Ball State University
Toledo
Football Suffers 34-23 Loss at Toledo
September 21, 2014 | Football
Ball State's football team endured a two hour and 40-minute severe weather delay in its game at Toledo, and suffered a 34-23 loss to the Rockets to fall to 1-3 on the season and 0-1 in Mid-American Conference play.
The first half was a battle of Toledo's touchdowns and Ball State's field goals and enabled the Rockets to take a 20-9 lead into the half.
"We moved the ball very well tonight, but we had to settle for a lot of field goals," head coach Pete Lembo said. "We were ready to play and the kids stayed pretty resilient throughout the delay. We were excited to play and would have waited till three in the morning to play if we had to tonight."
Scott Secor kept the Cardinals in the game with three first half field goals. He connected on a career-long field goal of 49 yards with 4:20 to go in the first quarter and then added field goals of 45 yards and 22 yards in the first half.
With 11:55 to play in the first half, Dedrick Cromartie intercepted his first career pass and gave the Cardinals the ball at the Toledo 22-yard line and that resulted in Secor's third field goal of the half, which was a 22-yarder that made the score 20-9.
Toledo scored early in the first quarter prior to the delay and added on to that score immediately after the delay and took a 13-0 advantage. The Rockets struck again with 1:16 to go in the first stanza and the three scores and one missed extra point gave Toledo its 20 points. As the Rockets were driving to close out the first half, Ball State's Blake Dueitt forced a fumble and it was recovered by Zack Ryan, which allowed the Cardinals to close out the half.
The Rockets opened the scoring in the second half with a touchdown late in the third quarter to take a 27-9 advantage before Ozzie Mann connected with KeVonn Mabon on a 43-yard TD pass to pull Ball State within nine points.
Toledo opened the fourth quarter scoring with a touchdown with just over 10 minutes to play in the game and held a 34-16 lead before Mann and Jordan Williams hooked up on an 8-yard scoring strike with 5:55 left to play.
"I don't think we fit some things right and I think we missed some tackles," Lembo said. "We have to improve our execution in the red zone. There were some times we executed in the passing game a little better and having Jordan Williams out there certainly helped."
Mann finished the day with 15 completions on 27 attempts for 176 yards and two touchdowns with no interceptions. Jahwan Edwards tallied 125 yards rushing on 21 carries, while Williams had seven catches for 58 yards and one TD.
Ball State will be idle this week before playing at Army Oct. 4 in its final non-conference game of the season.
