The ACU football team played under the lights at Shotwell for the first time in nearly a month on Saturday, and looked right at home, beating the Eastern New Mexico Greyhounds 59-17.
Freshman Cade Stone ran the opening kickoff back for a touchdown to give the ‘Cats a 7-0 lead seconds into the game, and ACU never looked back.
Eastern New Mexico and ACU each came into the game with a couple of conference losses, but the Wildcats showed that they were a better team by outplaying the Greyhounds on all three phases of the game.
Senior Mike Wallace continued to make highlight reel plays in the secondary with a 48-yard interception that he returned for a touchdown. The pass ricocheted off of a Greyhound receiver and into Wallace’s waiting arms, and Wallace turned on the jets to find the end zone.
To make matters worse for ENMU, defensive lineman Melvin Shead found pay dirt on an interception of his own. After three quarters, the Wildcat defense had scored more points than the Greyhound offense.
“It was a good feeling scoring that touchdown,” Shead said. “It brought back memories of me playing running back in high school.”
Meanwhile, the ACU offense was rolling the entire game, scoring a season high 59 points, and getting big games from several different Wildcat players.
“We had a great week of preparation,” quarterback John David Baker said. “We came out and we were focused and it showed tonight on the field. We were able to come out here and execute, both the ones and the twos.”
For the seventh time in quarterback Mitchell Gale’s career, he threw four touchdowns to go along with his 252 yards. Gale’s shoulder injury looked to be a thing of the past, as he played his best conference game of the season.
But it was not just Gale who played well; seven different Wildcats found the end zone. Running back Marcel Threat ran for 70 yards and touchdown, and wide receiver Taylor Gabriel lead the way receiving, catching eight balls for 112 yards. Darrel Cantu-Harkless also had 80 yards and a touchdown catch.
The Wildcats need to string some wins together in order to have a chance to win the Lone Star Conference title in their last year as a Division II team, and the win against ENMU will give them some momentum heading into Canyon next week to take on arch-rival West Texas A&M.
“We played really well in the second half against Delta State, and then put a full game together against Eastern New Mexico,” Baker said. “It gives us some momentum and gets us set up for next week. We’ll have to have a good week of practice and be ready to go up in Canyon.”
