Eastern Illinois junior Sean Payton had his 12th 300-yard passing day as the Panthers scored a 21-14 victory Saturday over Illinois State in Charleston. Payton threw two touchdown passes to Roy Banks, the second a 14-yarder in the third quarter that broke a 14-14 tie.
”Eastern`s passing game is great, but I felt we did a decent job against them,” said Illinois State coach Bob Otolski.”Roy Banks, as we expected, was a great receiver.”
It was the 75th meeting between the schools, the oldest rivalry between Illinois state teams. ISU leads the series 38-29-8.
Western Illinois has a freshman as its quarterback hero. Paul Singer led the Leathernecks to a 14-7 victory over Northern Michigan in Macomb, Ill. Singer threw a 26-yard TD pass to Mark Gartner to tie the score in the third quarter, then tallied the winning TD on a 3-yard run in the fourth period.
Top games
Eastern Illinois 21, Illinois State 14–Payton was 22 of 45 for 300 yards. DuWayne Pitts scored on a 1-yard run for EIU (3-3, 1-1). State (3-2-1, 1-2-1) scored on Steve Stull`s 74-yard pass to Chris Roberts and Jason Johnson`s 2-yard run.
Western Illinois 14, Northern Michigan 7–Singer was 10 of 18 for 115 yards to help Western (2-3) beat Northern (4-2) for the first time in their last 11 meetings. Northern was ranked seventh in Division II.
Colorado 38, Missouri 7–QB Mark Hatcher rushed for 151 yards and 3 TDs and passed for another score in Boulder, Colo., as the Buffaloes (4-1, 1-0)
beat Missouri (0-5, 0-1) for the first time since 1978.
Iowa State 22, Kansas 21–Don Poprilo scored on his only two carries in Ames, Ia., including the game-winner from three yards out with 2:45 left. State is 3-2, 1-0. Kansas is 4-2, 0-1.
Other games–Kent State (2-3) had four third-period TDs on its way to a 51-24 victory over Texas-El Paso in Kent, Ohio. Eric Wilkerson rushed for 123 yards and two TDs. Luther Johnson returned a kickoff 93 yards for a TD for UTEP (0-6). . . . Drake rallied from a 10-7 deficit with two TDs in a 40-second span and went on to beat Texas-Arlington 21-10 in Des Moines. Tim Ray scored twice for Drake (4-3). Texas-Arlington (2-3) lost four fumbles. . . . Erroll Peebles ran for 151 yards and a TD and Carl Boyd added 130 yards as Northern Iowa (5-1, 3-0) beat Indiana State (2-4) 24-7 in Cedar Falls, Ia. . . . Tony Brown scored two fourth-quarter TDs as Central Michigan (4-0, 3-0) rallied from a 17-0 deficit to a 24-17 victory over Western Michigan (0-5, 0-3) in Kalamazoo. . . . John Diettrich kicked field goals of 54, 53 and 46 yards to lead Ball State (3-3, 3-2) past Ohio U. (0-5, 0-3) 36-23 in Athens, Ohio. Ohio`s Dennis Swearingen was 31 of 58 for 355 yards and 3 TDs.
