Coyotes fall 45-26 to Illinois State
The Coyotes didn’t make many positive memories inside the DakotaDome this year. Their 45-26 loss to Illinois St. ended a need-to-forget, two-win season at home.
USD (2-9, 0-6 Missouri Valley) opened up their home slate of games with two straight wins against William Penn and Northern Arizona but closed with four straight losses. The team is now still in search of their first conference win of the season.
Despite the team’s seventh loss in a row, head coach Joe Glenn said he was happy with his team’s effort.
“When you’re struggling like this your goals slightly change,” Glenn said. “We wanted a win, but we also wanted to just play better today, and despite what the score says, we did that.”
Redbird junior running back Marshaun Coprich was off to the races early in the game. By halftime Illinois St. had 209 yards on the ground, and Coprich was responsible for 157 of them.
“I have to give credit to that guy. Marshaun Coprich is a great running back and he’s just a junior, and he’ll have another great year next year,” Coyote junior linebacker Keyen Lage said.
Another issue South Dakota had to play with is the Coyotes biggest weapon — kicker Miles Bergner.
Bergner came into the game 16-16 on field goals and had been doing a good job of flipping the side of the field on his punts. He was knocked out early with a concussion.
“You take the guy that was probably playing the best on our team, and he gets concussed,” Glenn said. “He handles field goals, punts, extra points and kickoffs. That’s probably one third of our team.”
The Coyotes went into halftime trailing 28-12. They got the game to a one possession contest early in the fourth quarter after a whacky play.
The Coyotes had their extra point blocked, but picked it up and ran it in for two points. At that point it was 28-20 with 14:53 left.
Junior quarterback Kevin Earl said the team thought they had a real shot at winning the game down eight points in the fourth quarter.
“It was a one score game, and we believed we were going to win the ballgame,” Earl said. “There’s no doubt, no lack of confidence, and we moved the ball pretty well against them. We were just down one score and knew anything could happen.”
But in the end the Redbirds showed why they came into the day ranked the No. 8 team in the FCS. They closed out the game, scoring the final 14 points with the icing on the cake coming on a Josh Burch interception returned for touchdown with nine seconds left.
Illinois State’s offense was held to 10 points in the second half and just 84 yards. The improved play of his defense is what Glenn said he can raise his chin about after this game.
“We held them down in the second half and made a game out of it,” Glenn said. “We’re doing some really good things. Just probably not enough to beat the No. 8 team in the nation.”
The biggest star of the day for the Coyotes was junior wide receiver Eric Shufford, Jr., who had a career-best 138 yards receiving and one touchdown.
“He’s awesome and he’s been doing a great job this year. He’s fearless. You can throw the ball to him and traffic and he’s going to get it,” Earl said. “He might be a small guy, but he can get up off the ground and make tough catches. Those are the kind of guys that it’s an honor to throw to.”
The Coyotes have one game remaining: South Dakota St. Both team’s records get thrown out the window for that rivalry.
“If we were on the same team we’d be best friends, but we’re not,” Glenn said. “It’s the best game in the state and just one win by us would get their attention. They better beat us, that is all I have to say. And we better beat them.”
The USD-SDSU matchup will kickoff at 2 p.m. next Saturday in Brookings.
(Photos: Top: Univeristy of South Dakota’s wide receiver Eric Shufford breaks through the Illinois State defense Saturday afternoon in the DakotaDome. The Coyotes fell 45-26 in the match. Bottom: Kayl Barkley scores on a two-yard touchdown pass from Kevin Earl in the second quarter for the Coyotes’ first score of the game. Emily Niebrugge/The Volante).
