SPOKANE, Wash. – Whitworth University, coming off its first loss of the season, returns home to host Pacific Lutheran in a Northwest Conference football game on Saturday in the Pine Bowl. The game kicks off at 1:00 pm and will be heard live in Spokane on KSBN 1230am and on the internet at KSBN.net. The radio broadcast will begin at 12:45 pm (PDT). Local television station SWX will televise the game at 4:00 pm in Spokane on channel 6.2 and regionally on other outlets. Rob Jesselson will do play by play while Mike Peterson provides color commentary.
Saturday's game is also part of Homecoming/Family/Hall of Fame weekend at Whitworth.
Whitworth (4-1 overall, 1-1 NWC) is coming off a 42-7 loss at 7th-ranked Linfield, which dropped the Pirates out of both Division III football polls. PLU is 2-2 overall and 1-1 in the NWC after earning a 38-37 win at Lewis & Clark last Saturday.
Masks are required to be worn at all times in the Whitworth Pine Bowl, regardless of vaccination status. Please plan accordingly.
The Pirates: Linfield scored on the first play from scrimmage and built a 35-0 halftime lead on the way to a 42-7 win over Whitworth during the Wildcats' Homecoming Game last Saturday in McMinnville, Oregon. Linfield outgained the Pirates 508-246, including a 191-15 edge in rushing yards.
Caleb Christensen made his first start at QB and completed 11 of 18 passes for 72 yards with an interception in the first half. Jaedyn Prewitt played the second half, completed 13 of 21 passes for 159 yards, and ran for Whitworth's only touchdown with a minute to play. Jerusalem To'oto'o caught seven passes for 77 yards, while Jarvis Natividad had four catches for 64 yards. Solomon Hines ran 13 times for 40 yards to lead the ground game.
BJ Mullin and Derrick Platt led the Whitworth defense with seven tackles apiece. Dylan Ventress made six stops, including the Pirates' only sack of the game. Jaylen Gonzales had five tackles, forced two fumbles and broke up a pass at the line of scrimmage.
Alvaro Campos-Ontiveros punted nine times for an average of 37.8 yards. Nate RaPue missed his only field goal attempt in the fourth quarter, only the second miss of his career. Linfield's special teams limited Whitworth's kickoff returns to an average of 14.6 yards.
Whitworth saw its nine-game winning streak come to an end.
Team Captains: The Pirate team captains in 2021 are Jaedyn Prewitt and Cody Bollig from the offense and Bryce Hornbeck and BJ Mullin from the defense. A special teams captain will be selected on a week-by-week basis. Last week it was Dylan Ashbeck.
Extended Home Slate: Whitworth will play six home games in 2021, two non-conference contests and four Northwest Conference dates. The last time the Pirates had six home games during the regular season was 2018, which is the last time Whitworth won a Northwest Conference title.
Bryce Stands Tall: Despite the fact that he is one of the smaller players on Whitworth's roster, Bryce Hornbeck has come up huge for Whitworth's defense the last three seasons. After he did not get much playing time in his first two years, Hornbeck has owned one corner spot since 2019. He had four interceptions that season and five deflections. He added three interceptions in 2020-21 with four breakups. He returned an interception for a touchdown each of those two seasons. He has three picks this fall and now has nine career interceptions at Whitworth.
The Ironman: Colton Chelin has not missed a start, much less a game, in his Pirate career. The senior cornerback has started every game since stepping on campus for the 2019 season, when he was the Northwest Conference Freshman of the Year. He has seven career interceptions and 21 passes defended in his career.
Prewitt Can Do It: Jaedyn Prewitt, who threw nine passes over the course of his first two seasons, worked his way to becoming Whitworth's starting QB last spring. All he did was complete 62 of 103 passes (60.2%) for 1,074 yards with 11 touchdowns and two interceptions. He established career highs with 458 passing yards, 23 completions, 38 attempts and four touchdowns in the season-ending win over Pacific Lutheran.
Mr. Touchdown: If there was an official statistic for touchdowns per reception, Ethan Peloquin would likely have been a national leader in that category last spring. Half of his 14 receptions went for touchdowns. He had at least one in each of the four games. Four of those touchdown receptions came on either third or fourth down. He leads the team with four touchdown catches in 2021.
The Anchor: Cody Bollig is in his second season as Whitworth's full-time starter at left tackle. He has played in every game of his Pirate career, beginning as a major contributor during his freshman campaign.
