Box Score SALEM, Ore. – It was a tale of two halves for both teams in Oregon with a rare Friday night college football game as Willamette University held off a surging East Texas Baptist (1-2) team 38-24. Willamette scored the majority of their points in the first half with a 21-point second quarter taking a 28-3 lead at the half but East Texas Baptist roared back in the second half outscoring the Bearcats, 21-10.
Down 25 points at the half, 28-3, East Texas Baptist put together two strong quarters to take the second half. The Tigers scored a safety and touchdown in the third quarter for eight points and then added 13 more points in the fourth quarter to pull within 11 points with seven minutes to go in the game.
Seth Hubbard and Kwame' Spikes set career highs, again, in week three of the season. Hubbard threw for 317 yards completing 29-of-52 passes for two touchdowns. Spikes was Hubbard's go-to receiver grabbing 14 catches for 157 yards and two touchdowns all for career highs.
East Texas Baptist and Willamette were even across the board in every offensive category as they both averaged 2.4 yards per rush, 4.7 yards per pass, and was just 35 seconds difference in time of possession. East Texas Baptist had 24 first downs and Willamette produced 25 first downs and both teams had five turnovers.
For the third week in a row, Collin Bieschke brought in an interception as the defense had two sacks, too, from Jordan Hayes and Ja'Kory Hunter. Jordan Hayes led the team with 11 tackles and Mark Gray followed with nine tackles. Hunter nabbed the quarterback for one of the two sacks on the night for East Texas Baptist.
Willamette struck first with seven minutes left in the first quarter, when Josh Dean lofted a pass to Jake Weischedel from seven-yards out. Almost seven minutes later, the Bearcats struck again on a Dyrell Jones two-yard pass as Willamette jumped out to a 14-0 lead. With 10:35 left in the second quarter, Brian Nolan split the uprights for East Texas Baptist as they cut the lead to 11, 14-3. Over the next 10 minutes, Willamette would find the endzone, twice, on two passes from Mead that were 19-yards and 16-yards for the 28-3 advantage.
It was a different team the second half for East Texas Baptist they put up 21 points. Roy Denbow was the first Tiger to cross the plain with 6:11 left to play and then the defense picked up two points on a safety to make it 35-11.
In the fourth quarter, with the help of the defense forcing five overall fumbles, East Texas Baptist added two touchdowns at 14:20 and 12:55. Spikes was on the receiving end of both passes from Hubbard with an eight-yard pass and a 27-yard pass to move within 11, 35-24. Willamette hit a field goal with one minute left in the game to put the final score 38-24.
East Texas Baptist University will have a bye week next week before opening up ASC play vs. Texas Lutheran in Sequin, Texas, on September 29th.
