From today’s Tribune/Vindy
Youngstown State outlasts Indiana State, 48-42
LOCAL SPORTS
OCT 15, 2022
JOEL WHETZEL
Staff writer
jwhetzel@tribtoday.com
YOUNGSTOWN — As the Youngstown State football team exits Beede Field at Stambaugh Stadium and enters its locker room, a message is displayed overhead in the tunnel: “Football is a 60-minute game.”
It took each of those 60 minutes Saturday — and an explosive day of offense, too — as the Penguins fended off a scrappy Indiana State team, 48-42, in a battle that included 90 points, 1,034 yards and 136 plays between the two teams.
“Coming in, both these teams needed a win,” said YSU coach Doug Phillips. “So it was going to be a dogfight for 60-plus minutes. … Did we plan on scoring and allowing 90 points in a football game? (No.) But you never know in the Missouri Valley — you don’t know.”
From the outset, each team made explosive plays. Indiana State (1-5, 0-3) scored on the opening play from scrimmage as Justin Dinka spun out of a tackle and raced down the sideline for a 75-yard touchdown, and then YSU (3-3, 1-2) answered with a 50-yard go route to Bryce Oliver, who caught the ball with one hand, stiff armed the defender and ran to paydirt.
From there, the shootout was on.
YSU took a 14-7 lead on a 1-yard Dra Rushton run with 5:44 left in the first quarter, a score that was set up by a 57-yard completion from Mitch Davidson to Oliver.
Perhaps just as important as the early points those deep passes provided was the ability YSU showed in stretching the field. That opened up a ground game that started sluggish before getting better as the game went along.
Youngstown State managed just 22 yards on 10 rushes in the first quarter, before gashing the Sycamores for 313 yards on the ground by game’s end.
Jaleel McLaughlin tallied 200 yards and two touchdowns — the other a 68-yard scamper — on 32 carries, while Rushton added 65 yards on11 attempts. McLaughlin became the fourth player in YSU history to tally at least three 200-yard games.
“They had to respect the passing game; they had to respect Bryce and Latrell and all that. … So those guys work day in and day out, and it’s making my job a little bit easier,” McLaughlin said.
Oliver hauled in seven passes for 143 yards and his touchdown, while Latrell Fordham had three receptions for 46 yards. Davidson completed 14 of 25 passes for 223 yards and a score.
“We have the guys that can do it,” Phillips said of stretching the field offensively. “Teams want to come up and press, and we know Bryce can go over (the top). … We’ve been talking about getting the ball downfield for the last two and a half years, so it’s exciting to see the ball getting downfield.”
Fordham’s biggest play came on a kickoff, though. After ISU had tied the game at 14-all, Fordham returned the ensuing kickoff 98 yards — the longest score in YSU history — to push Youngstown State back ahead. It was the first kickoff return for a touchdown by a Penguin since Jody Webb housed two kickoffs against the Sycamores in 2015.
Youngstown State’s biggest advantage came out of halftime. Up 35-28 after the intermission, YSU received to begin the second half and capped a 13-play, 75-yard drive with a 10-yard McLaughlin touchdown. Then, the Penguins forced and recovered a fumble on the ensuing kickoff, and parlayed that into a Colt McFadden field goal to extend the advantage to 45-28.
However, as it had all day long, the Indiana State offense had an answer.
Dinka took a pitch-pass 18 yards for a touchdown on the Sycamores’ next possession, and then ISU recovered the ensuing onside kick. ISU made it a one-score game again — 45-42 — as Cade Chambers ran in from 11 yards out with 2:25 to go in the third quarter.
Chambers, making his second start of the season at quarterback, completed 15-of-29 passes for 311 yards and three touchdowns, and added two scores on the ground. All-MVFC receiver Dante Hendrix nabbed five receptions for 117 yards, while Dakota Caton had five catches for 83 yards and two touchdowns.
Dinka, meanwhile, tallied 159 yards and a score on just 11 carries.
As a team, Indiana State racked up 498 yards of offense to YSU’s 536.
“We went into the game knowing Nos. 8, 27 and 1 (were playmakers), and who hurt you? (Nos.) 8, 27 and 1 (Hendrix, Dinka and Caton). I give them credit because I think those are very good football players,” Phillips said.
“We really just didn’t tackle that well today,” said defensive end James Jackson. “It was probably our worst game tackling, so we have to clean that up. But at the end of the day, we pulled it out and I’m proud of everybody.”
Indeed, after getting torched time after time through three quarters, the YSU defense arrived in the fourth. The Penguins forced a punt on Indiana State’s first offensive series, and then turned the ball over on downs on ISU’s final possession.
Indiana State had 84 yards of offense in the second half, and just four yards in the fourth quarter.
Jackson was critical in that, recording three sacks and supplying pressure on Chambers that ultimately forced some incompletions.
McFadden hit the second of his field goals between those two drives to bring the final score to 48-42.
“I knew we’d settle down (defensively),” Phillips said. “They had (84) yards in the second half, so the defense when we needed to stop them, we did.”
The win snapped a 3-game losing streak for YSU, which visits winless Western Illinois next week.
“We’re not close, but we’re going to enjoy this victory,” Phillips said. “This was a hard-fought Missouri Valley Conference football game. We’re going to enjoy it, and then we’ll get back and we’ll fix the things that we need to correct.”
