Photo by Jake McNeill: Southwest Minnesota State University defensive lineman Daniel Obwaya (94) attempts to tackle Nebraska Kearney quarterback Abram Scholting during a Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference football game on Saturday afternoon. The Lopers defeated the Mustangs 35-0.

MARSHALL — Starting their third quarterback in the first five weeks of the season, the Southwest Minnesota State University football team couldn’t get any production out of its offense when it hosted Nebraska-Kearney for a non-conference matchup on Saturday. The Mustangs’ defense held the Lopers to one score after halftime, but an early deficit left SMSU with a 35-0 loss. The result marks the Mustangs’ third time being shut out this season.

The Mustangs went into the game coming off a 62-0 loss to Minnesota Duluth the week prior. Kendon Krogman started the game, throwing 19 attempts for 58 yards and a pick before being replaced by true freshman Drew Kluender. 

Kluender threw 10 attempts for 15 yards in his last outing and got his first career start on Saturday against Kearney. He showed flashes of potential with his quick, accurate passing, but the Lopers’ aggressive pass rush made it difficult for him to get his bearings in the pocket.

He was sacked four times for 34 yards, and he completed 10 of his 26 pass attempts for 86 yards and an interception.

“[Kluender] missed a couple of reads like you’d expect, but I thought that he competed. The key thing is when you get that opportunity to go compete,” Underwood said. “Some throws are going to be better than others. At times he got rushed or felt like he got a little pressure, which he did. You just have to be able to stand in there and deliver the ball. He short-armed a few things, but overall for a first game, he made progress.”

Nebraska-Kearney got on the board five minutes into the game. Starting from their own 20-yard line, Isaiah Harris started the drive with a 38-yard run. A 16-yard gain through the air to Earnest McDaniel-Mitchell and another 18-yard run by Harris set the Lopers up in the red zone and Abraham Scholting connected with Dijmon Wheeler for a 15-yard touchdown pass, giving the Lopers all the offense they would need for the win.

SMSU shut out the Lopers for the remainder of the first quarter but Kearney got back on track in the second. Despite a big tackle from Kloeppel at the 3-yard line stopping a Kearney fourth-down conversion attempt, the Lopers forced a Mustang 3-and-out to get the ball back at their 30-yard line and marched down the field before Harris ran for a 10-yard touchdown to double the lead. 

UNK defensive lineman Nathan Pesek then showed off some cat-like reflexes when he picked off Kluender at the line of scrimmage on SMSU’s next play and returned it for a touchdown to make the score 21-0.

On its first two possessions of the game, SMSU advanced the ball to the Kearney 42-yard line and the Kearney 43-yard line. Those were the only possessions in which SMSU advanced the ball past midfield.

“It’s certainly a work in progress,” Underwood said of the team’s offense. “We’re more youthful on [the offensive] side of the football and obviously it’s shown in our ability to put up points at times… today we probably dropped more balls than I’ve seen us drop in quite a while, so that helps move the chains and do things and get points hopefully at some point on the board. But for right now, it’s just that we’ve got to be able to execute and help a young guy at quarterback trying to feel his way through his first game.”

Redshirt freshman Abram Scholting got the start in the absence of quarterback Reagan Jones for the Lopers and looked every bit the part of a QB1. In his first career start, Scholting completed 22 of his 33 passing attempts for 247 yards and a pair of touchdowns. He was sacked twice for 11 yards — once by Jojo Kloeppel, once by Avery Johnson — but made up for it by finishing the day with 13 carries for 46 yards.

Harris’ second touchdown came in the final minute of the first half, when he punched in a two-yard run for a 28-0 lead, capping off a 12-play, 81-yard drive over four minutes.

Underwood said that the Mustangs didn’t get enough pressure on Scholting, adding that the Lopers took advantage of their height advantage at wide receiver to make some plays downfield. He also said that he felt his defensive backs were well-positioned on some of the touchdowns, but need to do a better job of stripping the ball from the top down.

Parker Knudson led the Mustangs with three passes broken up while Keshaun Reynolds recorded another two.

Harris led the Lopers on the ground with 13 attempts for 101 yards and a pair of touchdowns. 

While Nebraska-Kearney ran for 191 yards on 4.4 yards per attempt on the ground, SMSU couldn’t pick up anything in the run game. Zander Wolf was the team’s leading rusher, with two yards on two attempts, while Honstetter had a team-high eight carries for no yards. As a team, the Mustangs finished the day with -16 yards.

Despite not having much time to rest between drives, SMSU’s defense held strong for most of the game. Yet, SMSU’s offense finished the first half 0 for 5 on third-down conversions, helping the Lopers finish the half with 49 plays to SMSU’s 20, skewing the points allowed by giving Kearney quality field position. SMSU also stopped each of Nebraska-Kearney’s three fourth-down conversion attempts in the game.

“We’ve got a good portion of our upperclassmen talent on defense, so we expect a lot out of them,” Underwood said. “We have to create things and turnovers that make opportunities for our offense and kind of continue to work on that to spark them a little bit. We’re just not playing at a consistent level on both sides, so we need to pull each other through it.”

Colin Maher had a 27-yard reception to lead the team in receiving yards while Stevie McMath and David Ola-Kazeem brought in two receptions each for 10 and nine yards respectively.

Gideon Ervasti and Thomas Mergen led the team with nine totals each, including seven unassisted tackles for Mergan and six with a tackle for loss for Ervasti. Cam Enright also forced a fumble in the final minute to help SMSU force the Lopers’ lone turnover of the game. SMSU, meanwhile, turned the ball over twice. 

Kearney’s last score came in the fourth quarter when Scholting connected with Tamicus Napier for a 6-yard touchdown, making the score 35-0 with three-and-a-half minutes to play.

Southwest Minnesota State University falls to 0-5 with the loss, the worst start for the program since they dropped each of their first six games in 1976, 1977 and 1978. SMSU will look to avoid tying that mark when it hosts Wayne State for Homecoming Week on Saturday at 5 p.m. 

“You can only do what you can do. You need to do your job and execute it at the highest level, and that means playing with confidence and within yourself and within the teammates you have around you,” Underwood said.”As we continue to preach that, particularly when it’s frustrating, the human nature tells you to break down, point fingers and abandon that idea and your teammates, but we’ll continue to fight and work through that like all teams that are off to a struggling start.”

The Wildcats defeated SMSU 49-10 when the teams met in Nebraska last season. The Mustangs have not beaten Wayne State since a 61-3 victory over the Wildcats in Wayne, Neb. in 2015.