topper extra october 30, 2012

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Your source for WKU sports • October 30, 2012Your source for WKU sports • October 30, 2012

Tops take on Tops take on rival MTSUrival MTSU

6-2 Toppers 6-2 Toppers looking for bowllooking for bowl

Veteran D-line Veteran D-line starring for WKUstarring for WKU

Blue Raiders Blue Raiders to watchto watch

see page 3see page 3 see page 5see page 5 see page 7see page 7PHOTO BY JON HERNANDEZPHOTO BY JON HERNANDEZ

see page 4see page 4

OCTOBER 30, 2012 • TOPPER EXTRA • WKUHERALD.COMPAGE 2

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When WKU faced Middle Tennessee in Murfreesboro on Oct. 6 last season, the Toppers were winless through four games and looking for a spark to get them on the right track.

The stakes will be a little different when the Blue Raiders come to town on Thurs-day.

The Toppers beat a 1-3 MTSU team in double-overtime in that game and pro-ceeded to sweep the rest of their Sun Belt Conference schedule en route to a 7-5 season.

When WKU (6-2, 3-1 SBC) takes on MTSU (5-3, 3-1 SBC) in Smith Stadium at 8:15 p.m. on Thursday, the game will be more about bowl positioning than saving a season.

“This year is totally different,” coach Willie Taggart said. “Both teams are play-ing well and both teams have a lot to play for.”

Senior defensive end Cole Tischer, com-ing off of a two-sack game, said the Top-pers know MTSU will be looking for re-venge.

“They’ll defi nitely be looking for a win, just like we’re going to be looking to beat them,” Tischer said. “That double-over-time win was fun. That’s all I can say.”

While the Blue Raiders need one more win to become bowl-eligible, the Toppers earned eligibility on Saturday with a 14-6 road win over Florida International. They have four more regular season games to jockey for the best bowl berth they can receive.

Athletics Director Todd Stewart said representatives from several bowls have all seen WKU play this season. Bowl reps will have a chance to watch WKU this week as well — the game will be televised nationally on ESPNU.

The national TV audience will watch the Toppers deal with one of the Sun Belt’s best quarterback-receiver combinations, junior passer Logan Kilgore and senior wide receiver Anthony Amos.

Kilgore has thrown for 1,930 yards and 12 touchdowns this season.

Amos is his favorite target. The senior leads the Sun Belt in receptions (53), re-ceiving yards (794) and receiving yards per game (99.2). His 794 receiving yards are more than double that of MTSU’s sec-ond-leading receiver.

Sophomore safety Jonathan Dowling, WKU’s answer for opposing deep-threats at receiver, said he’s preparing for Amos as he would for any other opponent.

“We don’t feel one person can just beat us,” Dowling said. “I’m going to prepare

for their whole offense, not just him.”WKU will take part in its second and

fi nal Thursday game of the season this week. The Toppers beat Troy on the road in their last Thursday night game.

This time, the Toppers will have the benefi t of playing this month in front of a home crowd.

Expectations for fan turnout are high — WKU has already played in front of the largest and second-largest home crowds in school history this season, and the fi rst 5,000 fans to show up on Thursday will re-ceive a free red towel.

Stewart said he thinks the Thursdaygame will attract students.

“To me, Thursday is what it’s about forstudents, because it’s a game during theweek,” he said. “It’s not a Saturday gamewhere people may be going home. It’sa Thursday night game, it’s national TV,and we need our students to be out in fullforce.”

Taggart said fans should expect an excit-ing game against the Blue Raiders.

“Both teams are hungry and both teamswant something special,” he said. “We’llsee who wants it the most.”

LUCAS AULBACHSPORTS!WKUHERALD.COM

Safety Ryan Beard sacks MTSU quarterback Logan Kilgore in the fourth quarter of WKU's 36-33 win over the Blue Raiders last October in Floyd Stadium. The teams meet again at 8:15 p.m. Thursday in Smith Stadium. CHRISTIAN RANDOLPH/HERALD

Toppers face MTSU in high-stakes game


Coach Willie Taggart calls his offensive and defensive linemen ‘the tunnel work-ers’ because they’re the unnoticed heroes of the WKU football team.

The defensive line had a heroic perfor-mance against Florida International on Saturday, a night when not much else went right for the Toppers.

