Senior tailback Marcus Crawford pounded in for two short touchdown runs, the second of which came with eight minutes remaining in the game, to lift Lindenwood to a 14-10 Senior Day win over visiting Avila in Heart of America Athletic Conference action on Saturday in St. Charles.
Avila opened the scoring on their initial possession of the game, marching 75 yards in 16 plays, finishing it on a fourth-down trick play which saw one wide receiver – Jonas Serfozo – toss a 15-yd. TD pass to another wide receiver, Chad Rivera. The Eagles took that lead into the second quarter, before Crawford scored his first TD of the game on a 6-yd. run, capping a 12-play, 75-yd. drive.
"Both teams came out and really played hard," said Lion head coach Patrick Ross, who saw his career record move to 37-18 with the win. "We knew from watching Avila's film all season that they were a much-improved football team, and we knew we were going to have to play well to beat them."
The game stayed at 7-7 at the intermission, a low score considering neither team punted in the first half. Lion junior tailback Hakeem Abdullah racked up 116 rushing yards on 17 first half carries, but the Lions saw one drive end in a fumble deep in Avila territory, and another come up empty when freshman Haley Farrell missed a short second quarter field goal. Their only other possession in the first half was the one which ended on Crawford’s first TD.
"It was kind of a strange game in that both teams moved the ball pretty well most of the time, but there weren't a lot of points being scored," said Ross. "We shot ourselves in the foot a couple of times when we got down there in the first half, and they really battled poor field position all day."
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