Marquette rallies, knocks off undefeated Dwight

OTTAWA – Mistakes are a part of the game, but the biggest error was made earlier this week by anyone who was not giving two-loss Marquette much of a chance against undefeated Dwight/Gardner-South Wilmington.

The Crusaders believed and then made enough big plays on both sides of the ball to upend the Trojans 26-21 in a Chicagoland Prairie Conference game Friday night at Gould Stadium.

The visitors jumped out to a 14-0 lead in the first seven minutes of the game and, after Marquette battled back to tie it at halftime, a freak 85-yard kickoff return TD by Dwight’s Caiden Nelson on the second-half kickoff regained the Trojans edge.

But Marquette didn’t yield, notching a pair of third-period TDs – a 16-yard run by Payton Gutierrez and an 8-yard pass from Anthony Couch to Jaxsen Higgins – gave the hosts their first lead before the Cru defense made those stand up with takeaways on Dwight’s last two possessions.

A fumble recovery by sophomore Jacoby Gooden and an interception by freshman Connor Baker with just 58.6 seconds remaining finished off the victory, lifting Marquette to 2-2 and handing the Trojans their first loss in four games.

“I give our kids a ton of credit,” Marquette coach Tom Jobst said. “We could have tanked so easy in that first quarter, but they didn’t. You could just tell they just weren’t gonna throw in the towel. I’m very proud of them, because that’s a good team. …

“This is huge, huge for us mentally. We know what’s ahead of us next week (at St. Bede for its homecoming at 1 p.m. next Saturday). We’ll have to be ready.”

Dwight’s Ayden Collum, who last week rushed for 176 yards and three TDs in a win over Aurora Central Catholic, on its second play broke off an 86-yard TD run. For the night, he had 130 yards on 10 attempts.

On the ensuing series Marquette fumbled, and Joey Starks scooped it up for a shocking 89-yard score, making it 14-0 in the blink of an eye.

But the Cru bounced back with a 1-yard sneak by Couch later that quarter and tied it at 14 on a 4-yard burst by Grant Dose in the second stanza. Dose finished with 22 carries for 119 yards and Gutierrez 14 tries for 110, nearly all of MA’s 251 ground yards.

“I’m thankful for Dose and Gut. Their running the ball makes the defense collapse, always,” said Couch, who completed 8-of-12 passes for 66 yards and the winning TD, plus had back-to-back defensive sacks before a Rush Keefer interception on a key stop to end the half tied.

“My head’s going to blow up after those sacks. Those made me more excited, but the winning touchdown, I’d rather have that. That made it a win.”

Marquette rallied again in the second half, getting Gutierrez’s score – but a missed PAT left the home team a point short, 21-20.

The defense then held and forced Dwight’s first punt of the year, but the Trojans’ backup punter shanked a 12-yarder to set up Marquette at the Dwight 26 for the winning TD pass, Couch-to-Higgins, with 2:25 left in the third.

From there, Gooden’s fumble recovery and Baker’s pick closed the door.

“Too many turnovers, that’s just what I told the boys,” Dwight/GSW coach Luke Standiford said. “I told them before we came, and it’s been our message all week long, that this is a team that we can’t afford to turn the ball over against, that we can’t have missed tackles, and we had them.

“We hadn’t been in a situation yet this season where we faced some adversity. … When you go three weeks just slaughtering teams (outscoring them 146-8) and then all the sudden you have to fight, scratch and claw your way back into a game, there’s some emotions there, and we have to do a better job of handling them.”