The line — comprised of four starting seniors — recorded nine sacks on the night.

Defensive end Quanterus Smith led the way with fi ve, a Sun Belt Conference single-game record.

Fellow end Cole Tischer had two sacks, while tackles Jamarcus Allen and Ram-mell Lewis each added one of their own.

Taggart said the linemen were the dif-ference-makers against FIU in the 14-6 WKU win.

“Our d-line has been playing outstand-ing all year long,” he said. “It’s great to see because all of those guys have been play-ing since freshmen.”

The Topper linemen have grown up with the WKU football program. WKU went 0-12 in 2009, the fi rst season of eli-gibility for the four starters — this year, they’ve helped the Toppers get off to a 6-2 start.

They have grown into the strongest de-fensive line in the Sun Belt Conference, ranking No. 1 in the league rushing de-fense and sacks.

Defensive line coach Eric Mathies has seen the linemen grow up. He said the struggles helped the starters and older re-serves, such as senior Kenny Martin, grow to become a determined crew.

“You’ve seen them and you see them on the fi eld — they went from the ‘Tiny Tack-

les’ back in the day to now, they’re a more mature group,” Mathies said.

Smith was the star on Saturday, but don’t call it a breakout game — he came into the game with 6.5 sacks on the year and currently leads the NCAA in sacks per game (1.64) while holding a tie for the lead in total sacks (11.5) and sack yards (79).

Taggart said Smith's fi ve-sack perfor-mance against FIU was the result of hard work in the offseason.

“That doesn’t happen every day in col-lege football, and it’s good for Q to be able to do that,” Taggart said. “The guy’s been working his tail off over the last few years and he’s starting to reap the benefi ts of working hard.”

Smith, who was named Sun Belt de-fensive player of the week for the second time this year on Monday, said a lot of

credit for some of those sacks has to go to the man playing next to him.

When Allen rushes the quarterback, Smith said, the tackle puts him in a posi-tion to make a play from the outside of the line.

“If (offensive linemen) see him coming inside, they might want to step outside,” Smith said. “It benefi ts.”

Allen, a three-year starter, is a team cap-tain and vocal leader for the Topper de-fense.

Mathies said Allen has earned the re-spect of his teammates by giving his all on every down, calling the tackle a “warrior.”

“I’ve watched the fi lm — the kid doesn’t take plays off,” he said. “He plays hard every snap and it helped in his develop-ment, too.”

The WKU defensive line will have a whole new look next year. All four starters

are playing in their last season of eligibil-ity — Allen has already graduated with a degree in sociology.

Of the 10 defensive linemen that aren’t seniors currently on the WKU roster, eight are freshmen.

Tischer said the underclassmen under-stand that their time to step up for the program is coming.

“They’re out here every day working as hard as we are doing what they do,” he said.

They also have the benefi t of playing be-hind seniors who have seen it all.

Taggart said the defensive line has grown into the strength of the Topper de-fense in the past fi ve years.

“They’ve been puppies and now they’re full-grown dogs, and they’re barking and they’re helping our football team.”

LUCAS AULBACHSPORTS!WKUHERALD.COM

WKU defensive end Quanterus Smith tackles Kentucky wide receiver La'Rod King during WKU's Sept. 15 win over the Wildcats. Smith set a Sun Belt Conference single-game record on Saturday with " ve sacks in a win against Florida International. JABIN BOTSFORD/HERALD

D-Line coming off dominating performance against FIU


Jerry Palm, CBS Sports

Toledo vs. WKULittle Caesars Bowl

Dec. 26, Detroit

Mark Schlabach, ESPN

Kent State vs. WKUGoDaddy.com BowlJan. 6, Mobile, Ala.

Bill Bender,Sporting News

Houston vs. WKUBeef O'Brady's BowlDec. 21, St. Peters-

burg, Fla.

Brad Edwards, ESPN

Toledo vs. WKUGoDaddy.com BowlJan. 6, Mobile, Ala.

College Football News

Northern Illinois vs. WKU

GoDaddy.com BowlJan. 6, Mobile, Ala.

A familiar process is going on in WKU’s athletic department, although this time the school is hoping for a different result.

WKU athletic representatives are currently pitching the 6-2 Topper football team to bowl sites and talking with represen-tatives from a number of bowls.

