Seiji Wood

Sports Editor

The ISU football team lost, 48-41, last Saturday to Liberty. The Bengals are now 4-3 on the season after losing two close games in back-to-back weeks.

This game was a non-conference game, so it doesn’t affect ISU in the conference standings, but how “a win is a win” for head coach Rob Phenicie, a loss is a loss.

“This is on us,” Phenicie said. “I mean, you go 1,700 miles and put up 631 yards, you still gotta score more than the other guy.”

I’m not as frustrated with this loss compared to ISU’s previous loss to UC Davis. Both teams were throwing punches. It was a back and forth game and the Bengals fell short. There were a few mistakes on offense and miscommunication here and there on defense that hurt the Bengals.

“It was just one of those games,” Phenicie said. “We can’t have turnovers. Three turnovers killed us. Dropped passes by our wide receivers killed us…we had a miscommunication on the last touchdown they had.”

Regardless, I’d much rather lose this way instead of us not being able to close out a game and lose the lead. If it were really up to me though, I’d much rather win these close games and I’m sure ISU feels the same way.

Idaho State had 631 yards of total offense and Liberty finished with 552. Tanner Gueller threw for 397 yards and four touchdowns but had two interceptions on 20 completions on 44 attempts. Gueller had a slow start to the game but managed to get better and more effective as the game progressed.

“Tanner even knew he was having an off day,” Phenicie said. “He kept saying, ‘I’m gonna get better. I’m gonna get better.’ And the last couple of series he did. It was nice to see.”

Gueller made history this game when he broke the school record for most career touchdown passes, passing Justin Arias’ 64.

This is a great accomplishment and I wish the headline for this week was “Idaho State wins as Gueller breaks school record,” and we put most of the focus on that, but a loss always puts a damper on things. Still, it’s an outstanding accomplishment, so congratulations to Gueller.

The possible reason for Gueller’s slow start may have to do with Liberty’s defensive coverage on the Bengals.

“It was tough. Man to man,” Phenicie said. “It’s gonna be all or nothing. So, they did a good job.”