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| Matt Padilla |
Throughout the 2006 season, the Miner offense has generated the headlines while the defense has batted with inconsistency.
On Saturday, the roles were reversed somewhat as the defensive unit shut out Austin Peay in the second half, allowing the Miners to come away with a 21-14 win over the Governors at Allgood-Bailey Stadium.
With the game tied at 14 heading into the second half, the Miners held the Governors to 86 yards of total offense in the second half of play with the longest drive covering just 29 yards. That was enough to allow the offense to get the one score it needed to decide the game, as Joe Winters hit freshman wideout Chad Shockley with a seven-yard scoring pass midway through the third quarter for the go-ahead score.
Early in the contest, the offense missed two golden opportunities to score. Kevis Buckley fumbled away the opening kickoff to the Miners at the APSU 23, putting the Miners in scoring position right away. However, the drive stalled at the six and then Tim Valencia's 29-yard field goal attempt was blocked.
UMR drove back into the Governors' red zone again on its next possession, but Valencia had another field goal attempt blocked to leave the game scoreless. The Miners did get points on their next possession, however, as they drove 59 yards for a score when Winters connected with Brandon Landry on a six-yard scoring pass with 1:30 left in the opening quarter.
Austin Peay had its most productive quarter of the day against the Miner defense in the second period, racking up 173 yards and both of its touchdowns. The Governors got on the scoreboard on a one-yard scoring run by Chris Fletcher, then completed a 93-yard scoring drive the next time they got the ball when Lanis Frederick caught a 19-yard scoring pass from Mark Cunningham.
UMR answered the Governors' scoring drive with one of their own, taking advantage of a good kickoff return by Ashton Gronewold and three complete passes from Winters to set up a four-yard scoring run by Matt Padilla to tie the game with 2:26 remaining in the half.
The Miners marched into Governor territory again to open the second half, but an interception in the end zone on a fourth down play ended that drive. But after the defense forced a three-and-out for APSU, the Miners started what turned out to be the decisive drive of the contest.
A 20-yard completion to Mike Greaving put UMR in Austin Peay territory, then Winters had a 15-yard run to move the Miners inside the Governors' 10-yard line. Three plays later, Winters hit a sliding Shockley in the front of the end zone for the go-ahead score.
The Governors moved into UMR territory twice in their final three drives, but were forced to punt on the first one and then couldn't take advantage of a 33-yard punt return by Frederick on the final drive.
Fletcher managed to get a first down on a fourth-and-one play to keep the drive going, but the UMR defense denied the Governors another set of downs after that. Faced with a fourth-and-five, the Miners forced an incompletion on a pass from Cunningham to Jon Sanders and were able to get one first down in order to run the clock out.
Winters, who ended up as UMR's leading rusher in the game with 48 yards, completed 29 of 44 passes for 265 yards and increased his seasonal touchdown total to 26 with the two scoring passes. Landry caught 10 of the passes for 68 yards, while Gronewold, who is second in NCAA Division II in receptions, hauled in seven balls on the afternoon. The seven catches by Gronewold allowed him to break the UMR career record for receptions that was previously held by Bob Somerville; the Miners' junior wideout now has 163 catches in his time at UMR.
However, Gronewold did not score a touchdown in the game and saw his streak of games with at least one score end at 10.
Defensively, linebackers Garyion Turner and Justin Butler made eight tackles apiece, while Brian Jordan picked off a pass that set the Miners up on their initial scoring drive in the first quarter.
UMR, 3-4 on the season, will play host to Southern Nazarene next Saturday for Homecoming. Game time will be at 1 p.m. at Allgood-Bailey Stadium.
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