ARKADELPHIA, Ark. – A staple of the Ouachita Baptist coaching staff over the last decade and the mastermind of the Tigers' defense during that time, first-year head coach
Roy Thompson made his return to Ouachita on Saturday night and guided his Arkansas Tech football team to a gritty 28-23 win.
The victory puts the Wonder Boys at 3-0 on the season, marking the first time the program has started this way since 2017. That year's team would win its first four games and went on to post an 8-3 record in GAC play and finished 8-4 overall after earning a bid to compete in the Agent Barry Live United Bowl.
Saturday's night game was an absolute heavyweight battle between the Tigers and Wonder Boys. Statistically, not a lot separated the two, but a stat that jumped out was the turnover battle. The Wonder Boys were able to come away plus-one in that department as they intercepted Ouachita twice and recovered a fumble on a muffed punt return. Tech would commit a pair of turnovers as they lost a pair of fumbles.
Only one of those turnovers, however resulted in points for the opposing team as both defenses did a good job of limiting the damage. The one takeaway that did result in points on the other end was in favor of Tech and came with 6:58 left in the fourth quarter and put Tech up 28-17.
Prior to that takeaway, the Wonder Boys were faced with a fourth-and-seven from the Ouachita 37-yardline. Tech would not elect to go for it, rather had quarterback
Jack Dawson pooch punt. His punt would be downed at the Ouachita 18-yardline.
The very next play from scrimmage was an interception hauled in by
Tyrique Jones. Jones would pick off the pass at Ouachita 31 and returned it back to the Ouachita 5-yardline. On that play, Ouachita was hit with a personal foul penalty to put the ball at the Ouachita 2-yardline. The Wonder Boys then needed on play to punch it in as reserve QB
Dominic Feliciano scored his second rushing touchdown of the game.
Ouachita would waste little time in their response as they engineered a 9-play, 61-yard touchdown drive to make it a 28-23 game. The Tigers would elect to go for two points to make it a three-point game with just over three minutes left, but the attempt was no good.
The ensuing kickoff was a squib kick that pinned the Wonder Boys inside their 20-yardline at the 16. Tech then went 3-and-out on the drive and were forced to punt the ball away with 2:38 left on the clock. Freshman Aussie punter
Angus Greaves was up to the task in flipping the field and he would punt the ball 46 yards where it was fair-caught by Ouachita at their 37-yardline.
That drive quickly got to 4
th-and-2 from the Ouachita 45-yardline. With the game on the line, Ouachita's quarterback Nate TenBarge dropped back to pass and then attempted to scramble for the first down and appeared as though he would have it, but gave himself up and went into a slide right at the line of scrimmage, turning the ball over on downs with 1:49 left to play.
Ouachita still had two timeouts left and elected to review the ruling on the field in hopes of it being overturned. The call was confirmed on the field, however, and Ouachita was down to a single timeout. Tech then ran the ball on the next play to force Ouachita to take their final timeout with 1:40 left.
Tech was able to run two plays on the ground to keep the clock running and were able to dwindle it down as far as possible in the process before having 4
th-and-2 from the Ouachita 37-yardline with six seconds left.
The Wonder Boys would call up a safe scramble by Dawson, who then heaved the ball down field and out of bounds. There was still time left on the clock after that play, but a defensive holding penalty was called, giving the Wonder Boys an automatic first down and all but ending the game.
Tech would take victory formation on the next play and knelled it to secure the win.
The Wonder Boys will now prepare for a home game on Saturday, September 27 against Arkansas-Monticello. That game is Family Day and is scheduled to kickoff at 6 p.m.
