Morris Wins Ugly Behind DeGraffenreid's Kick Return

The Cougars of the Univeristy of Minnesota Morris were able to limp away from Big Cat Stadium with an ugly, hard-fought victory over the Martin Luther College this afternoon, beating the Knights by a score of 10-0. In a wildly different game from last season's matchup where the two teams combined for over 800 yards of offense and 84 points, the defenses ran the show for both sides today. 13 seconds into the game, UMM already had all of the scoring they would need to win after Dalton DeGraffenreid returned the opening kickoff 88 yards for the touchdown. The only other scoring of the game came in the second quarter when Cameron Adel hit a 25 yard field goal after Morris stalled in the red zone.

While a win is a win, and you are always happy to start conference play with a W, Morris cannot be happy with the way they played today. A 10 point victory, in which your offense is unable to get into the end zone, at home, against one of the bottom teams in the conference does not inspire hope for any sort of serious contention in the UMAC for the Cougars this season. In fact, in many ways, the Knights controlled the game. MLC accumulated 17 1st downs compared to 8 for UMM and won the total yardage battle 201 to 178. However, Martin Luther continually shot themselves in the foot putting the football on the ground 8 times, losing 5 of those fumbles in addition to throwing an interception. 6 turnovers combined with Martin Luther's inability to score in the red zone and DeGraffenreid's big play on special teams kep the Knights from ever seriously contending.

The Cougars rotated Derrick Foss and Dan Gerrigan at quarterback throughout the game without either looking particularly strong. Gerrigan appeared slightly better and demonstrated more mobility but finished only 4-8 for 42 yards in addition to throwing an interception. As the old saying goes, 'If you have 2 quarterbacks you don't really have any.' Morris is going to need to figure their quarterback situation out as the season goes on if they hope to fix their offensive woes. All-conference running back Leandro Dower had an average day by his standards rushing for 76 yards on 21 carries. Dower looked explosive at times but was shut down by a tough Martin Luther front for the majority of the game. He will need to have much bigger games in the future for the Cougars for their offense to move the football.


Martin Luther successfully kept themselves around in an ugly game in typical MLC fashion. Their defense looked very strong with Paul Spaude, Derek Loewen, and Conrad Dewey all finishing with 8 tackles. The Knights defense certainly has the look of one that can present some problems to opposing offenses throughout the season. However, their offense was virtually inept today. Quarterback Matthew Olson finished with disgusting passing numbers at 3-18 for 38 yards. Olson did rush for 109 yards, but that was over 36 carries for an average of only 3 yards per carry. Without any sort of passing attack, Martin Luther will struggle to keep themselves in games if they are not able to get ahead early and stay out of 3rd and long situations.

Overall, neither team can leave this game feeling particularly good about themselves. However, Morris can be happy to escape with a win and a shutout. They will need to build on this defensive performance and hope their offense can figure something out in the upcoming weeks. Martin Luther kept it close and did some things well, but appears to be extremely limited offensively. Both teams need to improve greatly in a short amount of time to have a chance at beating any of the teams in the top half of the UMAC.