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By David Boyce

MARYVILLE, Mo. - Northwest Missouri State opened the game with a crisp, seven-play, 80-yard touchdown drive, which let Emporia State and 6,542 fans know that the eight senior Bearcats were ready to put on a championship performance.
 
Senior quarterback Brady Bolles keyed the offense with his best passing game of his career. Senior defensive lineman Brandon Yost, senior linebacker Brock Sherman and senior defensive back Bryce Enyard made it tough for the Hornets to move the ball.
 
Together, with plenty of help from the underclassmen, Northwest roared to its third straight MIAA championship by thumping second-place Emporia State 44-10 on a cool Saturday evening at Bearcat Stadium.
 
"We had fun tonight," said Bolles, who passed for a career-high 362 yards and four touchdowns. "We had a blast playing together tonight. We knew what was at stake tonight and we knew it was a big game, but nobody panicked. Everybody did their 1/11th."
 
Northwest Missouri, ranked No. 2 in the AFCA top 25, improved to 10-0. The victory gave the Bearcats a two-game lead over Emporia State and Central Missouri with one regular season game left.
 
"The intent the whole week was to send the seniors off the right way, especially with our home crowd. The night game made it the perfect ending," Northwest junior defensive back Kevin Berg said.
 
It was simply another memorable time in the storied history of Northwest football. Proving that Once A Bearcat Always A Bearcat (OABAAB), former Northwest athletic director Wren Baker took time from his duties as deputy athletic director at the University of Missouri to attend the game.
 
"It is the culture, the family atmosphere and how much it means to the fans," Wren said. "Everybody has passionate fans and everybody has a sense of family in their program, but when you are on the field like this postgame, you can see what it really means to the people here.
 
"I was here only 2 ½ years, but during that time, I developed some great friendships. I have stayed in touch with Adam Dorrel and several of the coaches and people in the athletic department. Being at Mizzou and only 3 hours away, I am able to come here and see them experience success and that is something I am excited to do."
 
Before the game, Northwest honored the eight seniors for their contributions to the football program.
 
And then the entire football team went out and showed why Northwest has been such a dynamic program for the last two decades.
 
"This is what we worked for all offseason," Sherman said. "It was our goal to come out and win conference this year and win it outright and luckily today we were able to do that.
 
"We all are enjoying the process. Everybody is taking it one game at a time, trying to get better each day."
 
It was a perfect start for Bolles. The first play of the game was a 14-yard completion to junior wide receiver George Sehl. Bolles followed with a 29 yard pass to Sha'Corey Foster. The play signaled that Emporia State was in major trouble.
 
"We said we had to get off to a fast start with how explosive their offense was," Bolles said. "We knew it was big for us to come out and drive for a touchdown to start the game."
 
Several plays later, Northwest did exactly that when Bolles tossed a 6-yard pass to Sehl. The scoring drive took 3 minutes, 11 seconds.
 
"As we were going down the field I was thinking we were 100 percent focused right now," Northwest junior running back Phil Jackson II said. "You could just feel it throughout the offense.
 
"We have been practicing this the past six weeks on being focused, doing our job and not trying to do too much and it showed today."
 
Emporia State managed one first down on its first offensive play. But thanks to a vocal Northwest crowd, the Hornets had two straight false start penalties and had to punt.
 
"Like I have been saying," Bolles said, "Bearcat nation is something you don't find in Division II. We are so blessed as players to be able to play in front of these fans. I can't hear myself think when I am on the sidelines. I can't imagine what the other teams are going through."
 
In the first quarter and a half, Emporia State had six false start penalties whistled on it. These mistakes hurt the Hornets.
 
But the play that was costly for Emporia State occurred late in the first quarter when Northwest punted. The ball rolled into an Emporia State player who was not paying attention. Northwest recovered the miscue at the Hornets' 36.
 
Bolles knew what to do with a short field. He engineered a 9-play, 36-yard touchdown drive that ended on a 5-yard run by Jackson II on the final play of the first quarter, making it 14-0.
 
"I thought if we could take care of the football offensively and get some scores and do some good things early, I thought it was going to put a lot of pressure on Emporia," Northwest coach Adam Dorrel said. "Defense played lights out again. That is a good offense we went against."
 
Emporia State needed to use half the second quarter to finally get on the scoreboard on a 3-yard run by senior quarterback Brent Wilson with 7:37 left until halftime, making it 14-7.
 
It was the last bit of hope for the Hornets.
 
A little over a minute after Emporia State scored, Bolles tossed a beautiful 68-yard touchdown pass to freshman wide receiver Shawn Bane Jr., and that quickly snatched away the little momentum the Hornets had generated.
 
Bolles was on fire. He finished the second quarter with a 23-yard touchdown pass to sophomore Shane Williams with 36 seconds left until halftime.
 
When the Bearcats trotted to the locker room, they held a commanding 28-10 lead. It was obvious Bolles was having a career game. In the first half, he completed 17 of 21 passes for 255 yards and three touchdowns.
 
"I thought Brady Bolles played lights out tonight," Dorrel said. "He was putting throws on the money. He knew exactly when they were playing man and when they were playing zone. He did a great job of getting us in the right place."
 
Bolles wasn't done.
 
But first the Northwest defense made its presence known. Early in the third quarter, the Bearcats sacked Wilson in the end zone for a safety, and that fired up the offense even more.
 
On the first play after the safety, Bolles zipped a little screen pass that Bane Jr. turned into a 52-yard touchdown reception. He flew down the sidelines so fast that a referee could have whistled him for speeding.
 
Defensively, Northwest stuffed a high-powered Emporia State offense that came into the game averaging 36.7 points.
 
 "Emporia is a great team," Yost said. "They are sound fundamentally in everything. It was awesome the way we pulled together and got the job done.
 
"It meant a lot to me that everybody on the field gave their all today."