UNI unwraps a gift and outlasts Wofford, 28-21

CEDAR FALLS - Referee Jason McArthur just stood there as the football wobbled in the end zone at his feet.

He didn't blow his whistle, didn't wave his arm back and forth over his head for a touchback. Nothing.

It took a few seconds for a pack of Northern Iowa players, and the 6,915 fans at the UNI-Dome, to figure out what was going on. They all seemed to realize it at the same time.

The crowd yelled, UNI's Phil Wright picked up the ball, and everyone looked at McArthur. Touchdown, they wondered?

Touchdown. An absolutely weird one that ended up giving Northern Iowa a 28-21 win over Wofford in a head scratcher of a FCS second-round playoff game Saturday night.

"We just saw the ref kind of stand back," Wright said. "It was like it was too good to be true. This doesn't ever happen. We jumped on it and took our touchdown."

Hard to believe a team could rush for 466 yards, outgain its opponent by an over two-to-one margin, own a 10-minute advantage in time of possession and lose. Hard to believe Wofford kick returner Stephon Shelton's brain cramp of a lifetime.

Shelton backpedaled into the end zone as he reached over his head to field Tyler Sievertsen's kickoff four seconds into the fourth quarter and moments after UNI took a 21-14 lead on David Johnson's 1-yard touchdown run. He began meandering away, as Northern Iowa's kick-coverage team flew toward him and Zach Cutkomp of the Panthers took a swipe at the ball, knocking it to the turf.

Shelton didn't care, believing the play was dead. It wasn't because he hadn't kneeled.

"It takes a couple of seconds, then it hits you," said Wright, a sophomore wide receiver, playing just his fourth game. "You don't expect that to happen. We just took advantage of it."

"Everyone on the sideline was like 'Did that really just happen.' We didn't know what was going on," said UNI quarterback Tirrell Rennie.

What was going on was another costly Terriers mistake that ultimately decided this game and helped move fifth-seeded UNI (10-2) onto next weekend's quarterfinals at No. 4 Montana (10-2). Wofford (8-4) had two fumbles in UNI territory, missed a 35-yard field goal at the end of the first half and had the aforementioned Shelton called for roughing the kicker on Sievertsen's chip-shot 20-yarder.

UNI took that gift, which led to Johnson's TD. Then the Panthers took another immediate gift.

"I did a poor job of coaching in some situations, and it showed today," said Wofford Coach Mike Ayers. "I wish I'd have done a better job. If I had, we'd have won the game."

UNI's Mark Farley won it instead and offered no apologies. This was payback for that upset home loss last season in the playoffs to Lehigh.

The Panthers got two TD passes from Rennie to Jared Herring but were mostly outplayed, to tell the truth, having a difficult time with Wofford's triple-option rushing attack. But, hey, this is the playoffs, man.

They don't ask you how you advanced, just if you advanced.

"Stats mean nothing," Farley said. "We're moving on, and that's what we came here to do."

One thing you can do to overcome an option team is get ahead of it, and that's exactly what UNI did, taking the opening kickoff and marching 72 yards for a quick score: a 22-yard Rennie-to-Herring pass. But Wofford did what Wofford does on its first possession, methodically moving the football downfield, taking 16 plays and 8:38 to cover 81 yards, with Eric Breitenstein plunging over from the 3.

That was the first of three TDs for the junior running back. His 3-yarder brought Wofford within 28-21 with two minutes to go. UNI recovered an onside-kick attempt, though Sievertsen eventually missed a 47-yard field goal short. That gave Wofford the ball at its 29 with 53 seconds remaining, but the Terriers are the proverbial duck out of water in passing situations, and Northern Iowa's defense forced a four-and-out to end it.

Quarterback Mitch Allen, who completed just 3 of 8 passes for 21 yards but rushed for a team-high 156 yards, was sacked by August Hadenfeldt on fourth down.

"Every team in the playoffs is good," said UNI linebacker James Conley. "It's win or go home. We knew we didn't want to go home."