Cedar Rapids, Iowa / Waverly, Iowa -- One team is in the NCAA playoffs for the first time since 2009; the other made a strong case for its third-straight postseason appearance. Both will be able to call themselves "Champions" for the rest of their lives. After wins by Central and Wartburg today, the American Rivers Conference's football championship for 2019 will be shared. It's the first co-championship since Central and Coe were co-champs in 2005.
Central jumped out to a 31-7 lead on the road before Coe scored a couple of touchdowns late to make the final, 31-21. The Dutch earn the conference's automatic qualifier to the NCAA Division III Football Championship as a result of last week's head-to-head win over Wartburg. The Knights rebounded in a big way on their home field with a 48-7 win against Loras, solidifying their case for at-large selection; that's now in the hands of the DIII Football Committee with an announcement of the 32-team field tomorrow at 4:30 p.m. Central Time. Both teams finish the season at 9-1 overall and 7-1 in the conference.
The committee will like the A-R-C's 11-6 record in non-conference play. It also will like Central's convincing week-two victory over DePauw (45-19). The Monon Bell game went to DePauw today, 17-13, over Wabash, which won the regular-season championship of the North Coast Athletic Conference. That should factor into the strength-of-schedule numbers for both Central and Wartburg. Central's other non-conference win is against Northwestern-St. Paul. Wartburg got a good result today when Monmouth won the championship game of the Midwest Conference over St. Norbert. The Knights beat Monmouth handily, 38-9, in week two.
Central 31, Coe 21
Coe struck first on a 1-yard run from
Tyler Dralle midway through the first quarter. Undaunted, the Dutch answered a couple of possessions later on a 28-yard TD pass from QB
Blaine Hawkins to WR
Hunter Robinson. It was 7-7 after one quarter.
A drive that began in the latter stages of the first quarter brought Central its second touchdown early in the second. Hawkins completed his second TD pass of the day, this time to
Tanner Schminke from 11 yards out. Central led 14-7 at the half.
A key drive to open the third quarter took just two minutes, 14 seconds off the clock and was capped by Hawkins's 38-yard TD pass to RB
Jason Hopp. After a three-and-out for Coe, Central went on another march that culminated in a 20-yard field goal from
K Jon Alberts. That drive chewed up another 5:35 off the game clock and closed the scoring the third quarter.
Any thought of a comeback was dashed on a 6-yard TD run by Central's
Cameron Bannister. The lead was 31-7 with 11:12 left in the game. Coe scored on its next possession with a 4-yard pass from QB
Max Ridenour to
Colton White. The Kohawks got the ball back after a short possession and cashed in on Dralle's second TD run of the day, a 2-yarder.
Hawkins was 17-of-23 passing for 218 yards and three TDs. Hopp ran for 103 yards and one TD on 22 carries. Robinson caught seven passes for 133 yards and a score.
Jordy Borman was credited with 10 tackles. Ridenour passed for 190 yards and a touchdown and also led Coe in rushing with 97 yards on 16 attempts.
Manny Lopez had 10 tackles for Coe.
The Kohawks showed well this season with a 6-4 overall record, 5-3 in the A-R-C. They finished alone in fourth place in the final conference standings.
Wartburg 48, Loras 7
The Knights scored 27 first-quarter points and never looked back. Loras had the ball first but was stopped on a three-and-out. Wartburg took over and needed just five plays to put the ball into the end zone on a 31-yard pass from QB
Noah Dodd to WR
Jojo McNair. Another three-and-out for the Duhawks led to a nine-play, 45-yard drive that Dodd took in himself from four yards out. Loras got very little going on its next drive and had to punt again from deep in its own territory. Wartburg took over on the Loras 33 and scored five plays later on Dodd's 20-yard scamper. The defense then decided to get into the act. On a third-and-eight from the Wartburg 43, Loras QB
Noah Sigwarth was picked off by McNair, who plays both ways for the Knights, and he returned it 65 yards to paydirt. The PAT failed and a very good first quarter for Wartburg ended.
Wartburg scored two more times in the second quarter. Dodd found
Brandon Childs for 45 yards and then hit
Kolin Schulte for an 11-yard touchdown pass to make it 34-0. Loras did make it deep into Wartburg territory later in the quarter, advancing the ball to the Knights' 12-yard line. A couple of sacks and a penalty kept the Duhawks off the scoreboard, which showed Wartburg up 34-0 at the half.
The next Wartburg touchdown was a doozie as RB
Mason Carter went 84 yards for the score midway through the third quarter. Again, the defense came up big as Loras fumbled on its next possession and LB
Antonio Santillan came up with the loose ball. The big-play capability of the Wartburg offense showed again on a 51-yard Dodd-to-Schulte scoring pass that accounted for Wartburg's final points of the game.
Loras cracked the scoring column just over midway through the fourth quarter.
Jerry McDaniel capped a seven-play, 64-yard drive with a 13-yard TD run.
Dodd was 13-of-23 passing for 246 yards and three touchdowns. Schulte was the leading yardage-receiver with 82 yards on four catches. Santillan led all tacklers with 12.5. Sigwarth was limited to 112 passing yards on 12-of-32 efficiency. Although he ran for 79 positive yards, the Wartburg defense forced him into 64 negative yards on 13 total tackles for loss (five sacks). Loras showed great improvement this year, finishing 5-5 overall, 4-4 in the A-R-C and tied for fifth place with Simpson. They had won three-straight games entering today's contest.
