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Football goes toe-to-toe with No. 23 Austin Peay before falling in shootout

MSU Athletics

In the highest scoring game in Jayne Stadium history, Morehead State football went back-and-forth with 23rd ranked Austin Peay before falling 78-40 on Saturday evening.

The Governors scored the game's opening points on their first drive and completed a successful two-point conversion to take an 8-0 lead. Redshirt sophomore Aaron Turk wasted little time answering, returning the following kickoff 92 yards for six points. The Eagles were unsuccessful on their two-point attempt.

Turk's kickoff return was the first for Morehead State since Brandon Bornhauser scooped up an onside kick and returned it 54 yards for a score in a 49-36 win over Pikeville on Sep. 6, 2014.

Following another APSU score, the Eagles answered again. This time redshirt senior quarterback Lawson Page found pay dirt from three yards out to cap off a solid 15-play drive that went 75 yards and spanned 8:01. Page then connected with senior back Arien Beasley to pull Morehead State within a point at 15-14 with 4:44 in the first.

Austin Peay began to separate following the Eagles' drive, scoring two touchdowns that were answered by MSU field goals as sophomore kicker Andrew Foster booted in kicks of 44 and 34 yards.

The back-and-forth affair continued through the first half, with Austin Peay scoring on a 54-yard pass with 6:10 remaining to pull ahead 36-20.

Just as the momentum seemed to be trending in the direction of APSU, redshirt sophomore corner Brandyn Duncan stepped in front of a Governors' receiver and made his first interception of 2018. Duncan returned the pick 28 yards to set the Eagle offense up at the 14-yard line, where redshirt freshman back Jovan Smith capped off the short, four-play drive with a three-yard plunge for six with 2:41 remaining until the half.

Fifty-five seconds later Austin Peay scored again to bring the score to 43-26 at the break.

Austin Peay again scored on its opening drive of the third quarter but Morehead State answered back with 14 unanswered points of its own to cut the lead to 50-40 with 2:34 left in the third.

Beasley found the end zone for second time, diving in from one yard out with 7:50 to go. The Morehead State defense then stood strong and forced a three-and-out to get Page the football back where he was able to connect with freshman Ian Holder for a 65-yard score.

The Governors took control of the game for the remaining 17:34 scoring 28 unanswered points.

"We did a lot of great things tonight, I thought we were well prepared for this game," said head coach Rob Tenyer. "Their speed and athleticism just simply wore us down in the fourth quarter."

The Eagles again racked up over 100 yards on the ground, rushing for 151. Page led the ground attack with 65 yards while also tossing for 162.

Kordell Brown and Starr Hutcherson made eight tackles to lead the way defensively for Morehead State.

The coach believes his team had the ability to finish the upset but needs to work on things going forward.

"We had a couple of chances to make this a closer game, we just need to clean up some things and those mistakes hurt us by taking points off the board tonight," added the coach.

Morehead State will now go into a bye-week before traveling to Butler for its' Pioneer Football League opener against Butler on September 29. The Eagles and Bulldogs will kick-off at 1:00 p.m. ET.

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