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TOPEKA, Kan. -- The No. 12-ranked Washburn Ichabods turned up 620 yards of total offense improving to 8-1 on the season and 6-1 in the MIAA with a 45-20 win over Fort Hays State. The Ichabods will travel to Pittsburg State next week to face the Gorillas at 2 p.m.

Washburn took the opening drive of the game on jumped on the board first with a 26-yard field goal by Jeremy Linn just over three minutes into the game. On the ensuing kickoff, the Ichabods recovered a muffed kickoff at the Fort Hays State 44. On the first play of the series, Justin Cooper scored around the right side putting Washburn up 10-0 with 11:23 to play in the opening quarter.

The Tigers would go on an 8-play, 52-yard march down the field to cut into the Ichabod lead when Anthony Sheppard connected with Chase Leake for a 15-yard pass play with 7:41 to play in the first quarter. Washburn would then stretch its lead to 16-7 when Dane Simoneau hit DeJuan Beard from 35-yards out on a drive covering seven plays and 80 yards.

Neither team would score until the FHSU's Sheppard scored from 1-yard out pulling the Tigers within two at 16-14 with 4:55 to go in the half. However it took only 46 more seconds for Washburn to score again on a 42-yard touchdown pass play from Simoneau to Beard putting the Ichabods up 23-14 entering the halftime break.

In the third quarter, Washburn's Sean McPherson scored on a 1-yard run for the only points of of the quarter adding to Washburn's lead of 16 at 30-14.

Cooper scored his second touchdown of the day when he scampered in from 23 yards out wrapping up a 9-play, 89-yard drive and with a Simoneau to Tore Hurst 2-point conversion, Washburn led 38-14 with 9:29 to play in the game.

Sheppard scored the Tigers' final points of the game on a 14-yard touchdown run pulling the Tigers with 18 at 38-20 after the 2-point coversion failed.

The Ichabods wrapped up the scoring with a 1-yard plunge by Greg Schoenberg with 49 seconds left in the game.

Both Cooper and McPherson went over 100 yards in the game with Cooper recording 16 carries for 111 yards and two scores and McPherson tallying 102 yards on 20 carries with one touchdown. Simoneau finished with 313 yards completing 24 of 34 passing attempts with two touchdowns. He also became the fourth MIAA player to throw for more than 10,000 yards in his career as he raised his school-record passing yards to 10,024, which is one behind former Missouri Western quarterback Kasey Waterman who recorded 10,025 for the Griffons.

DeJuan Beard had six catches for 131 yards and two scores for Washburn.

Andre Smith led the Tigers with 78 yards on the ground on 17 carries while Sheppard finished 18 of 26 with two interceptions and one touchdown for 182 yards. Leake had five catches for 51 yards for the Tigers.

Defensively for the Ichabods, who held the Tigers to 155 second half yards, Marty Pfannenstiel had 11 tackles along with Bryce Atagi. Jahmil Taylor had seven tackles and an interceptions while Casey Curran had six tackles and an interception.

Alex Whitehill had 14 tackles for the Tigers.



The Ichabods recorded 29 first downs in the game en route to the 620 total offensive yards with 352 coming through the air and 266 on the ground. The Tigers had 19 first downs with 330 total offensive yards (148 rushing/182 passing).