{"id":12425,"date":"2014-09-05T14:59:40","date_gmt":"2014-09-05T19:59:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/?p=12425"},"modified":"2014-10-20T16:59:35","modified_gmt":"2014-10-20T21:59:35","slug":"the-tiger-football-team-falls-to-uco-in-season-opener","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/?p=12425","title":{"rendered":"The Tiger football team falls to UCO in season opener"},"content":{"rendered":"

It was seemingly the little things that cost the Fort Hays State University football team their season opener of 2014 to the University of Central Oklahoma, 26-7.<\/p>\n

The Tigers offense was out of sync, recording just nine first downs compared to the 23 by Central Oklahoma, they were 4-of-11 on third downs compared to the 12-of-21 by the Bronchos and the 45 plays ran by the Tigers was almost half of the 81 ran by UCO. The Tiger offense had two turnovers the defense did not put any pressure on Central Oklahoma.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey put points on the board, got third down conversions and we didn\u2019t do any of that stuff on offense,\u201d said head football coach Chris Brown.<\/p>\n

The Tiger’s offense did not even cross into the endzone once as the only points the Tigers were able to muster came on an 89 yard kickoff return for a touchdown late in the third quarter by DeAndre James, defensive back, Tampa, Fla., sophomore.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe things we did on the field tonight are not who we are,\u201d Brown said. \u201cWe\u2019re a much better football team than what we put on the field.\u201d<\/p>\n

That Tiger offense that only gained 181 yards was sluggish from their first possession of the game, whether it was the near interception on the first pass by Treveon Albert, quarterback, Atlanta, Ga., junior or the three penalties on the drive that put it in a stand still.<\/p>\n

\u201cOur timing was horrible,\u201d Brown said.<\/p>\n

The Tiger defense which was on the field for most of the game, over twice as long as the Broncho defense, gave up 489 yards.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe just got to come back and tighten up the loose ends on defense,\u201d said Daniel Lindsey, defensive back, Inkster, Mich., junior.<\/p>\n

The long amount of time spent on the field started from the first quarter, which led to Central Oklahoma scoring on the first play of the second quarter, taking advantage of the tired defense of the Tigers with a reverse pass back to UCO quarterback Chas Stallard out of the wildcat formation for a touchdown pass to Connor Pulley.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a learning experience,\u201d Lindsey said.<\/p>\n

Lindsey was a leader for the Tigers in the opener, as he was one of four Tigers to have 11 tackles.<\/p>\n

\u201cI felt good, I was just trying to contribute any way that I could,\u201d Lindsey said.<\/p>\n

After a rough first quarter by Albert, backup Kevin Spain, quarterback, Scottsdale, Ariz., junior was brought in the game to try to ignite the offense.<\/p>\n

On his first drive as a Fort Hays State Tiger, Spain would hit Ed Williams, wide receiver, Tampa, Fla., senior for 38 yards and hit Isaiah Maix, wide receiver, Kansas City, Mo., sophomore over the middle for 18 yards to put the Tigers deep into Central Oklahoma territory, but the very next play James Sullivan, running back, Colorado Springs, Colo., red shirt freshman fumbled the ball inside the 5 yard line and the drive stopped.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe didn\u2019t react very well to it. When you face adversity are you going to fold your tents and be done, or fight back and battle?\u201d Brown said. \u201cWe lost a little momentum.\u201d<\/p>\n

Central Oklahoma took a 14-0 lead a little under half way into the second quarter with an 11 yard touchdown run by Stallard on third down.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe got to find a way to get ourselves off the field,\u201d Brown said.<\/p>\n

The second half was much the same for the Tigers, Albert did make the start in the second half after not seeing a snap in the second quarter and would stay in the game until leaving with an apparent hand injury in the fourth quarter.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe figured we\u2019d try to run the ball a bit, that\u2019s why we wanted to stick with (Albert) him,\u201d Brown said.<\/p>\n

The only points for the Tigers came with them already down 20-0 on James\u2019 89 yard kickoff return for a touchdown.<\/p>\n

\"James'<\/a>
James’ 89 yard kick return for a touchdown was the first kick return by a Tiger since 2009.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n <\/p>\n

\u201cI seen the hole and took advantage of it,\u201d James said.<\/p>\n

The loss puts the Tigers at 0-1 as they gave up 100 yards to two different ball carriers.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey got to figure out what their identity is and what they\u2019re going to do next,\u201d Brown said.<\/p>\n

Albert finished the game 4-of-9 for 24 yards while Spain was 3-of-13 for 65 yards with one interception. Stallard for UCO finished the game 15-of-23 for 204 yards. Stallard as well had 107 yards on the ground with one score.<\/p>\n

The Tigers were never able to get a running game together as both Spain and Kenneth Iheme, running back, Wichita, sophomore led the way with 22 yards on the ground.<\/p>\n

The Tigers look to regroup next as they prepare to take the trip to Tahlequah, Okla. for the first time since Northeastern State joined the MIAA and take on the Riverhawks for the MIAA Game of the Week. Kickoff is set for 2 pm.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It was seemingly the little things that cost the Fort Hays State University football team their season opener of 2014 to the University of Central… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[3387],"tags":[2796,1629,1624,604,2840,2519,2313,1620,2543,2475,181,1979,481,2839],"class_list":["post-12425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-football-sports","tag-daniel-lindsey","tag-deandre-james","tag-ed-williams","tag-fhsu-athletics","tag-fhsu-season-opener","tag-fort-hays-state-football","tag-head-coach-chris-brown","tag-isaiah-maxi","tag-kenneth-iheme","tag-kevin-spain","tag-miaa","tag-tiger-athletics","tag-treveon-albert","tag-university-of-central-oklahoma"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12425"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12444,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12425\/revisions\/12444"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tigermedianet.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}