Nearly Nate Ra-Perfect: Nate RaPue was selected as the "In the Huddle" Division III Special Teams Player of the Year last spring after he made all six of his field goals and all 19 of his extra points. So far in 2021 he is 6-8 in field goals, with a new long of 49 yards, and 13-13 in PATs.
Shutout Avoided: Whitworth scored against Linfield with 1:04 to play to avoid the Pirates' first shutout since a 35-0 loss at Linfield on Nov. 9, 2002, a stretch of 179 straight games. It is the longest stretch of games between shutouts in Pirate football history. The second longest stretch of starts between shutouts is 77 games from midway through the 1994 season until the Linfield game in 2002.
National Rankings: Whitworth fell out of the top 25 in both the D3football.com poll and the AFCA Division III Coaches Poll. The Pirates are listed fourth among "others receiving votes" in the D3football.com and fifth in that list in the AFCA ranking.
NWC Poll: Whitworth was second in the 2021 NWC preseason coaches poll with 43 points and one first place vote. Linfield (49 points, 7 first place votes) was first and Pacific (Ore.) (35 points) was third. Coaches cannot vote for their own school.
Winning the Opener: Following a season-opening victory over Carnegie Mellon, Whitworth has now won seven of its eight season-openers under head coach Rod Sandberg. The Pirates are 5-1 at home and 2-0 on the road. Whitworth's only season-opening loss under Sandberg was a 50-49 OT setback to Central (Iowa) in 2016. The Pirates defeated the Dutch 56-13 in Pella, Iowa during the season opener the next season.
Looking back at last "season": Whitworth played four games, but only two opponents, in 2020-21 after the season was delayed until February and March because of COVID-19. The Washington members of the Northwest Conference played only each other in all fall and winter sports.
The Pirates opened with a 53-6 win over Puget Sound and beat the Loggers 30-12 in Tacoma in game three. After beating Pacific Lutheran 28-10 on the road in the second game, Whitworth closed the spring with a 56-23 win over the Lutes at home.
Leading the Evergreen State: Since Rod Sandberg took over as Whitworth's head coach in 2014, Whitworth University has the best winning percentage of any football playing university in Washington State. Heading into 2021, the Pirates are 51-14 since 2014, a winning percentage of 78.5. That figure is better than the University of Washington (58-27, .682), Washington State (47-34, .580), Eastern Washington (59-24, .710), Central Washington (45-21, .682), Pacific Lutheran (24-33, .421) and Puget Sound (31-31, .500).
Seven in a Row: With the win at Puget Sound last March, Whitworth clinched its seventh consecutive winning season under head coach Rod Sandberg. That matched the longest streak of winning campaigns in school history, set between 1959 and 1965.
On the Air Again: Whitworth's games are once again carried live this season on KSBN 1230am in Spokane. The relationship between Pirate athletics and KSBN goes back to 1994, a span of 25 years. Bud Nameck, familiar to listeners in Spokane as the (now retired) longtime host of the KXLY 920am Morning News, is in his seventh season as the voice of the Pirates in 2021. He was the voice of Washington State University men's basketball for 22 years, and spent that same amount of time on the Cougar football broadcasts – the final three on play by play. He is a longtime resident of the Inland Northwest who began his career as the Sports Information Director and radio voice of Gonzaga University basketball and baseball in the 1980s.
Two SWX Broadcasts: Local cable station SWX will carry two of Whitworth's games this season: the Oct. 2nd game against Lewis & Clark and this week's contest against Pacific Lutheran. Rob Jesselson will do play by play while Mike Peterson provides color commentary. SWX stands for Sports & Weather Right Now and is owned by local NBC affiliate KHQ channel 6. SWX can be seen both over-the-air and through some cable services in the Spokane-Coeur d'Alene, Kennewick-Pasco-Richland, and Yakima viewership areas. In the Spokane-Coeur d'Alene area, SWX is found on digital channel 6.2, on Comcast channel 112 in Spokane and Time Warner channel 306 in North Idaho. Click here for a complete list of station numbers throughout the Eastern Washington/North Idaho region.
