another 229 yards passing, completing 23 of 32 attempts. The UM Grizzly transfer

See WESTERN, Page B3

is the league's second-best offensive threat in total offense behind Carroll College quarterback Tyler Emmert, the defending national player of the year. In the second half, Samson had just 24 yards on 11 carries while completing 6-of-11 passes for 93 yards — including one completion for 42 yards.

"This is what our defense is capable of doing week in and week out," Western's senior defensive end Ruley Stingley said. "I was more surprised with how many first downs they were getting than how many first downs we held them to in the second half. We just played to our capability in the second half.

"We feel our defense is an elite defense and if we are going to think that we are going to have to show it. We didn't show it in the first half, but came out in the second and made a statement."

Stingley had two sacks in the second half and the Bulldogs sacked Samson five times, all told. Senior linebacker Bryan Arntson led the 'Dogs with 14 tackles. Junior linebacker Kawai Curnan had 10 tackles. Senior linebacker Zach Tune, who didn't play in the first half for disciplinary reasons, recorded eight tackles and a sack. Tackle Jerome Hess and end Nick Rewerts had five tackles and a sack apiece.

"We didn't do as good in the first half, but we made the right adjustments in the second," Tune said. "They kept edging us on those crossing patterns with trips receivers. We just adjusted our linebackers' drops in coverage."

But the Bulldogs' offense was just as lethal.

Of Blome's 10 completions, seven went for more than 23 yards as he picked apart Northern's man-to-man coverage. He was 5-of-7 for 141 yards in the third quarter alone in expanding a 14-7 lead to 31-7 in just 15 plays. He then capped the Bulldogs' final drive of the third quarter, which actually went into the fourth quarter, with a 1-yard touchdown plunge for his fourth touchdown of the game.

"It just boiled down to us making the plays," Western coach Tommy Lee said. "We executed a lot better than we have been."

Western improved to 6-4 overall on the season and will finish the regular season next week at home against future Frontier foe Eastern Oregon, which beat the Bulldogs at home last season. The Bulldogs concluded their Frontier schedule with a 6-2 record. If two-time defending national champion Carroll College beats Montana Tech next weekend, there will be a three-way tie for the conference title. With the tiebreaker determined by points allowed against common opponents, Western needs Tech to score 74 points and lose for another tiebreaker to enter the equation.

The Northern Lights are 0-10 overall and 0-7 in the Frontier.

MSU-N 7 0 0 0 — 7

UM-W 7 7 17 7 — 38

First Quarter

MSU-N — Kyle Samson 11 run (Chris Nagel kick), 7:06 (15 plays, 81 yards; key plays: scoring play on 3rd-and-7, Don Saisbury 1 run on 3rd-and-1 to UM-W 41, Jeff Brandon 7 pass from Samson on 3rd-and-6 to MSU-N 49)

UM-W — Dallas Mock 24 pass from from Travis Blome (Eric Zahler kick), 1:44 (6 plays, 77 yards; key plays: scoring play, T Artis 32 pass from Blome to MSU-N 23)

Second Quarter

UM-W — T Artis 48 pass from Blome (Zahler kick), 2:07 (2 plays 73 yards; key play: scoring play)

Third Quarter

UM-W — Blome 1 run (Zahler kick), 14:05 (3 plays, 72 yards; key play: Kyle Hannah 59 pass from Blome to MSU-N 1)

UM-W — Josh Illig 14 pass from Blome (Zahler kick), 8:16 (5 plays, 50 yards; key play: Illig 33 pass from Blome to MSU-N 14 on 3rd-and-7)

UM-W — Zahler 32 FG, 4:55 (6 plays, 33 yards; key plays: Don Saisbury 19 punt to MSU-N 33, Josh Shrum 12 run to MSU-N 15)

Fourth Quarter

UM-W — Josh Shrum 5 run (Zahler kick), 13:10 (8 plays, 67 yards; key play: Shrum 30 run to MSU-N 36)

MSU-N UM-W

First Downs 20 17

Total Yards 386 446

Rushes-Yards 47-154 36-171

Passing 275 232

Punt Ret. 1-5 3-43

KO Ret. 4-57 2-15

Int. Ret. 0-0 0-0

Comp-Att-Int 10-15-0 24-35-0

Sacked-Yards Lost 5-26 0-0

Punts 6-36.2 3-39.3

Fumbles-Lost 0-0 2-1

Penalties-Yards 9-75 6-65

INDIVIDUAL STATISTICS

RUSHING — MSU-N, Kyle Samson 23-80, Cody Nickel 10-35, Don Saisbury 9-27, Todd Nelson 4-9, Adrian Largetn 1-3. UM-W, Josh Shrum 14-95, Caleb Drinkwalter 14-50, Tyler Cress 4-12, Travis Blome 3-11, Keali'i Perbera 1-3.

PASSING — MSU-N, Samson 23-32-0-229, Saisbury 1-1-0-3, Neill Crandell 0-2-0-0. UM-W, Blome 10-14-0-275, Perbera 0-1-0-0.

RECEIVING — MSU-N, Saisbury 6-74, Nick Arnold 6-64, Nickel 4-17, Danny Wirtzberger 3-17, Clint Herrera 2-47, Jeff Brandon 1-7, Samson 1-3, Dugan Kanta 1-3. UM-W, Josh Illig 4-76, T Artis 2-80, Kyle Hannah 1-59, Kevin Staley 1-31, Dallas Mock 1-24, Drinkwalter 1-5.

Missed Field Goals — MSU-N, Nagel 35 (BLK). UM-W, Zahler 25 (BLK).