YSU struggles in dome away from home

October 22, 2017 at 12:10a.m.

By JIM NELSON

CEDAR FALLS, IOWA

Ninth-ranked Youngstown State got behind early, was taken out of what it does best and couldn’t protect its quarterback.

All those things factored into the Penguins dropping their third consecutive game Saturday as Northern Iowa scored a 19-14 victory over YSU in Missouri Valley Football Conference action at the UNI-Dome.

The Penguins (3-4 overall, 1-3 in MVFC) were sacked 10 times, rushed for just 47 yards on 36 carries, 201 yards below its season average, and gave up 181 rushing yards to the ninth-ranked rushing offense in the MVFC.

UNI (4-3, 3-1) never trailed as it knocked off its second-consecutive top-10 opponent in as many weeks, and YSU for the eighth consecutive time inside the UNI-Dome.

“The first half we just didn’t play great,” Penguin safety Kyle Hegedus said. “We got knocked off the ball. We gave up sacks. Overall, it was missed opportunities all over the field. The second half we rebounded, but we came out flat and paid for it.”

UNI scored on its first two drives of the game racking up 29 plays, going 158 yards and holding the ball 11 minutes and 32 seconds while taking a 10-0 lead as the Panthers did to YSU what the Penguins like to do to their opponents.

The Panthers said YSU’s 22-play, 86-yard, 11:40 scoring drive that propelled the Penguins to a 14-10 win last year at Stambaugh Stadium, was a focal point in practice leading up to the game.

“That was what we talked about during the week,” UNI head coach Mark Farley said. “You had to beat them at their strength and take their strength in the game away from them, and I thought we did that. I know we did that.”

After UNI’s fast start, YSU appeared to recover and Nathan Mays found an open Damoun Patterson deep for a 41-yard score making it 10-7 with 5:48 left to half, but the Panthers didn’t flinch.

UNI answered YSU’s touchdown with a 9-play, 79-yard drive capped off by a Marcus Weymiller 6-yard touchdown run with 3:17 left as the Panthers took a 16-7 lead into the break.

Weymiller, who rushed for 170 yards and three scores last week in a 38-18 win over South Dakota State, finished with 132 yards on 29 carries.

“Defensively we let them get a few big plays early and they feed off that,” Hegedus said.

Offensively, the Penguins occasionally put things together, but time and time again UNI would thwart a drive with a sack of either Mays (eight times) or Ricky Davis, whom had to replace Mays on several drives in the second half after Mays was injured early in the fourth quarter when he was sacked by the Panthers’ Rickey Neal.

The Penguins have now given up 22 sacks in their last three games.

YSU did make it interesting late as Davis found Alvin Bailey for a 15-yard score with 1:23 to go, but Weymiller fell on the onside kick, and the clock ran out on the Penguins.

Despite the third consecutive loss, the Penguins still feel they can attain all their goals.

“Absolutely,” Hegedus said. “Our goal is to win every week. We lost our game and it is onto the next game. We will watch this film tomorrow, and then we will move on and try to go to 1-0 next week and repeat that in the games after that and we will see what happens at the end of the year.”

YSU hosts Illinois State next week in its annual Homecoming game at Stambaugh Stadium.