Eastern Washington held out of end zone in second half, fall to Weber State 45-21

OGDEN, Utah – There was no great conspiracy that created the schedule Eastern Washington’s football team has faced this season, and in the end, this may still end up being a team with a winning record.

But it’s going to take quite the turnaround for the Eagles to make that happen.

Playing its second ranked opponent in as many Big Sky games, and playing on a short week against a Weber State team coming off its bye, the Eagles failed to score an offensive touchdown in the second half and the Wildcats scored the final 24 points in a 45-21 victory Saturday night in Ogden.

It was a disappointing game for an Eagles team desperate for a win, and it dropped them to 1-4 overall and 0-2 in Big Sky play with a game against another ranked opponent, unbeaten Sacramento State, next weekend in Cheney.

“The one thing we do know is that we are 1-4 right now,” said defensive end Mitchell Johnson, who scored the second touchdown of his career at Eastern. “We’ve got to be better than 1-4, and I know we have a better team. I think the majority of the Big Sky Conference (knows that).”

The Eagles have now lost four games in a row for the first time since 2011. That year they opened with losses at Washington, at South Dakota, at No. 12 Montana and in Cheney against Montana State. They won six of their next seven but failed to make the playoffs with a 6-5 record.

Finishing with that mark this year would require that the Eagles win five of their final six, a stretch that includes games with No. 5 Sacramento State, Cal Poly, Portland State, Idaho, No. 3 Montana and Northern Colorado.

EWU coach Aaron Best said Saturday that the Eagles are “not too far away, and yet we feel like we’re farther away than we are.”

“It’s not like we’re decimated. We’ve got a lot of healthy bodies,” Best said. “We’ve got a lot of cards to play with. We just haven’t found our niche (playing) complementary football.”

Eastern, ranked 24th in the FCS Stats Perform Top 25 heading into this game, came out running the football against seventh-ranked Weber State (5-0, 2-0) and found success doing so. The Eagles ran 23 times for 86 yards in the first half, chewing up 18 minutes and 13 seconds of clock. A big reason for that was third-down conversions, at which Eastern was 6 of 9.

The Eagles also made good on their one red zone opportunity in the first half, scoring on third-and-2 from the Weber State 12-yard line when Tuna Altahir took a direct snap around the left side of the line for a touchdown. It was the second of his career.

Altahir, a redshirt freshman, finished with career-bests in carries (19) and rushing yards (81) and also had three catches for another 14 yards.

“Tuna Altahir played really well and played behind his pads,” Best said, “and that was fun to see for a guy that got extensive playing time really as the (No. 1 running back) on the road against a tough outfit.”

A Freddie Roberson 27-yard touchdown, his third of the season, gave the Eagles their second score of the game, one that tied it at 14 early in the second half.

But the second half was a different story, and that Roberson score was the last time Eastern’s offense would reach the end zone.

After the break, Eastern converted on just 3-of-8 third downs and only 1 of 3 times on fourth down.

Senior quarterback Gunner Talkington rarely threw the ball downfield , finishing 21 of 31 for one touchdown and an interception.

He also scrambled 10 times for 36 yards, but none of those plays gained more than seven yards.

Best said he thought Talkington was in sync early, and that “he led the outfit the way he needed to lead it.”

“We just couldn’t create on those third-down opportunities,” Best said, “especially in the second half against a team that’s really stout against (teams on) third down.”

Yet the Eagles were very much in the game into the third quarter. Johnson’s touchdown came from 13 yards out when Weber State quarterback Bronson Barron and running back Josh Davis fumbled the ball on a handoff exchange.

“Gabe (Johnson) tried to pick it up, kicked it right to me,” said Mitchell Johnson, who ran untouched into the end zone to tie the game at 21 with 7:03 left in the third.

Eastern’s defense held the Wildcats to a 49-yard field goal on the next drive as Weber State reclaimed the lead, 24-21.

On the first play of the subsequent possession, Talkington scrambled up the middle of the defense, and Kalisi Moli popped the ball loose from the quarterback’s arm. Weber State recovered, and two plays later Dontae McMillan scored his second touchdown of the game to make it 31-21.

Eastern had just 61 yards of offense from that point on against a Weber State defense that has yet to allow any points this year in the fourth quarter. Weber State, meanwhile, turned to its ground game, which produced 223 yards on 44 carries. That balanced Barron, who completed 16 of 22 throws for 237 yards and a touchdown. He was sacked just once.

“They wanted numbers,” Johnson said of Weber State’s defense. “If we had enough guys in the box, they’d throw a bubble screen; if we didn’t have enough guys in the box, they’d hand the ball off.”

Including losses to FBS teams Oregon and Florida and a win over Tennessee State (another FCS team), the Eagles have now surrendered 18 rushing touchdowns and 1,405 rushing yards through five games this season.