Faced with fourth and one with less than six minutes remaining in regulation, Nate Davis stood on the 40-yard line and waved his hand, signaling to the coaches he wanted to go for the first down.
Trailing three points and unable to create momentum offensively, Davis figured it would be best to force feed the Cardinals' usually-reliable side of the ball. However, Ball State University coach Brady Hoke chose to punt the ball and put his team's fate in the hands of its defense.
"I thought defensively we had been in a pretty good groove from the middle of the second quarter on," Hoke said. "We had some three-and-outs and positive plays. So I thought with six minutes and three timeouts left we were in a good position to get the ball back."
The Cardinals' defense responded with its fifth three and out of the game, giving the ball back to the offense with 3:57 left in the fourth quarter. Davis said it was nice to be able to lean on the defense while the offense struggled to find its groove.
"The defense stepped up really big this week, especially in that last drive," Davis said. "I appreciate that for the offense. We had a bad first half and didn't play as well as we could, so it was great to see the defense playing well."
The bulk of Ball State's focus entering the game was placed on Western Michigan University receiver Jamarko Simmons, who is third in the nation in receptions with 69 and seventh in the nation in receiving yards with 806. Though Simmons finished with nine catches and 110 yards, the junior didn't record a touchdown. The Cardinals used a Cover 2 and Cover 3 base defense, forcing Simmons to catch the ball in front of the defensive backs, who immediately swarmed the junior.
Ball State nickelback Trey Buice said it was easier going against Simmons after defending Ball State's receivers every day in practice.
"Taking nothing away from [Simmons], when you cover Dante Love, Darius Hill, Joe Everett and Louis Johnson every day in practice, it makes coming out and defending the other team's receivers easier," Buice said. "No team has as many weapons as we do. Love is fast, Everett is quick, [Johnson] has great hands and runs great routes and Hill gives you that height challenge. You see one or two of those things in the opposing receiver, so covering them makes it easier."
After the offense scored with a little more than a minute left to play, the burden again fell on the defense to keep Western Michigan away from a last-second touchdown.
"We were fired up on defense to get the ball back," Knipp said. "We didn't want to just run the clock out; we wanted to make them punt and get the ball back. That helped us to make plays."
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