The longest winning streak in all of college football came to an end at 17 games Thursday night as Central Washington University used a late field goal to pull out a 13-10 victory over the University of Minnesota Duluth.
A national television audience and the second largest Malosky Stadium crowd ever -- 5,389 -- saw the defending NCAA Division II champion Bulldogs fall for the first time since Oct. 27, 2007 and go to 1-1 on the year. No. 9 Central Washington, a former colleague of UMD's in the now-defunct North Central Conference, remained unbeaten at 2-0.
The No. 2 Bulldogs took a 10-3 lead into halftime on a 2-yard run by junior All-American running back Isaac Odim and sophomore placekicker David Nadeau's 20-yard field goal, but were blanked in the final 30 minutes of play and had two field goal attempts blocked during that stretch (including a 48-yard try on the final play of the night).
Johnny Spevak capped off a nine-play, 76-yard drive by hauling in a 6-yard scoring pass from Ryan Robertson on Central Washington's first possession of the third quarter to pull even and Garrett Rolsma booted a 24-yard field goal with 4:13 remaining in regulation to secure the victory.
UMD held the edge over the Wildcats in total yards (340 to 267), first downs (19 to 18) and time of possession (33:19 to 26:41), but were racked up 99 yards worth of penalties with most of those coming at critical times.
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Odim topped all rushers with 120 yards on 25 carries, marking the 11th time he eclipsed the 100-yard barrier added another 18 yards on a pair of catches. The Bulldogs lost starting quarterback Jon Lynch on the first series of the game with an elbow injury and true freshman Chase Vogler did an admirable job in his place, completing 13-of-22 passes for 126 yards with no interceptions. He also ran six times for another 48 yards.
"We let that one get away," said UMD coach Bob Nielson, who tasted defeat for the first time since his first tour of coaching duty in 2003. "It was difficult to be without three key people on offense (running back Brad Foss and wide receiver Noah Pauley were also sidelined with injuries) against a team like Central Washington. Yet, we hung in there and had our chances to win."
The Bulldogs will return to action on Sept. 12 to take on Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference rival Southwest Minnesota State University in their 2009 road debut.
