INSTITUTE, W.Va. - The University of Charleston defeated West Virginia State University 34-13 Saturday afternoon at Lakin Field to win the second installment of the Kanawha Classic presented by Frontier Communications.

The Golden Eagle defense limited the Yellow Jackets to 283 yards of total offense on the day. A vast improvement for a unit that was allowing an average of 468 yards per game through the first three contests.

UC again used a balanced attack on offense, totaling 411 yards on 85 plays from scrimmage. The Golden Eagles rushed for 224 yards led by Tevion Cappe's 86 yards on 24 attempts, including three short touchdown plunges. Jeremy Johnson handled much of quarterback duties for UC, passing for 159 yards on 10-for-23 and rushing for 33 yards and a touchdown on his 11 attempts. Mason Olszewski had Charleston's only TD pass, connecting with Joey Augustin in the fourth quarter on a 11-yard pitch and catch. Augustin has six of the seven touchdown receptions for the Golden Eagles through four games.

The Yellow Jackets opened the scoring on their initial drive after Matt Kinnick connected with Tyrone Barber on a 16-yard screen pass to grab an early 6-0 lead after the PAT failed. Johnson marched his Golden Eagles down the field on UC's first series and capped off a 12-play drive with a 1-yard touchdown scamper to put UC ahead 7-6.

Cappe finished off another long UC drive at the start of the second quarter with one of his three touchdowns on the afternoon that put Charleston on top 14-6 and silence the home crowd. An energized Jacket squad still had fight left in them and used a big pass play from Kinnick to Tyrell Henderson to pull State within a single point, 14-13, midway through the quarter.

Charleston, however, wasn't going to let the Yellow Jackets take the Kanawha Classic trophy from their grasps and outscored West Virginia State 20-0 over the next two and a half quarters to earn a 34-13 win at Dickerson Stadium on the Institute campus. UC's defense was the difference over the final 30 minutes, limiting the Jackets to only 46 yards of total offense in the second half.

Brett Benes again provided some bombs from his right leg, eclipsing his previous punt record of 69 yards by two yards after crushing a 71-yard punt in the fourth quarter. He averaged nearly 50 yards per punt and had three go over 50 on the day.

Rhakeem Stallings and Malcolm Cater totaled 21 tackles between the two from their linebacker positions while Torie Wagner broke up two passes on at his cornerback spot.

Charleston improves to 3-1 on the season and will have a short week to prepare for Concord University as they host the Mountain Lions this Thursday, October 1st at UC Stadium. The Thursday night game will be the NCAA DII/ESPN3 of the Week and will be broadcast on Watch ESPN and ESPN3, a first in Golden Eagle history. A post game fireworks show will follow the conclusion of the game and 1,000 Gold Rush t-shirts will be handed out to UC fans entering the stadium.



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