The Wayne State College Wildcat football team secured a 41-33 victory over the Minnesota State University Mavericks on Saturday, Oct. 8 in what was an offensive showcase for both teams.  

Anthony Watkins opened the scoring for the Wildcats on just the second play of the game with a 67-yard touchdown run rolling over the defender on the ground before taking it all the way.  

“I had full confidence that I was not down after bouncing off the ground and got up and just kept going,” Watkins said.  

The Wildcats would then go on to score their next five possessions with the highlights being a 45-yard touchdown pass to Mason Lee and a fumble recovery touchdown brought back by Gerald Flye to make the score 13-27 at halftime.  

The Wildcats came out flat on defense to start the third quarter with the Mavericks taking the second half kickoff downfield in four plays scoring a touchdown to make the score 20-27. The following drive started with WSC taking it down to the nine-yard line before being fumbled by Lee.  

Minnesota State drove the ball down to the 15-yard line before throwing an interception to J’von France shifting the momentum back to the Wildcats.  

“Before we went out there for the second half, we had this mentality that it was a 0-0 ball game and were going out there to play good Wayne State football,” France said.  

This gave the offense the opportunity to score, and they did just that, capping off a drive with a four-yard Jacob Keiser run to end the quarter 34-20 WSC.  

The Mavericks scored at the beginning of the fourth quarter on a touchdown pass making the score 34-26 before a blocked extra point by Jaxon Johnson made it a two-score game with the Wildcats leading by 8.   

“It was a bit of a motivation boost for us as it helped us put a little more pressure on them making it a two-score game,” Johnson said.  

WSC got the ball back and scored with a touchdown pass by Nick Bohn to David Elder to make it 41-26. Minnesota State marched the ball down field one last time to make the score 41-33.  

The attendance for the homecoming football game was 2,118. The Wildcats will play on the road Next week at Augustana University in Sioux Falls South Dakota on Oct. 15 at 1:00 p.m.