Record-setting day for Coe in 77-7 romp over Cornell

CEDAR RAPIDS - Never has a guy had this many receiving yards in a game. Never has the spread been this big.

Never has the Midwest Conference looked so good.

The 121st meeting in the longest college football rivalry west of the Mississippi River will be remembered for extremes, such as the final score: Coe 77, Cornell 7.

That's the largest margin of victory in this storied series, which Coe now leads either 67-50-4 or 66-51-4. There's a discrepancy in the records of the 1902 game, which each school claims was a victory.

There's no quarrel about this being Coe's 12th straight win over their Linn County mate. Nor that it has ever scored more points in a game, regardless of opponent.

"I wish we could have one more game," said Coe Coach Steve Staker. "I wish we could have not one more, but another game (after that), which leads to maybe another. But unless you win a national championship, you're going to go out with a loss. So I guess being able to win the last game of the season is a consolation prize. We'll take it."

Coe (6-4) dropped a heartbreaker last week to Dubuque that knocked it out of contention for the Iowa Conference championship and a third straight bid in the NCAA Division III playoffs.

So it was a loose bunch of Kohawks Saturday that racked up 635 yards and 11 touchdowns. Coe led at halftime, 49-7, basically running the football up the middle the entire fourth quarter.

Not a nice way to send Cornell (3-7) back to the Midwest Conference. This was the final IIAC game for the Rams after 14 seasons.

"It was really hard getting ready to play," said Coe quarterback Brad Boyle. "We just didn't have any focus at all this week in practice. We were just trying to have fun. I don't want to say we didn't care, but we haven't had a game where it didn't mean anything."

Boyle ended his prolific career with 333 yards passing and five total TDs, three passing and two rushing. The two-time Iowa Conference MVP set 11 school records in his three years as a starter, without question Coe's best quarterback ever.

He'll head to Chicago for optometry school after graduating in the spring.

"I had a great opportunity, great guys around me all the time," he said. "This year, we had all new skill guys, and they adapted great. The people around me were just great. Helped me out."

Guys like Jared Kuehner, for instance. The junior from Center Point-Urbana caught seven passes Saturday for a school-record 267 yards and three touchdowns.

They covered 47, 63 and 81 yards, as he was consistently able to get behind Cornell's defensive backs.

"I didn't expect this at all," Kuehner said. "I saw a lot of Cover 4, Cover 3 defense out of them, so there was a gap in between the corner and the safeties. We took advantage."

About the only good thing to happen for Cornell was a 63-yard TD run on a first-quarter quarterback draw by Juan Flores. That accounted for basically one-fourth of the Rams' total yards on a day that everyone would like to forget.

Well, not Coe, obviously. Despite being in different conferences for the first time since 1921, the schools are scheduled to continue their rivalry in 2012 and 2013.

They'll play next season in Week 2 at Mount Vernon.

"Always good to get a win for the seniors," Kuehner said. "We defintely wanted to go to the playoffs, but it just didn't work out. We're hoping for next year."

Here is the game boxscore:

TEAM STATISTICS

Cornell

Coe

First downs

12

26

Rushes-yards

29-124

50-302

Passing yards

122

333

Comp-Att-Int

17-29-3

13-20-0

Total yards

246

635

Fumbles-lost

5-3

2-1

Punts-average

6-30.7

1-64.0

Penalties-yards

9-59

5-45

Rushing:

 Cornell –

Jason Propheter 10-65 ,

Juan Flores 14-47,

Hayden Howard 3-8 ,

Beriah Quick 1--1 ,

 Coe –

Brendan Leiran 12-123 ,

Jacob Frederick 16-54,

Brad Boyle 7-37

Carvin Thompson 5-32 ,

Gage Mohs 4-21

Jacob Workman 3-13 ,

Jake Osborn 1-13 ,

Jared McNutt 1-7,

Joe Langenberg 1-2

Passing:

 Cornell –

Juan Flores 16-27-3-120,

Beriah Quick 1-2-0-2

 Coe –

Brad Boyle 13-19-0-333, Jared McNutt 0-1-0-0

Receiving:

 Cornell –

Justin Cox 8-54 ,

James Scully 6-59, Jason Propheter 2-4, Cal Huber 1-5

 Coe –

Jared Kuehner 7-267 ,

Nick Ratchford 2-29,

Keaton Juergens 2-24 ,

Brendan Leiran 2-13

Cornell

7

–

7

Coe

21

28

14

14

–

77

Coe - Brendan Leiran 12 run (Wes Anderson kick)

Coe - Leiran 4 run (Anderson kick)

Cornell - Juan Flores 63 run (Anthony Bridges kick)

Coe - Brad Boyle 1 run (Anderson kick)

Coe - Jared Kuehner 47 pass from Boyle (Anderson kick)

Coe - Kuehner 81 pass from Boyle (Anderson kick)

Coe - Jacob Frederick 1 run (Anderson kick)

Coe - Frederick 2 run (Anderson kick)

Coe - Kuehner 63 pass from Boyle (Anderson kick)

Coe - Boyle 4 run (Anderson kick)

Coe - Frederick 18 run (Anderson kick)

Coe - Jake Osborn 13 run (Anderson kick)

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