Too bad Rod Serling of Twilight Zone fame passed away in 1975 or he might have been the perfect guest for the coin toss at Eastern Washington’s football game with Drake last Saturday at Roos Field.
Had Serling been present as he approached his 100the birthday in December to witness the strange occurrences in the Eagles 35-32 overtime loss to the Bulldogs from Des Moines, Iowa it just might have fueled a football themed episode of the 'Zone?
No, not to the memorable level of airplane the passenger — played by a young William Shatner — seeing a gremlin clinging the wing outside his window at 30,000 feet, but strange nonetheless.
The afternoon was a day of firsts, and obviously not particularly the good kind for Eastern.
Drake and Eastern had never-before met on the football field. The Bulldogs were the defending 2023 Pioneer League champions and Eastern prepped to go 2-0 for the first time since 2021.
The game was played in the hottest temperature ever in Cheney for Eastern football. Officially it was 97 degrees, but the reader board on Washington Street peaked at 98.
And when Drake's Trey Radocha drug his toe just in bounds in the southeast corner of the red turf for the winning score in OT, the game ended at four hours, six minutes.
Whether that's a record kept in the Eastern archives or not, the game's length was not lost on people along the way who on more than one occasion offered thoughts that, "Gee, this seems like a long game?"
Sure enough, the first quarter's allotted 15 minutes on the scoreboard went over an hour on the clock.
The game featured the first of at least five official reviews in which referee Jim Crowley ordered the portable viewer brought out onto the field.
And like four of those instances, the first call of a touchdown by Eastern's Jeff Carpenter was overturned. That allowed Tuna Altar's one-yard TD for a 7-0 Eagles' lead moments later.
Not five minutes later came another review, and another reversal, this time an initial fumble recovery by Drake handed back to Eastern.
In defense of the reviews, it's better to be fixed in the first place rather than fume about the what-if?
Fast forward to the fourth quarter in which a friend's text suggested that neither team seemed to want to win the game.
Drake was playing in its first full game following a weather cancellation the previous week. But both teams seemed destined to trip over their own feet along the way.
It took just seconds into the third quarter for another replay, this one favoring Drake whose returner appeared to fumble the opening kickoff. Three plays later, including a 63-yard catch and run, the Bulldogs led 20-14.
But it wasn't all reviews that contributed to the bizarre nature of the game.
And then there were the penalties.
As the second quarter wound past the midpoint, Eastern quarterback Kekoa Visperas found Efton Chism III along the right sideline for a short pass and run that ultimately ended 69 yards down field at the Drake 2.
But an ineligible man downfield brought it all back. Instead of Eastern possibly leading 14-7, following a punt, Drake kicked a field goal for a 10-7 lead.
While Eastern had the edge in penalties and were flagged 10 times for 115 yards, Drake had its moments, too.
With under five minutes to play and tied at 29, Drake forced Eastern to punt on a fourth-and-two at the Eagle 49. But the Bulldogs were flagged for an illegal substitution — 12 men on the field.
Eastern retained possession only to fumble four plays later on the Drake 31.
Now the Eagles try to flush last week and prepare for this Saturday's non-conference rematch with 0-2 Southeast Louisiana in Hammond. Eastern won last year’s edition of the home-and-home match-up, 40-29.
And as if 90-degree temps and 90 percent humidity is not enough of an added foe, the area was scheduled for a midweek visit from hurricane Francine and up to a foot of rain.
Certainly, the perfect ending to a strikingly bizarre week of Eastern football.
Reader Comments(0)