UW-La Crosse at UW-Eau Claire Statistics

Eau Claire, Wis. - The UW-La Crosse football team dropped its third straight Wisconsin Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (WIAC) game with a 27-17 loss at UW-Eau Claire Saturday afternoon at Carson Park. The Eagles, who opened the season 4-0, fall to 5-4 overall and 2-4 in the WIAC while the Blugolds improve to 5-4 overall and 3-3 in the league.

After winning six straight times in Eau Claire, UW-L has now lost its last five trips to Carson Park with the last victory coming in 1999. The Blugolds have won six of the last seven meetings overall with the Eagles.

UW-L opened the game with a 10-0 lead after the first quarter. Reid Oldenburg scored on a 21-yard run with 7:46 left in the first quarter to make it  7-0. The touchdown was set-up after the Blugolds' Austin Neu had a 22-yard punt and the Eagles started at UW-Eau Claire's 25-yard line. On the Blugolds' next possession, the Eagles' Matthew Buswell intercepted a Kyle Paulson pass and returned it 33-yards to the UW-Eau Claire 30-yard line.  Six plays later Dylan Rude converted a 30-yard field goal attempt for a 10-0 UW-L lead.

The Eagles forced a punt on UW-Eau Claire's next possession and started their drive on their own four-yard line. UW-L went 89 yards on 14 plays to drive down to the UW-Eau Claire seven-yard line, but quarterback Nick Anker was sacked and fumbled the ball with Dan Mahaffey recovering the fumble. On the next play from scrimmage, Paulson hit David Goodman with a 93-yard touchdown pass to cut the UW-L lead to 10-7 with 9:19 left in the second quarter.

UW-Eau Claire appeared to take a halftime lead on the final play of the first half as Paulson threw a 43-yard touchdown pass to Nils Dillon, but the Blugolds were called for pass interference and the Eagles led 10-7 at intermission.

The Blugolds scored 13 points in the third period to lead 20-10. UW-L was forced to punt on the first possession of the second half and UW-Eau Claire went 91 yards in four plays to take its first lead of the game at 14-10. Paulson hit Brett Schreiner with a 10-yard touchdown pass with 10:12 remaining in the third quarter. The touchdown was set-up by Paulson's 65-yard completion to Spencer Kehoe.

UW-L was forced to punt again on its next drive and UW-Eau Claire used a 14 play, 80-yard drive to take a 20-10 lead. Cory Sartorelli scored on a two-yard run with 4:12 left in the third, but missed the extra-point. The Blugolds had set-up for a 26-yard field goal attempt by Sartorelli on fourth-and-one at the Eagles' nine-yard line, but UW-Eau Claire faked the field goal with Sartorelli running seven yards for a first down.

Oldenburg cut the lead to 20-17 for UW-L as he scored his second touchdown of the game, this time on a 18-yard run with 13:28 left in the game. The Eagles went 66 yards on nine plays.

After each team punted twice, the Blugolds started a drive at their own 20-yard line with 6:35 remaining. UW-Eau Claire earned a pair of first downs on the ground, but were forced to a fourth-and-four on the UW-L 45-yard line when Neu threw a 45-yard touchdown pass to Ryan Moertel on a fake punt to give the Blugolds a 27-17 lead with 2:08 remaining.

Anker was sacked on UW-L's last play from scrimmage and UW-Eau Claire ran out the final 1:06.

UW-L finished with 419 yards of offense, including 102 rushing and 317 passing. Oldenburg recorded his sixth 100-yard rushing game of the season with 103 yards on 31 attempts. He also scored twice. Anker set a single-game school record with 57 passing attempts, breaking the record of 53 set by Matt Makaryk against Illinois Wesleyan University in 2002. Anker completed 29 of his 57 attempts for 317 yards with one interception. The 29 completions is tied for second in single-game school history. Josh Boraas completed a school record 31 completions against the University of Minnesota-Duluth in 1999. Anker was sacked three times Saturday.

Travis Bordeau led the Eagles with 11 catches for 134 yards while Alex Maxinoski had seven catches for 76 yards.

UW-L finished eight-of-20 on third-down, but missed all three of its fourth-down attempts. The Eagles had three turnovers and were penalized eight times for 107 yards.

UW-Eau Claire totaled 436 yards, including 101 rushing and 335 passing. Sartorelli had 72 yards rushing on 25 carries and a touchdown while Paulson finished 17-of-37 passing for 290 yards with two touchdowns and one interception. Schreiner had seven receptions for 51 yards and a touchdown while Kehoe caught five passes for 110 yards.

The Blugolds were five-of-17 on third-down and two-of-four on fourth down. UW-Eau Claire finished the game with seven penalties for 70 yards.

Jim Litscher led the UW-L defense with eight tackles, all solo, while Dustin Drath also finished with eight tackles, including seven solo. Nicholas Matthews had 4.0 tackles for loss.

Mark Bader had eight solo tackles for UW-Eau Claire.

UW-L wraps up its season Saturday, Nov. 14 hosting second-ranked UW-Whitewater at 1 p.m.