DURANGO, Colo. - #1 Colorado School of Mines' coronation as RMAC champion came on a history-making Saturday as they defeated Fort Lewis, 82-0, to wrap up the regular season.
John Matocha became college football's all-time recordholder for total touchdowns as the Orediggers (11-0, 9-0 RMAC) wrapped up a perfect regular season and their fifth consecutive RMAC championship with a completely dominating victory over the Skyhawks (0-11, 0-9 RMAC).
Matocha threw for three touchdowns and ran in another to surpass Houston's Case Keenum and Central Iowa's Blaine Hawkins for the most touchdowns produced in college football history, and he now stands alone at 181 with 155 thrown, 25 run in, and one caught. It is the latest in a season full of career superlatives for Matocha, who also tied Keenum for third place all-time in career passing touchdowns among all divisions at 155.
Mines set a program record for total offense in a game with 798 yards, and ran for more than 500 for only the second time in program history and first time since 1992 with 508. Six different Orediggers had a rushing touchdown led by
Landon Walker's three spot, and Walker,
Noah Roper,
Chris Yoo,
Konnor Mickelsen, and
Braelon Tate all had 70+ yards. Meanwhile the defense worked its second shutout of the season with four turnovers, holding FLC to -33 rushing yards and 208 yards of total offense overall.
Mines had a monster first half putting up 534 yards of offense, averaging 13.7 yards per play, and going for 248 yards on the ground as Roper had 116 yards and Walker 97 on just 15 combined touches. Mines had two takeaways on defense and another on special teams in the half as Fort Lewis was held to 89 yards.
The Orediggers raced out to a 28-0 first-quarter lead as Walker opened the scoring with a 35-yard touchdown run, Matocha tied the touchdowns record with a seven-yard keeper, and a pooch kick by
Jacob Click went untouched by Fort Lewis for Mines to recover (technically an onside kick recovery), leading to Walker's four-yard score. Matocha broke the record on a spectacular 55-yard touchdown pass to
Flynn Schiele, going over the top with a perfectly-placed ball midway through the first quarter to lead 28-0.
Zach Hoffman and
Max McLeod were recipients of Matocha touchdown passes on the next two possessions, and from there it became a running game for the Orediggers with
Chris Yoo moving around the right for a four-yard score and Walker breaking loose for a 53-yarder to make the halftime score 55-0.
Mines' run game couldn't be stopped in the second half as they rotated all available backs.
Konnor Mickelsen got free for a 62-yard score,
Noah Roper ran in from 10 yards, and
Braelon Tate went for a 37-yarder in the third quarter, and Yoo's four-yard punch-in was the fourth quarter's only tally.
Fort Lewis had two scoring opportunities in the game; Hunter Villavicencio attempted a 45-yard field goal that missed to open the second quarter, and the Skyhawks drove to the Mines 4 late in the fourth quarter before quarterback Braden Wingle was stripped of the ball by
Christian Peluse and
Joey Beckner recovered the fumble.
Blake Ramsey also had an interception with a 40-yard return and
Devyn Lauer picked off a Fort Lewis Hail Mary to end the first half, while
Nolan Reeve strip-sacked Wingle and recovered a fumble for his 10th career forced fumble.
NOTABLES
- Mines is now only the third program in RMAC history to win five or more consecutive titles and the first since 1979, joining Western Colorado (1973-79) and Utah (1928-33).
- Atop the NCAA regional rankings again this week, Mines' win assures them of the #1 seed in Super Region IV and a first-round bye when the NCAA field is announced Sunday.
- Mines put up historic offensive numbers, crossing over 800 yards of offense before kneeling down in the red zone to finish the game set them at a program-record 798. That surpasses the 749 yards put up at Black Hills State in 2013 and is the fifth 700+ yard game in program history, and first since 2015. Meanwhile the Orediggers' 508 rushing yards was just shy of the program record of 521 set against Fort Lewis in 1992, and is only the second 500-yard game in Mines history.
- Mines did not lose rushing yardage until victory formation at the end of the game; the tailback rotation of Roper (129 yards), Walker (97 yards), Yoo (95 yards), Mickelsen (76 yards) and Tate (74 yards) dominated behind a Mines offense line that also used all of its available personnel.
- Mines completed the ninth unbeaten and untied regular season in program history and third time getting to 11-0, joining the 2004 and 2019 teams.
- It was the fourth consecutive shutout over Fort Lewis and the second shutout of the season by the Oredigger defense.
- The Mines defense has held opponents to under 100 yards rushing in seven consecutive games.
-
James Hess had a big second half with 4.0 tackles for loss and 2.0 sacks to co-lead Mines in tackles with
Joel Diaz at six. Peluse and Reeve also had sacks.
- Mines' receivers had greats days even though most of the game was on the ground.
Flynn Schiele had a four catches for 97 yards and
Max McLeod had five for 77 with each generating a score;
Blake Smotherman had a career-long 50-yard reception as well.
NEXT UP
Mines will likely play its next game in the NCAA second round at home on Saturday, Nov. 25. They will learn the NCAA field Sunday at 4 p.m. MT, streamed live on NCAA.com.
