By FHSU SPORTS INFORMATION
Fort Hays State rolled to a 72-0 shutout of Lincoln University on Saturday (Sept. 18) at Lewis Field Stadium to pick up its first win of 2021. The Tigers jumped out to a 37-0 lead by halftime and tacked on another 35 in the second half. They posted their first shutout of an opponent since a 58-0 win over Northeastern State in Hays in 2018. FHSU is now 1-2 on the season, while Lincoln dropped to 0-2.
The scoring extravaganza for the Tigers started off a bit slow with only one touchdown in the first quarter, courtesy of Adrian Soto on a one-yard touchdown plunge on fourth and goal. Early in the second quarter the Tigers picked up two more points when Lincoln, pinned up against its own goal line, snapped the ball over their punter’s head for a safety.
From that point the Tigers went on to score nine more touchdowns, including four in the second quarter, three in the third, and two in the fourth. Soto had two more touchdown runs of three yards and one yard to account for three of the first half scores. He finished with the first 100-yard rushing game of his career, right on the mark, on 13 carries. Irick McDonald hauled in a 5-yard touchdown pass from Chance Fuller, and Alex Schremmer hauled in a 29-yard strike from Fuller in the endzone as time expired in the first half.
In the third quarter, Fuller took a ball into the endzone from two yards out, Voshon Waiters had a six-yard touchdown run, and Waiters found Calvin Stapp for a 15-yard touchdown pass. In the fourth quarter, Toronto King had a nine-yard touchdown run and Clay Robinson plunged into the endzone from one yard out. The Tigers finished with seven rushing touchdowns for the night spread around to five different players. Tristan Tucker and Robinson each rushed for 65 yards on top of Soto’s 100. As a team the Tigers finished with 311 yards on the ground, their most in a game since 2019 when the rambled for 370 against Northeastern State.
Fuller, NCAA Division II’s pass yards leader entering the game, did not have to put up big numbers through the air with the ground game chewing up yards. He finished with 210 passing yards, completing 13 of 17 attempts. Manny Ramsey was the top Tiger receiver with 114 yards on six catches. Tucker had 60 receiving yards in the game and led the Tigers in all-purpose yards with 125 for the night.
The Tigers distributed tackling evenly throughout the squad in the shutout effort. Layke Heimerman and Sam Brandt tied for a team-high five tackles each, while Jhimon Preston, Mason Perez, and Javaris Sanders all had four. FHSU held Lincoln to just eight first downs, including just one in the second half. FHSU held LU to just 167 total yards, while producing 621 on the offensive side of the ball.
The Tigers head on the road next week to Missouri Southern on Saturday (Sept. 25) for an afternoon contest set for 2 pm. The Lions are also 1-2 on the season after picking up their first win on Saturday as well, a 14-10 win at Central Oklahoma.