HELENA, Mont. – Jack Prka's nine-yard pass touchdown pass to Tony Collins made Carroll (Mont.) a 20-17 overtime winner over Southern Oregon in a Frontier Conference battle Saturday at Nelson Stadium.
Cesar Ruiz had given the Raiders three points on the first possession of the extra session by sending through a 42-yard field goal. Prka's clinching pass came on third down, moments after the Saints elected to go for it on fourth-and-1 at SOU's 16-yard line and Prka kept them alive with a completion to Michael Maafu.
Prka completed 20-of-30 attempts for 184 yards. His only other touchdown pass was an 18-yarder to Kyle Pierce that tied the score at 14-all with 5:40 left in the fourth quarter.
The Saints improved to 5-4 in the Frontier, and SOU dipped to 3-6 heading into next week's season finale at Eastern Oregon.
The teams played to a scoreless tie in the first half, the second first-half combined shutout the Raiders have been involved in this year. They broke through with 12:31 left in the fourth on
Blake Asciutto's 22-yard TD pass to
Bryce Goggin that tied the game. Asciutto and Goggin connected again a couple minutes later from 11 yards out to give SOU its first lead.
Goggin accumulated six receptions for 109 yards, marking his fourth 100-yard game of the season. The TD receptions were his seventh and eighth.
Christian Graney added six catches for 51 yards. Asciutto's final line was 18-of-38 for 197 yards. SOU's ground game struggled again with 33 yards on 23 attempts, and the Saints totaled 154 rushing yards.
The Raiders played even for most of the day anyway thanks to a defense led by linebacker
Drew Schuler, who totaled 17 tackles – tied for the fifth-most in SOU single-game history – and forced two fumbles.
Stokes Botelho recovered one of those fumbles and came up with his fifth interception.
Seth Miller added an interception, his second, and
Tua Laolagi (10 tackles) and
Noah Turnbull (9 tackles) were credited with 1 ½ sacks apiece.
SOU's defense had six sacks as a unit, matching its highest output of the season.
