Fort Lewis College returned to Durango a bit defeated after a long road trip to South Dakota resulted in more than one loss.
The FLC football team dominated Saturday’s game at Black Hills State University but still came up short in a 13-7 road defeat in Spearfish, South Dakota.
In the second quarter, FLC (2-2) also saw starting quarterback Jake Lowry go down with a sprained knee. Head coach Brandon Crosby officially called Lowry questionable for Saturday’s home rivalry showdown with Adams State University (3-1).
Lowry, a junior out of Littleton, went down with a season-ending leg injury in a Week 3 loss last season at Chadron State. Erik Ornduff, a junior from Morgan Hills, California, played briefly last season before he suffered a broken hand, and he replaced Lowry last week.
This season, Ornduff has passed for 61 yards on 9-of-17 passing.
“I recruited a bunch of quarterbacks last year, and again it looks like I might be here with one quarterback going into this week,” Crosby said. “Jake has an MRI or X-ray coming up this week. We’ve got Erik, and I’ve got fingers crossed I can get a waiver for a guy to be eligible this week to have a backup.”
Crosby said Isaac Leppke, a receiver transfer from Wyoming who was recruited out of high school as a quarterback, could be another option for the Skyhawks.
“We always have Isaac,” Crosby said. “If Ornduff were to go down, and hopefully that doesn’t happen, Isaac would be the next guy to step in from receiver to play quarterback.”
Lowry had gone only 32-of-70 passing for 387 yards, three touchdowns and three interceptions, but he provided value in the running game with 158 yards and a TD. Ornduff has also shown he can run the ball, as he has 60 rushing yards and a TD this season.
“The guys love (Ornduff),” Crosby said. “Last year, he broke his hand midseason, but he was doing good stuff against Western before he broke it. At the end of the season, he opted to cut his cast off and play quarterback for us the last game of the year, and we had one of our best games offensively, and he made some big plays for us. It showed a lot about the character of the kid and proved to us coaches that we have kids who want to play for us and do some things that some kids might not.”
If Ornduff does replace Lowry at QB going forward, it won’t be the only big change for the Skyhawks. After redshirt freshman kicker Hogan Keasler missed two more key field goals Saturday at Black Hills, he is now only 1-of-4 on field goals this season. Because of his struggles, Crosby elected to try for fourth-down conversions with his offense in the red zone last week instead of taking field goals.
“Our field goal kicker looked very, very uncertain,” Crosby said. “At that point, we went for it five times in the red zone and only came up with points once. If we make three field goals, we win the game. We make two, we tie.”
Crosby said Wednesday the team will turn to sophomore Beau McCannon for field goal duties Saturday against the Grizzlies. A year ago, McCannon was 3-of-5 with a long of 49 yards at Adams State to send that game into overtime. In 2018, Keasler was 2-of-4 with a long of 39 yards.
“We’re gonna start Beau McCannon this week. He helped us out last year with some good games, and he had some bad games. He missed an extra point last year that cost us the South Dakota Mines game, but he also was player of the week last year after the Adams State game. He’s done some good things, and, hopefully with the experience and more reps, he can come out and do some good things for us so we don’t have to stress out about going for it in the red zone. We don’t script that stuff, so it’s hard to scheme that stuff up.”
With an elite defense, the Skyhawks are tired of missing out on scoring opportunities in close games. FLC’s two losses this year have come by a combined 13 points. Ornduff and McCannon will try to help FLC get over the hump Saturday.
jlivingston@durangoherald.com
