Pacific Lutheran doomed by penalties (15), turnovers (five) and unforced errors in 23-13 home-opening loss

Scott Westering hasn’t quite been in a situation like this before in his coaching career at Pacific Lutheran University.

On one hand, the longtime coach knows he is leading a tenderfoot football team. He can just glance at the two-deep as a reminder of all the sophomores and freshmen that play significant minutes.

On the other hand, he doesn’t want his players to use inexperience as a crutch. In fact, after the Lutes dropped their season opener two weeks ago at California Lutheran, Westering delivered a pointed message that mistakes would not be blamed on lack of playing time.

Did it get any better Saturday as the Lutes hosted Trinity University of Texas in their home opener at Sparks Stadium?

No.

As troublesome as the five turnovers was the rash of PLU penalties. The Tigers took advantage of all of that to take home a 23-13 victory, sending the Lutes to their first 0-2 start since 2009.

Of the 15 penalties, 13 of them came on offense.

And 12 of them were pre-snap procedure penalties — an issue that baffled Westering and offensive coordinator Trevor Roberts.

“Crazy thing about offense,” Westering said. “You can always look at the ball.”

Those types of mindless mistakes really hampered the PLU offense, particularly in the first half when the Lutes had opportunities to build on a 7-0 lead.

They came in all forms — illegal procedures, false starts and illegal shifts

Two first-half drives that easily could have netted points were affected by those mistakes:

▪ From their own 26-yard-line, the Lutes drove past midfield. But a false-start penalty put PLU in second-and-15, which ended up leading to a fourth down.

Opting to go for it, PLU was stopped when quarterback Jon Schaub was sacked at the Tigers’ 45.

Given life, Trinity went down and scored a touchdown on its next series — an Austin Grauer 7-yard strike to Keller Murphey — to cut the Lutes’ lead to 7-6 with 9:45 to go in the first half.

▪ Even more impressively, Schaub led an even longer drive the next time out. Starting from its own 8, PLU reached the Tigers’ 6, knocking on the door for another touchdown.

But a flag came out. Another false start penalty. And two plays later, Schaub was sacked, fumbled and the Lutes turned it over.

“We were a young team at the beginning of the season. But after game No. 1 … we are not a young team anymore. We are veterans at that point,” said Ben Welch, the Lutes’ third-year starting wide receiver.

“We lean heavily on Jon to be a leader and make huge plays, but we are putting him in tough spots.”

Trinity scored on its first three third-quarter drives — the last on Jeremy Simmons’ 3-yard touchdown scamper at the 6:01 mark to take a 23-7 lead.

Even facing that deficit, the PLU defense gave its offense plenty of chances. But in a span of four minutes — on three consecutive passes — Schaub threw interceptions in Tigers territory.

Schaub did post a second consecutive 300-yard passing effort in his second career start, completing 32 of 53 passes for 378 yards. Wide receiver Richard Johnson, a Lincoln product, hauled in a career-high 10 receptions for 152 yards.

After the game, Westering said on more than a few occasions his offense never got the “gun out of the holster” to cash in with points.

“We’ve never been that inefficient in the red zone since I can almost remember,” Westering said. “When they are unforced errors you can control … that is tough. That is really tough.”

This story was originally published September 26, 2015 at 10:51 PM with the headline "Pacific Lutheran doomed by penalties (15), turnovers (five) and unforced errors in 23-13 home-opening loss."