Oilers Roll in Houghton in Final GLIAC Game
Houghton, MI – The University of Findlay football team capped its time in the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (GLIAC) with an exclamation point with a dominating 59-21 victory over the Michigan Tech Huskies on Saturday, Nov. 12. Picking up the win in the team's final football game in the GLIAC gives the Oilers a 6-5 record for the season with all of the games being conference matchups. The winning season marks five winning seasons in the six years that the program has been under the leadership of head coach Rob Keys.
Findlay put up 59 points in a game for the first time since a 59-22 win over Tiffin in 2014, tying the most points in a game since Keys became head coach in 2011. In the win, the Oilers rushed for 435 yards and six touchdowns, both of which are the most under Keys. The last time Findlay rushed for more than 400 yards was in 2013 against Lake Erie.
Leading the rushing attack was junior Daouda Sylla who rushed for a career-high 169 yards and four touchdowns. He tied a career-high with 22 carries. His long run of the day came in the second quarter when he broke loose for a 49-yard touchdown run to put the Oilers up 24-0.
Fellow junior tailback Chauncey Bridges rushed the ball 20 times for 161 yards. He had a 54-yard run on the first offensive play of the second half which took the ball to the Huskies 20 yard line. Sylla later capped that drive with a four-yard touchdown run to give the Oilers a 45-0 lead, their largest lead of the season.
The Oilers' defense was stellar in the victory. The Huskies were only able to run 24 plays in the first half and were forced to punt three times, fumbled twice, and had one turnover-on-downs. One of the lost fumbles came on the first play of the game when Francis Cutchember recovered a fumble forced by Justice Jenkins.
Senior Myles Alexander had a game-high ten tackles for the Oilers, the seventh time this season he reached double-digits in that category. Of those ten tackles, 1.5 were sacks. Cutchemeber chipped in eight tackles while senior Anthony Linnear had six.
Junior Rhys Gervais threw the ball 17 times and completed 11 for 122 yards and two touchdowns. He finishes the season with 2,835 yards, 518 yards shy of his own record for passing yards in a season. He also tossed 27 touchdowns this season, second-most in a season at Findlay behind his own 33 touchdown mark from 2015. His 236 completions and 378 attempts are both new single-season records.
Junior Jason Moore had six catches for 38 yards and a pair of touchdowns. That gives him 15 touchdown catches for the year, the most in a single season at Findlay. He passed Rick Hatfield who held the top two spots with 14 touchdowns in 1979 and 13 touchdowns in 1978. His 38 yards also put him in the top spot for most receiving yards in a season with 1,115. He passed Lloyd Henry's 2014 season where he had 1,105.