The athletic fall season is not going well for the university, as the teams lose in heartbreakers and close games against their opponents.
Cowboys Football
McNeese State dropped to 1-1 on the season after a 34–10 loss to the University of Louisiana-Lafayette in front of a lively UL home crowd at Our Lady of Lourdes Stadium.
Late in the first quarter, McNeese tied the score at 7–7 with a 2-yard rushing touchdown by redshirt freshman Devin Lippold, capping an 80-yard drive. However, UL-Lafayette responded strongly. Just before halftime, redshirt sophomore running back Bill Davis burst through for a 36-yard touchdown, putting UL-Lafayette up by 14-7.
Early in the third quarter, McNeese senior Fabrizio Pinton kicked a 45-yard field goal for McNeese, cutting the UL lead to 17–10. The Cajuns, however, gradually expanded their lead, and with less than four minutes remaining in the third quarter, Daniel Beale found Landon Baptiste for a 10-yard touchdown throw, and Tony Sterner added two additional field goals in the fourth quarter. The game’s final score came late in the fourth quarter when Cajun Steven Blanco burst downfield with a 34-yard touchdown run to seal the victory 34–10.
McNeese quarterback Jake Strong threw 191 yards in the game, but the ground game lacked explosiveness compared to UL’s 315 yards.
“We didn’t run the ball good enough,” said McNeese Coach Matt Viator. “They ran the ball better than we did, they stopped the run better than we did… the positives, I went over with our players yesterday, I thought our effort was great. The competitive spirit was really, really good… all in all, despite not running the ball and not stopping the run, we had a chance.”
McNeese takes on Weber State at Navarre Stadium Saturday at 6 p.m.
Cowgirls Soccer
The soccer team fell to 1-6-2 this season after losing to Tarleton State and Sam Houston. McNeese struggled to score in both games, losing 0-4 to Tarleton on Sunday and 1-3 to Sam Houston on Thursday.
The Cowgirls will head out to Texas to face Stephen F. Austin Sept. 18 in their first conference game of the season.
Cowgirls Volleyball
The volleyball team hosted the Cowgirl Classic at McNeese Sept. 4 -6 , where they won their first game against Alcorn in a 3-0 set match Sept. 4. Unfortunately for the Cowgirls, they lost a close game against UT-Arlington in a 2-3 set match the next day, followed by a loss to UL-Monroe in a 1-3 set match Sept. 6.
“I love the fight in this team, obviously not pleased with the end result,” Head Coach Sasha Karelov said. “We weren’t playing our best volleyball and we were still finding ways to stay in the fight.”
The Cowgirls did not fare any better in Florida in their games against Florida A&M and Georgia State, losing 2-3 against Florida A&M Thursday and then falling 0-3 against Georgia State in today’s match.
The Cowgirls will return home to play against Southern University Sept. 16 at 6:30 p.m.
