The Baker football team will get its third chance to defeat a top-10 nationally ranked team when the Wildcats play No. 6 MidAmerica Nazarene University at 6 p.m. Saturday in Olathe.
BU stands 0-2 after a 24-14 loss to No. 9 Ottawa University and a 17-10 loss to No. 10 Missouri Valley College. Sixteen penalties for 144 yards against OU and five turnovers against MVC proved costly as the
Wildcats fell short in their fourth-quarter comeback attempts.
“We’ve been playing pretty well, but our expectations are still higher,” senior Kyle Weinmaster said. “We need to be creating more turnovers. There is always room for improvement.”
Head coach Mike Grossner is frustrated by the miscues the team has been making, but he believes the players can fix them.
“Our mistakes are correctable,” Grossner said. “I’m encouraged by our guys’ effort and we will correct what we are doing wrong and then I think the outcome will change in scores. But until we do that, we can play as good as we want, but we’re not going to win against great teams.”
The defense was successful in stopping MVC’s running game for most of the game until the last drive, and the Wildcats had almost stopped MVC on that as well. With 2:23 remaining, the Vikings decided to go for it on fourth-and-4 instead of attempting a field goal.
“I was over talking to my quarterback and getting ready for a two-minute drill and I had my back turned around and I assumed that they were kicking a field goal,” Grossner said. “All of a sudden I turned and the guy caught it and I didn’t know if they had faked it or if they had actually ran a play, so I had to ask. I saw the end of the play. I was over getting ready to put the final drive on.”
The Vikings converted the fourth-down attempt and didn’t allow the BU offense to have a chance to tie the game.
The highlight of the game for BU came on a special team touchdown.
“They had some miscommunication between their players,” sophomore Kyle Bolton said. “(Sophomore) Reggie (Harris) made the tackle in the endzone to cause the fumble and I recovered it for the touchdown.”
MNU is 1-0 on the season after defeating Avila University 42-7. The team is excited to play MNU after losing to the Pioneers 45-13 in the first game of the season last year.
After beginning last season 0-2, BU finished the season winning seven of its last eight games. The ‘Cats are seeking a victory against MNU to get the season going in the right direction.
“We’re going at it like any other game,” Weinmaster said. “We’ll be looking at film and going hard at practice. If we keep progressing, I think we have a good chance at beating MidAmerica on Saturday.”
