OTTAWA, Kan. – The Kansas Wesleyan Coyotes, ranked No. 4 in the NAIA and the No. 3 seed in the KCAC Tournament, fended off a challenge from the Southwestern College Moundbuilders on Friday in the quarterfinals of the KCAC Tournament at AdventHealth Field.
Wesleyan broke a 19-19 tie with 12 unanswered points to come away with a 31-19 win to advance to Saturday's semifinals in the tournament.
KWU will face Baker University in Saturday's semifinal round at 1 p.m. at AdventHealth Field.
The first two and three-fourths quarters of the game went back and forth until the Coyotes finally took the lead late and held on to win.
Wesleyan scored on its first drive of the game. After stopping Southwestern on its first drive the Coyotes only needed five plays to cover 69 yards for the first score of the game. The big play of the drive was a 46-yard pass from
Chihiro Iwata to
Jenise Washington to give the Coyotes first and goal at the Southwestern-3. Two players later, Iwata found
Yui Watanabe for three yards and the score with 6:12 left in the first.
Southwestern scored on its next drive, aided in part by a pass interference call against the Coyotes to set up a 36-yard touchdown pass for the Moundbuilders to tie things up at 7-7 with 3:59 left in the first.
Southwestern took a 13-7 lead with 6:30 left in the second, but the Coyotes answered right back converting a 19-yard pass from Iwata to Washington to tie things up at 13 with 2:12 left in the half.
The Coyotes took the ball to start the second half and scored on the first drive of the quarter as Iwata found
Aaliyah Young on a 1-yard touchdown pass with 6:57 left in the quarter.
Southwestern tied it up with 3:28 left in the quarter, but the Coyotes quickly answered back converting a 39-yard touchdown pass from Iwata to Washington to take the lead for good with 1:57 left in the third.
After stopping Southwestern at the KWU 27, KWU went back the other way using a 24-yard pass to Young and a 15-yard run by Iwata to get to the Southweetern-4 where Iwata found Watanabe for the final score of the game with 6:15 left.
Khylie Douglas sacked Southwestern quarterback Kennedi Hayes twice on the ensuing drive and Southwestern's fourth down pass was incomplete and the Coyotes would take over.
Two big runs by
Eva Decesare got the ball down to the Moundbuilder-4 but time would run out and the Coyotes would get the win.
The Coyotes racked up 431 yards of total offense in the game while holding Southwestern to 276. Iwata was 34 of 49 passing for 370 yards and five touchdowns. Washington had seven catches for 144 yards and two scores.
Aliyah Wood had 10 catches for 79 yards and Young had seven catches for 60 yards and a score.
Douglas had seven flag pulls, including two sacks to lead the Coyote defense.
Zo Lucas and Wood had six stops each.
The Coyotes face Baker in the KCAC Semifinals on Saturday at 1 p.m.
