(Image Credit: EWU Athletic Department)
Written by Brandon Clearwaters
Cheney, WA- The Eastern Washington Eagles didn’t disappoint on the team motto of “Leave No Doubt” on the field Saturday Afternoon. The Eagles would explode to a 58-13 win over their regional rivals Central Washington. This was a game where many school records would be set, EWU would finish with an explosive 677 Yards of Total Offense in a 45-Pt Victory over Central Washington in the 2018 Season Opener!
After the game, Eagles head coach Arron Best addressed the media about his team’s explosive win over the Wildcats. “We’ll learn along the way – we haven’t arrived yet. This was a good game, but it wasn’t a complete game. We had too many penalties and gave up the ball three times. There are still some things to work on. We kind of stubbed our toes and our kind of overcoming them. But down the road when everybody is fine-tuning their offense, defense, and special teams, you aren’t going to be able to crawl out of a lot of those holes. Those are things we’ll talk about in the coming weeks, but right now I’m proud of our team and they played their tails off against a very good football team.”
One of the keys to the game for the Eagles was to make sure they won the turnover margin of the game. This would be something that seemed to be a challenge for the Eagles, as they would commit three fumbles in the game all which were recovered by the Wildcats. Eagles quarterback Gage Gubrud would go 14-16 on completed passes, while the Wildcats quarterback struggled in the first half only going 12-20 on completed passes. The Eagles exploded in the first half combining for an impressive 363 total yards and five touchdowns through the first half of play.
The Eagles would come out of the locker room to begin the second half looking to make a statement to maintain the same momentum and energy they brought in the explosive first half of play. The first scoring play of the second half would come when the Wildcats looked to stop the momentum of the Eagles with five minutes of the third quarter, the Eagles would settle for a forty-seven-yard field goal. The Eagles would take a commanding 44-13 lead into the fourth quarter of play.
At the end of the third quarter, another record was set by Nsima Webster who would place ninth in most receiving yards in a game with 212 yards, with one-quarter of play left he would be on track to break a record that was set by Cooper Kupp of Colorado in 2015 of 275 yards. Coach Best addressed the media regarding Nsima performance Saturday saying, “Nsimba had a great game – he had a ton of catches and yards and made a lot of big plays. He fought his tail off along the sideline – we moved him inside for a reason and we saw the productivity.”
The Wildcats seemed to struggle all game combining for only 321 total offense yards for the entire game. Injuries also seemed to be an issue for the Wildcats as they would have three players leave the field in the game.
Saturday’s game would now be ranked eighth for the most total offense yards in EWU history with an explosive 653 total yards.
