Senior day is normally a day for seniors to play their last game in Welch Stadium and reflect back on their careers. Saturday was not a day the Emporia State football team wants to remember, but one they’d rather forget in a 42-14 thrashing by Northwest Missouri State.
“It’s been a good senior class, but it’s definitely been a year that’s hurt us,” said Garin Higgins, head coach. “I really could not be more proud of the way they come to work each and every day and there have been a lot of things that haven’t gone our way, but we’ve stuck together.”
After a 35-0 deficit hung over the Hornets’ heads at half time, they came out firing on all cylinders in the second half. They put a nine play drive together that was capped off by a one yard touchdown run by sophomore quarterback and chemistry major Ty Reasnor.
After the score, the Hornets surprised everyone in attendance with an onside kick. Four plays later Antonio Brown, running back, scored on a six yard rush, and for a brief moment it looked like ESU had a chance to do the impossible and climb back into it, down only three touchdowns with nearly a quarter and a half remaining. Northwest Missouri State quickly put any hope the Hornets had to bed with a 14 play 78 yard touchdown drive with only five seconds remaining in the third quarter, ending the scoring for the day, at 42-14.
The third down struggles continued again for the Hornets, after going just 2-9 last week they were just 3-15 this week making the third down conversion rate to just 5-24 over the last two weeks. That’s just over 20 percent.
“I don’t know that there’s really any rhyme or reason for struggling on third down. We just gotta avoid putting ourselves in third and long situations,” Reasnor said. “That’s every offense’s goal is to make things third and manageable and we have to do a better job on first and second down. If you look at our drives they’re real short and choppy, and we’re not hitting on our big plays.”
The struggling offense for ESU told the story for this game. They gained just 204 yards on 65 plays, which is only a net gain of 3.1 yards per play. Meanwhile, Northwest had 479 offensive yards, running 84 plays, which is a net gain of 5.7 yards per play. ESU also had to punt nine times. ESU had 297 yards punting versus 204 total yards offense.
While ESU’s season hopes for a winning record are now behind them, they do have one game left on the schedule that they hope to win for a strong finish.
“It’s a pride thing at this point,” said Austin Willis, senior wide receiver and recreation major. “I’m not gonna give up for those younger guys because after next week it’s over for us seniors and we’re going to give it all we have.”
The Hornets will finish the season at Nebraska-Kearney, with a 1 p.m. kick off.