Ball State football put together a solid defensive performance against UMass, allowing 259 yards through the air and 189 yards on the ground, with only allowed 10 points.
UMass' offense had managed to score 35 points against Toledo's stout defense, as well as to put up 27 on Notre Dame and 38 on Bowling Green.
The Minutemen's top receiver Tajae Sharpe came into the game leading the nation in receptions and was top ten in yardage. While he may have been injured, head coach Pete Lembo knows he is a tough guy to stop.
“If he tweaked [his leg], maybe the football gods were helping us,” Lembo said. “Tweaked or not, he's a great player and he made some great plays today, but I thought we contained him.”
Right from the get-go, it was all Sharpe, bringing in five receptions for 54 yards in the first quarter alone with four of them coming on the same drive.
In the remaining three quarters, Sharpe recorded 6 receptions for 29 yards.
Some time during the second quarter, Sharpe appeared to injure his right leg on a play, and trainers looked at him and taped him up on the sidelines.
UMass' offense missed its top weapon, accumulating 89 yards of total offense in the first quarter and 359 in the final three. The yards per play dropped by a significant margin, from 6.35 to 5.44.
While Sharpe appeared to be running slower and his cuts weren't as clean, corner back David Moore attributed his drop-off in yards and receptions to the defensive coordinator's play calls of Kevin Kelly.
“I think it was great play-calling by Coach Kelly,” Moore said. “If he was injured or not, I wouldn't know.”
While the Cardinals run defense let up a high 5.2 yards per carry, the passing defense held its own, allowing 5.9 yards per attempt and 8.1 yards per completion.
Looking at the statistics, some would think that UMass would have put up a large amount of points on Ball State's defense. The reason they didn't was due to the defense allowing yards during the drive but stepping up in the red zone.
UMass was forced to settle for two field goal attempts while only hitting one, and quarterback Blake Frohnapfel threw a costly interception in the end zone right to linebacker Ben Ingle, who recorded his first interception of the season.
The Cardinals will need the defense to have another good performance as they travel to Western Michigan on Nov. 5.
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