The school has also begun tak-ing ticket reservations from fans for a potential bowl game.

One season ago, WKU took these same steps, but the 7-5 Toppers were snubbed from the bowl process, becoming the only team with a winning record not to receive a bowl bid in 2011.

This year, athletics director Todd Stewart said, the school is doing everything it can do to avoid the same outcome.

“The main thing we’re trying to do is have non-stop dialogue with the bowls,” Stewart said.

The Sun Belt Conference has two direct bowl ties, the New Orleans Bowl (Dec. 22, New Or-leans) and the GoDaddy.com Bowl (Jan. 6, Mobile, Ala.)

Neither one of those bowls is contractually obligated to take the Sun Belt champion, though the two bowls would be a likely landing spot for a team that fi n-ished near the top of the league standings.

But several other bowls could take a Sun Belt team if the con-ferences with which the bowls are affi liated don’t have enough teams reach the six-win bowl eligibility threshold.

For example, the BBVA Com-pass Bowl (Jan. 5, Birmingham, Ala.) is contractually obligated to match an SEC team against a

Big East team.However, neither league may

have enough teams eligible, opening the door for an at-large team like the Toppers.

“I think it’s a better situation than last year in terms of where there’ll be openings,” Stewart said.

A GoDaddy.com Bowl rep was in Miami last weekend when the Toppers beat Florida Interna-tional.

Harold Graeter, associate ex-ecutive director of the Liberty Bowl, attended the Toppers’ Oct. 20 home loss to Louisiana-Monroe.

And a Beef O’ Brady's bowl

representative was on hand Sept. 22 for WKU’s home win against Southern Mississippi.

“Just like we’re talking to a number of bowls, should we be an at-large team needing a home, (bowls) do the same thing too,” Stewart said. “They do their homework.”

A big part of a team appearing attractive to bowl suitors is fan support, Stewart said.

Therefore, just minutes after WKU beat FIU on Saturday to become bowl eligible, a landing page appeared on WKUsports.com asking fans to reserve bowl tickets.

Fans can put down a single

$10 deposit to reserve all of theirtickets to the bowl game thatWKU is chosen to attend.

Once the bowl game is decidedand ticket prices are released,the $10 deposit will be used to-ward the overall price of the tick-ets bought.

If WKU isn’t selected for a bowl,those that put down a depositwill receive a full refund.

But Stewart said WKU isn’thoping that any refunds will beissued when the fi nal bowl se-lections are announced in earlyDecember.

“If we fi nish strong and wewin, then we’ll be in a great posi-tion,” Stewart said.

BRAD STEPHENSSPORTS!WKUHERALD.COM

WKU talking with several bowlsWKU BowlProjections

Screen shot of the wkusports.com home page advertising WKU's bowl eligibility.


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Career Opportunities Available

Anthony AmosNo. 6, Wide Receiver,

5-foot-11, 190 pounds

•Leads the Sun Belt Confer-ence with 99.3 yards per game receiving this season.•Had eight catches for 148 yards and a touchdown in a Oct. 13 win over Florida International.•Has 24 more catches than the team's next-leading receiver, junior Kyle Gris-would.

Logan KilgoreNo. 10, Quarterback, 6-foot-3, 194 pounds

•Was Phil Steele's selection as quarterback for the sec-ond-team midseason All-Sun Belt team.•Is completing 67 percent of his passes this year, trailing only WKU's senior Kawaun Jakes (69.7 per-cent) in the league.•Threw for a season-high 349 yards on Saturday in a win over North Texas.

Craig AllenNo. 35, Linebacker,

6-foot-2 ,230 pounds

•Is third in the Sun Belt this season with 41 solo tackles, and has 61 tackles overall.•Had a season-best 15 tack-les in an Oct. 6 loss to Louisi-ana-Monroe.•Runs the 40-yard dash in 4.5 second.

Kevin ByardNo. 20, Safety,

5-foot-11, 220 pounds

•Was named a second-team midseason all-Sun Belt selec-tion by Phil Steele.•Has 48 tackles, two intercep-tions and a forced fumble this season.•Returned an interception 68 yards for a touchdown in a Sept. 15 win over Memphis.

Blue Raiders to watch

topper extra october 30, 2012

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