The Head Coach: In seven seasons Rod Sandberg has entrenched himself in the Whitworth and NCAA record books as the Pirates' head football coach. Sandberg has guided the Pirates to a 51-14 record over that span, including two appearances in the NCAA Division III playoffs (2015 and 2018). He is in second place in total victories in school history and no Pirate coach reached 50 victories as quickly as Sandberg. Sandberg's winning percentage of .785 is the best among Whitworth coaches with at least five seasons and currently ranks among the top 10 active coaches in all of Division III. He coached the Pirates to only the fourth unbeaten regular season in school history (9-0) in 2018 and only the second NCAA playoff victory (48-6 over Claremont-Mudd-Scripps). The Bucs' 15-game winning streak, counting the final five games of 2017 and the first ten of 2018, is the second-longest in school history. Whitworth was 6-4 in 2014, Sandberg's first season, the best first-year record for a Pirate football coach since Rod Enos led the team to a 6-3 mark in 1965. Sandberg spent 19 seasons on the defensive staff at Wheaton College (Ill.), including the last 11 as defensive coordinator. Wheaton made the NCAA Division III playoffs five times during Sandberg's tenure as defensive coordinator. The team never lost a first round playoff game and reached the Division III semifinals in 2008 and quarterfinals in 2003. Sandberg's 2007 and 2013 squads led the Collegiate Conference of Illinois and Wisconsin, regarded as one of the strongest football leagues at the Division III level, in scoring defense. The Thunder were second in the league in scoring defense five other times.
The Lutes: Pacific Lutheran carries the momentum of an emotional win at Lewis & Clark into this week's contest at Whitworth. The Lutes (2-2 overall, 1-1 NWC) defeated the Pioneers 38-37 to go to 2-2 for the first time since 2018. PLU is scoring 25.5 points per game while allowing 29.5 points per contest. The Lutes average 346.5 yards per game while giving up 340.3.
Brant McAdams is in his fourth season as head coach at PLU. McAdams was previously the defensive coordinator at Trinity (Texas), his alma mater, for five seasons. He was also the defensive coordinator at Puget Sound for three years prior to Trinity.
Erik Bainter leads the offense as a dual threat quarterback. The junior has completed 61.5% of his passes for 620 yards with three touchdowns and five interceptions. He has run for 228 yards, with a 5.4 yards per carry average, and three scores. Malik White leads the ground game with 244 yards and two touchdowns. Alex Rendon has 18 receptions for 143 yards and a TD, while John Walker has ten catches for 177 yards (17.7 yards per catch) with two touchdowns. Ashton Barton (Jr., LB) leads the defense with 31 tackles and an interception.
PLU built a 35-10 lead at Lewis & Clark midway through the third quarter before the Pioneers rallied to pull within one point with 1:18 to play. L&C elected to try for a two-point conversion and the Lutes' defense made the big stop. After the Pioneers recovered an onsides kick, the PLU defense forced the hosts backwards and got a final sack on fourth and 30. Bainter ran 17 times for 99 yards and a score. He completed 15 of 30 passes for 100 yards with two interceptions. White rushed for 115 yards on only 19 carries with two touchdowns. Walker had four receptions for 48 yards and a TD. Defensive backs Colby Rhinelander and Jared Elwin each had five tackles and an interception for the defense.
The Series: No other opponent has more wins against Whitworth than PLU. The Lutes lead the all-time series 51-26. It has been a series featuring winning streaks by each team. The Lutes won the first nine meetings between the schools. The Pirates won seven in a row from 1959 through 1964, outscoring PLU 310 – 28 during that stretch with six straight shutouts. Between 1966 and 2001, PLU won 32 straight games against the Bucs. The Pirates won six in a row from 2004-09 then the Lutes won five straight from 2010-14. Whitworth has now won seven in a row, including two victories in the spring of 2021. The largest winning margin in the series is a 67-0 win for the Pirates in 1961. PLU's biggest margin of victory is 47-0 in 1970. The first meeting was a 27-0 victory for the Lutes in 1931. The last PLU win was 41-27 in 2014, Rod Sandberg's first season as head coach at Whitworth.
Last Meeting: Jaedyn Prewitt threw four first half touchdown passes to help Whitworth build a 35-3 halftime lead on the way to a 56-23 win over the Lutes in the Pine Bowl on March 13, 2021. Ethan Peloquin and Allen Ballew each caught a pair of those touchdown passes in the first half. Whitworth outgained PLU 509-262, including 484 yards in the air. Prewitt completed 23 of 38 passes for 458 yards with those four touchdowns and no interceptions. The completions, yards and touchdowns are all career highs. Dylan Peterson had two of the Pirates' four sacks, while Bryce Hornbeck and Tiliti Adams had interceptions for the Bucs. Erik Bainter took most of the snaps at QB for PLU and was 13 of 19 for 145 yards with a TD and an interception. He also ran for 46 yards and a score. Alex Rendon was the leading receiver with five catches for 66 yards.
Coming up next: Whitworth will host Willamette on October 23rd at 1:00 pm in the Pine Bowl.
