HOUSTON — ACU running back
Herschel Sims had his first 100-yard rushing game as a Wildcat as he and a potent passing attack led the Wildcats to a dominating 59-14 win against Houston Baptist in a Southland Conference game at Husky Stadium.
The Wildcats have now won three straight to run their record to 3-2 overall and 2-0 in league play, while HBU falls to 1-3 and 0-1. ACU will return to Shotwell Stadium next weekend for a conference game against Lamar. Kickoff between the Wildcats and Cardinals is set for 6 p.m.
Sims — who ran for 96 yards on 20 carries against Troy before leaving the game with a concussion and then missed last week's game against Incarnate Word — ran for 128 yards and three touchdowns on 15 carries to lead an ACU offense that finished the game with 659 yards. He scored on touchdown runs of 3, 2 and 4 yards and had a long run of 62 yards on one of those touchdown drives.
ACU sophomore quarterback
Parker McKenzie had another spectacular night, completing 21 of 31 passes for 385 yards and four touchdowns, his fourth game with at least 300 yards passing on the season. McKenzie has now thrown for 1,594 yards and 14 touchdowns this season, both of which lead the Southland Conference. He hit nine different receivers — including himself for a 14-yard gain on a ball batted back toward him — in the game as he led the Wildcats to their first 50-point game of the season.
McKenzie's main target Saturday night was junior
Cade Stone, who recorded the first 100-yard receiving game of his career with seven catches for 121 yards and a pair of scores in the game.
ACU gave up a 46-yard touchdown pass on HBU's second offensive play of the night, but then the Wildcats reeled off 31 straight points to take a 31-7 lead midway through the second quarter. McKenzie hit
Cedric Gilbert with a 9-yard touchdown pass with 5:26 left in the first quarter to give ACU a 10-7 lead and then Sims scored each of ACU's next two touchdowns before McKenzie hit Stone with a 20-yard touchdown pass with 6:15 left in the half to make it 31-7.
After Houston Baptist scored on a 77-yard strike from Ka'Darius Baker to Darian Lazard to make it 31-14 with 4:48 left int he half, the Wildcats responded with a four-play, 73-yard drive that was capped by a 4-yard touchdown run from Sims to make it 38-14 at halftime. The key play in the drive was a 59-yard completion from McKenzie to
Jonathan Epps to move the ball down to the HBU 14-yard line.
ACU then salted the game away on the first two plays of the third quarter.
After freshman linebacker
Sam Denmark recovered a fumble by Taylor Thompson on the opening kickoff, McKenzie hit Stone on the ensuing play for a 19-yard touchdown just 16 seconds into the half to push the lead to 45-14. McKenzie finished his night with a 13-yard touchdown pass to Gilbert in the fourth quarter, and
Randy Gober picked up his second rushing touchdown of the season with 5:30 to play to cap the scoring.
While ACU was rolling up 659 yards of total offense, the Wildcat defense was busy limiting the Huskies to just 300 yards on 58 plays. Of those 300 yards, 187 of them came on four pass plays, giving the Huskies just 113 yards of total offense on their other 54 plays.
