South Dakota State Pulls Away from Illinois State 31-14
South Dakota State scored 14 points in two minutes and twenty seconds of the fourth quarter, and that turned a 17-7 game into a 31-7 one. South Dakota State won at Illinois State 31-14 and is 5-0.
South Dakota State was not in a hurry. Josh Holst hit Lofton Ogroske for a 33-yard touchdown in the first quarter, Illinois State tied it at 7-7 on a Chase Kwiatkowski 1-yard run in the second, and Tristan Alvano's 31-yard field goal as the half expired made it 10-7. Holst threw a 7-yard touchdown to Greyton Gannon late in the third quarter for 17-7. Then the fourth got away from Illinois State. Myles Green returned an interception 31 yards for a touchdown at 11:04 (24-7), and James Basinger ran 66 yards for another at 8:44 (31-7). Kwiatkowski scored again from a yard out with 2:47 left, for the final 31-14.
The box score tells you which team had the ball and did something with it. South Dakota State had 392 yards, 239 of them on the ground, against 279 for Illinois State, which threw two interceptions and lost a fumble. South Dakota State lost one fumble and threw no picks, and it got there on just 153 passing yards, with Holst going 18 of 23.
Illinois State is 2-2. Take the pick-six away and it is 24-14, still a win for the visitors, just a less lopsided one. Fantasy-wise, this was South Dakota State's game: all three of the top scorers wore its colors, and the biggest of them was a wide receiver (Ogroske, 21.9).