Courtesy of WKU Athletics
BOWLING GREEN, Ky. – WKU Football shut out Eastern Kentucky 31-0 in the home opener at Houchens-Smith Stadium on Saturday.
The shutout was the first for the Hilltoppers (1-1 overall, 0-0 Conference USA) since blanking FIU 73-0 during the 2022 season, and it was the first shutout win against the in-state rival since beating the Colonels 35-0 in Richmond during the 1973 season. WKU is now 49-35-3 all-time against EKU.
Quarterback TJ Finley threw his first touchdown pass as a Hilltopper – a 12-yard score to Dalvin Smith – with 2:38 to play to cap off the 31-0 victory. Finley threw for 351 yards and one touchdown on 27-of-39 passing. Smith, a former Glasgow Scottie, caught four passes for 34 yards and the TD.
Seven different Hilltopper receivers posted multi-catch games. The Hilltoppers rushed for 116 yards and three touchdowns, led by a 52-yard, two-score effort from Young. He had 13 rushing attempts in the game.
The Hilltoppers collected their first touchdown of the season when Elijah Young dove over a group of players from a yard out with 22 seconds to play in the first quarter. The play was set up by a 17-yard pass from TJ Finley to River Helms the play before. L.T. Sanders scored his first career touchdown with a 2-yard run with 3:41 to play in the second quarter to give WKU a 17-0 lead. Young added a 9-yard touchdown run in the fourth quarter to make it a 24-0 Hilltopper lead.
The WKU defense held the EKU offense in check, allowing only 266 yards and holding the Colonels off the scoreboard. The Hilltoppers had one sack, eight tackles for loss and forced one turnover in the win. Darius Thomas recorded the only sack in the game, forcing a fumble on the play. It was recovered by Terrion Thompson – the second fumble recovery of his career.
“Just happy for our football team. Excited to come home in the home opener and get a win like we did tonight. Really proud of our defense. It’s hard to pitch a shutout. Those don’t come too often and Coach (Tyson) Summers, defensive staff and players did a fantastic job,” said WKU Football Head Coach Tyson Helton. ”I really thought we moved the ball really well on offense. The obvious is we’ve got to finish drives, got to put the ball in the end zone. Had a couple of fourth-down stops there in the red zone, but saw a lot of great things as a team tonight, a lot of players made plays and that was good to see. Got a bad taste out of our mouth from the week before and feeling good about ourselves, and we needed to do that tonight. Start conference play next week with a great opponent in Middle Tennessee, a rivalry game, so it was good to get this win and get the momentum going to get ready for next week.”
The Hilltoppers will head to Johnny “Red” Floyd Stadium in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, to take on “100 Miles of Hate” rival Middle Tennessee (1-1) in the first Conference USA game of the season for both teams. Kickoff is set for 6 p.m. CT.
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