McCarthy Stops Northern Arizona

Freshman quarterback Kevin McCarthy threw three touchdown passes to Jaxon Ernst in the second quarter and Idaho State prevented Northern Arizona from moving into a tie for the Big Sky Conference lead with a 41-24 victory on Saturday at Pocatello, Idaho.

Northern Arizona held a 6-0 lead after one quarter, but the Bengals took control of the game on McCarthy’s touchdown pass plays of four, 30 and 38 yards to Ernst. James Ferrell kicked a 42-yard field goal and Idaho State took a 24-15 halftime lead en route to its first conference victory.

McCarthy completed 11 of 24 passes for 191 yards and Ernst caught six for 105 yards.

Montana State 28, Weber State 14--The Bobcats went six quarters without a touchdown until Rob Compson threw three long scoring passes to Tony Vallez in the second half at Bozeman, Mont.

Compson connected with Vallez on a 55-yard scoring play on the first series of the second half to tie the score, 7-7, and hit Vallez again from 24 yards with 6:19 remaining in the third quarter to give Montana State a 14-7 lead.

Travis Wright scored on a one-yard run with 2:38 left in the third quarter to increase the lead to 21-7.

Compson hit Vallez on a 60-yard touchdown pass play early in the final quarter.

Vallez finished the game with 11 catches for a school-record 221 yards, breaking the record of 195 yards set by Rob Tesch in 1990.

Eastern Washington 24, Idaho 21--Rex Prescott ran three yards for the Eagles’ winning touchdown with 34 seconds left in a nonconference game at Spokane, Wash.

Harry Leons marched the Eagles 64 yards in just 37 seconds to the winning touchdown, hitting Jeff Ogden on pass plays covering 38 and 23 yards.

Eastern Washington had lost five consecutive games to Idaho since 1991.

Idaho took a 21-17 lead with 1:11 left in the game when Ed Dean connected with Deon Price on a 40-yard touchdown pass play.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Standings

Conference

*--*

School W L W E. Washington 5 1 8 No. Arizona 4 2 6 Montana State 4 2 5 Montana 3 2 5 Portland State 3 3 4 Weber State 2 3 4 CS Northridge 2 3 4 Idaho State 1 4 2 CSSacramento 1 5 1

*--*

Overall

*--*

School L PF PA E. Washington 1 319 143 No. Arizona 3 275 209 Montana State 3 153 154 Montana 3 252 142 Portland State 5 181 231 Weber State 4 166 192 CS Northridge 5 286 242 Idaho State 6 133 275 CSSacramento 7 168 281

*--*

Saturday results

Montana 21, Northridge 13

Montana State 28, Weber State 14

Idaho State 41, Northern Arizona 24

Portland State 27, CS Sacramento 13

Eastern Washington 24, Idaho 21 (nonconference)

Next Saturday

Idaho St. at Northridge, 6 p.m.

Sacramento St. at Weber St., 11 a.m.

Montana at Portland St., 1 p.m.

E. Washington at N. Arizona, 5 p.m.

Cal Poly-SLO at Montana St., 12:30 p.m.