UNI coach Mark Farley says the Panthers need to do a better job of finishing drives and that was a factor in their loss at Indiana State in their Missouri Valley Football Conference opener. He says they had 3 possessions in the red zone in the 3rd quarter and only got one touchdown. “If you get that 3 possession lead, then it’s a different came you’re calling,” Farley says.

The Panthers dropped their conference opener a year ago and that began a five game losing skid. Farley does not think Saturday’s loss will linger. He says he prefers to have more consistent growth instead of getting too high for one game and then too low for the next.

The Panthers fell behind 14-0 in the opening quarter at Indiana State and he says they need to have games where there are not lulls where they fall behind. He says you will sometimes get into soft spots by the other team, but you have to get out of it quickly.

UNI visits South Dakota on Saturday and the Coyotes are expected to regain the services of junior quarterback Kevin Earl. He passed for 370 yards in South Dakota’s overtime win in Cedar Falls last year.

South Dakota coach Joe Glenn expects the game to go down to the wire as he says the last two years the games have gone down to the wire with 2 overtimes in the game last year.

Like UNI the Coyotes are 2-3 overall. “It’s a game both teams really need badly. We are trying to get this thing up and running,” Glenn says.

South Dakota lost at Southern Illinois 41-10 last week.

By Elwin Huffman, KOEL, Oelwein