The Western Michigan Broncos slowly got themselves back into the game after falling down by three scores early to beat the Ball State Cardinals, 42-38.
Daniel Braverman found the end zone on a 12 yard pass from Zach Terrell with just 1:25 left in the game to propel the Broncos to the four point win. That score capped of an 8 play drive that started all the way back on WMU's own 20 yard line.
For the third time this season the Cardinals were faced with a chance to pull out a comeback win. This time, with a new quarterback under center. Unfortunately for Ball State, the result wasn't any better.
The Cards took the ball 56 yards on 11 plays, including hitting twice Corey Lacanaria twice on the drive for a total of 35 yards, but BSU ended up falling just short as Jack Milas' fade pass fell incomplete on 4th and Goal.
In his first start, Milas was very impressive for Ball State, going 26 for 42 with 326 yards and a touchdown. Milas helped Ball State take a 28-7 first quarter lead by throwing for three touchdown passes in the first half, two of which went to Jordan Williams, who finished with 179 receiving yards on 11 catches.
Big plays kept Western in the game during the first half. The Broncos found the end zone twice in the first half, both on plays that went for over 50 yards. After trailing 7-0, Braverman found the end zone on a 52 yard catch and run, which was followed by WMU's second score, a 72 yard pass from Terrell to Corey Davis, who was wide open over the middle and cut the BSU lead to 28-14.
After Western threw an interception deep in their own territory, Scott Secor made a 28-yard field goal to give the Cards a 31-14 halftime lead.
But, the Broncos looked like an entirely different team in the second half. WMU started the second half by scoring on their first drive. Following a 52-yard run by Darius Phillips, the Broncos were able to find the end zone again, this time on a 2-yard run by Jarvion Franklin. Western would score again two drives later on another Franklin touchdown run to cut the Ball State lead down to just 3.
The Cardinals quickly responded though, as Jack Milas found KeVonn Mabon for a 26-yard touchdown pass to give BSU some breathing room late in the 3rd quarter.
Following the touchdown, each team traded a stop before the Broncos would score again. Franklin found the end zone for the 3rd time in the second half as he went 54 yards with under eight minutes left in the contest to cut the Cardinal lead back down to just three.
After the score, the Broncos were able to force a three-and-out where the Bronco defense was able to stop wide out Chris Shillings just short of the sticks on 3rd and 4 to force a punt.
That stop was followed by the game winning drive for Western Michigan, where Terrell would throw his 20th completion of the day to Braverman to pick up the 42-38 victory.