Arkansas Business

This story is from the archives of ArkansasSports360.com.

Why Arkansas State Won
Key field position from Florida International turnovers led to multiple Red Wolves scores as Arkansas State bounced back from a missed field goal to score five times behind Ryan Aplin’s 15 of 23 passing for 223 yards and one score through the air and ground each. The defense benefited from playing against FIU’s (1-5, 0-2) first freshman at quarterback since 2002 and limited the Panthers to 341 yards of total offense and just six 3rd down conversions. J.D. McKissic once again led the Red Wolves in receiving with a career high 124 yard on five catches, giving him an average of 24.8 yards per catch and one touchdown.

Turning Point
After Neely Sullivent pinned FIU inside its own 10-yard line late in the second quarter, freshman quarterback E.J. Hillard made his first big mistake of the game when instead of finding a Panther receiver, he passed to ASU’s Sterling Young at the FIU 36 yard line. Young then returned the ball all the way to the Panther seven-yard line to set up David Oku’s one-yard plunge giving the Red Wolves a 14-10 lead before half time.

Player Of The Game: David Oku
The junior didn’t have many rushing yards, in fact he only had 53, but Oku was responsible for three touchdowns Thursday night. The total marks a new career high for Oku, who earned two against Alcorn State a couple of weeks ago.

All three of his touchdown runs were from less than five yards out of the end zone and two of them capped off drives that started inside the Golden Panthers own 30 yard line because of turnovers. Oku's running helped open things up for the passing game.

All Timer
Through five games the Red Wolves had been lacking big plays, only producing 22 plays of more than 20 yards. That changed with 11:46 left in the first half when Aplin, after an impressive play action fake, found J.D. McKissic wide open behind the secondary for a 74-yard touchdown to give the Red Wolves their first lead of the night. The play was a career long for both players and it moved Aplin into first place on the Sun Belt’s All-Time career total offense list.

Aplin scored with 12 minutes left in the third quarter on a 10-yard run to make it 21-10 ASU.

Turnovers
In its best turnover performance since playing Nebraska, the defense forced E.J. Hillard, Florida International’s freshman starting quarterback, into throwing two interceptions that would give the Red Wolves the edge needed to stay on top.

Sterling Young picked off his first pass of the season with less than a minute to go in the first half, when he stepped in front of a pass at FIU’s own 36 and followed blockers down the sideline before being pushed out at the seven.

Then it was Qushaun Lee’s turn to make up for his suspension against WKU last week when he grabbed a Hillard pass at the FIU 28 with 8:45 left in the 3^rd, leading to Oku’s second touchdown run.

Fourth Down
ASU’s defense finished Thursday night having given up three of four conversions on 4^th down. One them coming on a fake punt, where FIU’s punter Josh Brisk took the ball and ran almost 33 yards untouched for the first down deep into Red Wolves territory setting up a 19 yard touchdown pass from E.J. Hillard to Jacob Younger. That score made it 10-7 FIU with 4:30 left in the first half.

Kicking Issues
Brian Davis had been on a roll going into Thursday’s game, having made five straight field goals. That streak ended quickly on the Red Wolves first drive of the game, when Davis missed a 43-yard attempt wide left.

In the 3^rd quarter, Davis missed a chip shot on an extra point to make it 27-13 in favor of Arkansas State.

Early Problems
While Thursday’s game was a marked improvement for the Red Wolves, they still cannot lay claim to a complete four quarters. The Red Wolves had to settle for punts on three of their first four drives with the fourth ending in the missed field goal.

FIU’s first points of the game originated from another bad punt by ASU, when Neely Sullivent sent one kick only 21 yards, where it went out of bounds at ASU’s own 39-yard line.

Speaking Out
“This was going to be a defining game for our season – not a must win, but close. It was tough on a short week and it took a great effort.”
— Head coach Gus Malzahn

UP NEXT
Arkansas State (3-3, 1-1) returns to Jonesboro for Homecoming in nine days to take on South Alabama (1-4, 0-1) in the first meeting of the two teams since the Jaguars joined the Sun Belt conference for football. USA will be coming off a bye week after losing to Troy and their only win being a 9-3 win over Nicholls State. The game kicks off Oct. 13 at 6 p.m. at Liberty Bank Stadium.