Lakeland College

Junior WR breaks school record in win at Benedictine

Athletics - posted on 10/24/2009

The Lakeland College football team kept its Northern Athletics Conference championship hopes alive Saturday on a record-setting day for the offense.

Wide receiver Robert Flores, a junior from Milwaukee, set a new Lakeland record for receiving yards in a game as the Muskies (3-4, 3-1 NAC) rolled to a 30-14 win at Benedictine University in Lisle, Ill.

Flores finished with 231 receiving yards on eight catches and three touchdowns. The previous school best was 197 yards by Seitu Smith on Oct. 22, 1994.

With the win, Lakeland keeps pace with Concordia, Wis., the NAC leader at 4-0.

All three scores for Flores came in the first half as the Muskies built up a 21-6 lead by halftime.

"The offensive line did a good job of picking up their blitzes well and gave (Lakeland quarterback) Jake (Dworak) enough time to make the right reads." said Flores, who scored on plays of 81, 44 and 23 yards.

"The plays we were running were really effective. Coach (Travis) Miller tells us to make the catch, and then make a move after the catch second, and that was working well today."

Dworak, a junior from Denmark, finished 16-36 for 392 yards, four TDs and three interceptions. Senior receiver Jake Heinemeyer (Shiocton) had seven catches for 160 yards. Lakeland had 431 total yards.

Lakeland head coach Kevin Doherty said Benedictine's defense blitzed more than he anticipated, and after a shaky start, the passing game got into a rhythm by the second quarter.

"Jake makes some nice throws and Roberto was wide open," Doherty said. "His second touchdown, he went up over the defender and he willed that TD. That was all him. At one point of the second quarter he took over a little bit. But we were also hitting Heinemeyer so much that they had a hard time focusing on one guy.

"They forced us to throw by taking our run game away. We got separation from the defensive backs and Jake made the throws. We worked more on long balls and corner routes and long routes this week and it paid off. We spread it out and we moved Jake around and that helped to handle the blitz. They didn't know where the QB would be all the time."

Lakeland built its lead to 30-6 by the end of the third quarter as the Muskies' defense held the host Eagles (3-4, 2-2) to under 100 total yards through the first three periods.

Lakeland's defense had seven sacks from five different players, including two from sophomore Jason Bruggink (Plymouth). Lakeland's defense also had 15 tackles for loss.

"Our defense played lights out," Doherty said. "They got a lot of their yards in the fourth quarter. We were high energy the whole game. Our kids were really prepared well for this game."

The Muskies return to action on Saturday, Oct. 31, with a home date against Maranatha Baptist.

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