By Adam Teut
One week after barely escaping Midland Lutheran, the Morningside College football team found themselves in another lopsided home victory as they tore up the Doane Tigers 78-14. The team, now 8-0, is ranked nationally in the NAIA at the number four spot. The 78 points was the highest scoring day in college history since way back when in the 1930’s.

The potent Mustang offense was led by the arm of Tim Richard, who threw for 339 yards on 21 connections out of 22 passes thrown. This set the new record for single-game passing accuracy mark at 95.5-percent breaking the mark of 84.2-percent set earlier this year by him. It was a performance which earned him GPAC Offensive Player of the Week honors.

Richard connected on three of six touchdown passes in the first quarter. The first wasa 10-yard dump to Jake Peterson, and after a Brett Nickolite interception return from 34 yards out for a touchdown and a Doane 77 yard TD pass, he connected with Beau Kildow, who is a finalist for the William V. Campbell Trophy, for a 27 yard score. Taking advantage of the short field, the Mustangs finished a 19-yard drive with a one-yard Peterson touchdown, and a one play, 24- yard drive on the legs of Chad Buchholz with the pass from Richard. It was 34-7 at the end of the first.

The second quarter was studded with scores including an eight-yard run from Kildow, a 14-yard hook-up between Richard and Brad Norwood, a 25-yard pass to Buchholz, and a 36-yard field goal off the foot of CJ Gradoville. The defense allowed one 76-yard touchdown pass in the beginning of the second, but stepped it up to cause the Tigers to punt twice more and an interception made by Mike Buckley. At half time the score was 58-14.

Morningside came out strong in the second half with Richard connecting with Buchholz twice on consecutive plays for an opening score on passes of 51 yards and 17 yards. The Tiger’s opening drive was stopped by Marshall Barney and John Kirwan making the stop on third down for a fourth and nine punt situation. Both teams would end their next drives by punting, but Joe Don Hunter led the next Mustang drive finally making it into the zone from two yards out, 71-14.

The next and final score would come from Jared Goforth who picked up a fumble forced by Justin Shideler and ran it in 31 yards to make the final score 78-14. The defense would get the ball back for the offense for the last time after Taylor Smith brought down an interception in the endzone for a touchback with seven seconds left to play.

Hunter led the rushing attack with 103 total yards, and his second 100-yard game of the season. Kildow tied the career touchdown record at 34 as he caught seven passes for a total of 98 yards. Also, his touchdown reception for 27 yards was his 33rd touchdown reception, a school career record. Peterson broke and set the single season rushing touchdown record at 16 and is closing in on the single season touchdown mark of 22 as he currently leads in scoring with 20 touchdowns so far this season.

Gradoville is also closing in on a record. With one more field goal he could tie the career record of 31. Buchholz had a career day with six catches for 141 yards and three scores. Punters Kane Kuehl and Peter Olsen both had long punts of 41 yards on the day. Nickolite led the defense with five solo tackles and three assists. Austin Todd and Justin Shideler stepped up later in the game with seven and six total tackles, respectively. Justin Taylor, Barney, Matt Muschall, and Buckley all totaled four tackles on the day.

It certainly was a solid performance minus a pair of Tiger touchdown passes for the Mustangs as they gear up for the final two games of the regular season: a cross town battle on Memorial Field against rivals, Briar Cliff, and was has been slated as the GPAC Championship versus Sioux Falls in two weeks. The Mustangs will looked to follow up last year’s big win over the Chargers and hopefully top the 2008 73-8 performance this Saturday. (Nov. 5)