WEST LIBERTY, W.Va. – An injury-riddled West Liberty University football team hung with Glenville State for the better part of three quarters here Thursday night only to see the high-powered Pioneers pull away down the stretch for a 41-14 victory under the lights at West Family Stadium.
Trailing 24-14 at the half, Coach Roger Waialae’s Hilltoppers (4-6, 4-5) opened the second half with back-to-back defensive stops but were unable to put together a sustained scoring drive behind a patchwork offensive line.
Glenville (7-3, 6-3), which leads the Mountain East Conference and ranks among the nation’s top NCAA Division II teams in total offense on the season, got the ball back and chewed more than 6 ½ minutes off the clock before QB Dante Roberts scooted into the end zone from 3 yards out to make it 31-14 in the final minute of the third quarter.
Any hopes of a West Liberty comeback were dashed when the Hilltoppers fumbled the ensuing kickoff and the Pioneers recovered on the WLU 27. TB Tevin Drake scored from 2 yards out on the first snap of the fourth quarter for a 38-14 Glenville lead. Chandler Carrera tacked on a 29-yard field goal with 5:40 remaining to conclude the scoring.
“Glenville’s a good football team, a playoff-caliber football team, and they did what good football teams do,” Waialae said. “They knew we had to move guys around and bring some new guys into the mix because of all the injuries on our offensive line so they did what they could to exploit that.
“It’s a little hard to take because the offensive line has really been the strength of our football team for most of the season but you can’t lose 8 guys in a two- or three-week span and not be affected.”
Not only did the Hilltoppers have a difficult time moving the football Thursday night, they had a hard time getting their hands on the ball at all.
Glenville State rolled up a whopping 42:07-17:53 advantage in time of possession over the course of the evening and the difference was even more marked down the stretch. West Liberty had the ball for only 5 ½ minutes in the second half as the defense ultimately ran out of gas.
“It forces you to make a choice,” Waialae said. “When you have to keep a back in the backfield to help out with pass protection, you’re freeing up the defense to double-team all the receivers. If you don’t keep an extra blocker in, your quarterback may not have enough time for the pattern to develop. It’s up to us as a coaching staff now to get something going offensively with the new guys up front.
“Defensively we have to do a better job of getting off the field on third down and we have to start making plays on the ball. We had some opportunities for turnovers tonight and didn’t make the plays. We need some guys to step up.”
Glenville drew first blood with a 26-yard TD pass from Roberts to TE Jake Harper at the 11:35 mark of the first quarter.
West Liberty tied the game at 7-7 on a 16-play, 66-yard touchdown drive capped by TB Jeremiah Ortiz’s dive into the end zone from a yard out with 6:34 on the first quarter clock.
The Pioneers struck back less than 2 minutes later when Roberts hit WR Damon Lampkin in stride for a 50-yard touchdown. Holder Alfonso Medina bobbled the snap on the PAT but eluded one tackler and sprinted into the end zone for a 2-point conversion and a 15-7 lead.
Glenville pushed the margin to 24-7 in the second quarter when Roberts hit WR Ralph Gordon with a 19-yard TD pass and Carrera connected on a 33-yard field goal but WLU got back in the game just before halftime when Conwell found WR Max Kapron on the back line of the end zone for a 17-yard TD and a 24-14 halftime score.
Conwell completed 17-of-28 passes for 162 yards while running for a team-high 35 yards on 9 carries. Senior TE Daree Goodwin led the receiving corps with 62 yards on 3 catches. The Hilltoppers had 4 turnovers, converted 5-of-12 third downs and were penalized 12 times for 103 yards.
Roberts completed 30-of-40 passes for 338 yards and 3 TDs. Lampkin led all receivers with 7 catches for 106 yards. The Pioneers’ TB tandem of Tevin Drake and Rahmann Lee combined for 139 rushing yards on 38 carries. Glenville lost one fumble, converted 11-of-20 third downs and went 2-for-2 on fourth down but was flagged 15 times for a staggering 208 penalty yards.
West Liberty wraps up the regular season on the road Nov. 14 with a 1 p.m. kickoff at West Virginia State.
