Glendale, Ariz.- Making their debut in the Frontier Conference on Saturday, Arizona Christian needed an herculean effort by their defense led by Cameron Tibbetts and a major houdini escape by Tyler Duncan in the closing seconds trailing by six to pull off the one point win (21-20) over Montana State-Northern.

With the air attack not clicking on all cylinders, the ground attack was the key for the Firestorm as two of their touchdowns came on the rush.  Jaidren Williams pushed his way into the end zone for the first touchdown.  Justin Wright muscled, bounced, and powered a run for six points.  After dancing and spinning away from defenders, Duncan connected with Jarrod Favors for the game winning touchdown with just 11 seconds on the clock.

Allowing just 3.6 yards per play on the night, Tibbetts spearheaded the defensive attack with 17 tackles- a new ACU single game record.  Two interceptions- one by Javier Fernandez, Jr. and one by Griffin Meier- made a big impact as well.

Game Info

• Game score: Arizona Christian - 21, MSU-Northern - 20
• Records: Arizona Christian- 2-1, 1-0 Frontier, MSU-Northern - 1-2, 0-1 Frontier
• NAIA Top 25 Rank: Arizona Christian - RV, MSU-Northern- not ranked
• Location:  ACU Football Field, Arizona Christian, Glendale, AZ

Offensive Stars

• Duncan - 11-19, 77 passing yards, TD, 74 yards rushing
• Favors - receiving TD
• Justin Wright- 45 yards rushing, TD
• Williams - 39 yards rushing, TD

Defensive Stars

• Tibbetts - 17 tackles
• Meier - 9 tackles, INT
• Jackson Ortiz - 9 tackles
• Fernandez - 6 tackles, INT
• Moses Smith - 6 tackles, 2 tackles for loss

Inside The Numbers

• MSUN scored just under six minutes into the game but missed the extra point
• ACU took their first lead when Williams pushed the pile into the endzone from a yard out
• With just over a minute left in the half the Lights connected on a 27 yard TD pass- the longest play from scrimmage by either team in the game
• The Lights held a 20-7 edge headed to the fourth quarter
• Wright would not be denied as he bounced off would be tacklers and managed to get across the goalline to pull within six
• With 2:11 left in the game, ACU had to cover 52 yards for the win
• Facing fourth and goal at the seven, Duncan scrambled right circled back toward the middle of the field and fired a strike to find Favors wide open in the endzone
• Arizona Christian improved to 7-2 all-time in their conference season openers (independent in year one)

Thoughts from Coach Bowen
"Welcome to the Frontier!  Not quite the way we wanted to play tonight, but the guys were resilient and found a way to win it late in the game.  Time to get things fixed and move on to play at Carroll College."

Up Next
The first road test in the Frontier Conference for Arizona Christian will come next Saturday at Carroll College in Helena, Mont.  Kick-off will come at 1:00 pm Arizona time.