Homecoming Heartbreak; Bronchos drop first loss of the season to Pittsburg State

The UCO Bronchos football team lost for the first time this season against the highly regarded Pittsburg State Gorillas 35-21 in a game that shakes up the MIAA conference standings and national rankings. 

The Gorillas got off to a hot start early, scoring on their first drive thanks to a Chad Dodson pass to Kuron Parchmon on 3rd down for 41-yards. Cleo Chandler Jr., the Gorillas biggest weapon in this game, began the game of his life with the 17-yard touchdown on the very next play. The Gorillas would force a three and out and would march down the field for another touchdown to make this game 14-0 in less than five minutes. The Bronchos would find some groove with a classic Jett Huff pass to Terrill Davis for a 13-yard touchdown. Davis would end up with nine catches for 119-yards and two touchdowns. He became just the seventh Broncho receiver of all time to have 1,000-yards in a season and the third receiver to have 10 or more touchdowns in a single season.

The Gorillas emptied their playbook with all sorts of trickery including a 66-yard run by fullback/tight end Luke Niggemann to put the Gorillas up 21-7. The Bronchos would quickly strike back with an Ashton Schumann 10-yard touchdown score, but Pittsburg State came back swinging with a touchdown of their own. A four minute Broncho drive would end with a missed 31-yard field goal from Nicky Quevado sending the game into halftime 28-14. The Bronchos struck back to open the second half on Terrill Davis’ second touchdown of the game, this time for 16 yards. Then the game stalled out. 

No one could score for most of the second half. The defenses stood tall on both sides. Forcing a combined 15 total punts on the game. Central fought as much as they could, but the Gorilla defense was able to shut down the running back duo of Jaylen Cotrell and William Mason, holding the pair to just 74-yards combined and holding the entire team to 92 rushing yards as well. 

This forced Jett Huff to throw the ball 61 times. Huff completed 29 passes of those. The Bronchos failed to score the rest of the game and the Gorillas put the game out of reach thanks to another Cleo Chandler Jr touchdown. The redshirt junior from Texas had a career day with 19 rushing attempts for 130-yards and two touchdowns. As the Gorillas would spoil the Bronchos homecoming with the 14 point victory in Edmond.

Despite the loss, however, the Bronchos are in good spirits. 

“We just gotta win out,” said Broncho linebacker Jack Puckett. “We got a lot of season ahead of us and I’ll ride with this group 10 times out of 10.” 

While the loss may sting for Broncho fans and players. The team is not letting it define them as they look forward to bouncing back next week on the road at Missouri Western. 

The Missouri Western Griffons have a 3-5 overall record and are 2-5 in the conference. They had a bye-week after losing to Nebraska Kearney by one point in their homecoming. The Bronchos and the Griffons will battle it out on Nov. 2 at 2 p.m.