A big part of Northwestern State’s season-opening win against Alcorn State last Thursday night was stout defense and controlling field position.
Those two aspects led to weekly conference honors for two first-year members of the Demon football team.
Junior linebacker Fernando Washington (defensive) and redshirt freshman punter Cooper Evans (special teams) were named Southland Players of the Week, the league office announced on Monday.
After the 20-10 triumph last week, Northwestern heads north for a contest Saturday at Minnesota, then visits Cincinnati next weekend.
Washington was a menace against Alcorn State, making plays all over the field and on both sides of the line of scrimmage.
He led the Demons with eight tackles, six of them solo stops, on the night and wreaked havoc behind the line with two tackles for loss and a sack for a total of 11 negative yards. Washington paced a defense that did not allow a touchdown, holding the Braves to only a 51-yard field goal after a lost fumble in the red zone.
NSU came up with three turnovers.
Washington, who came to NSU following the last two seasons at Copiah-Lincoln (Miss.) Community College, broke up a pass on the third-down play that forced the long field goal attempt.
That defensive effort we a perfect complement to the work done by Evans with his left foot, forcing Alcorn into long fields.
Evans averaged 44.7 yards per punt blasting a pair of 50+ yard punts, including a long of 55, and placed three total kicks inside the 20-yard line. The redshirt freshman transfer from South Florida , placed one kick out of bounds at the 11 and another at the 6-yard line.
Alcorn’s average starting field position following an Evans punt was its own 24-yard line with none of the ensuing Braves’ possessions resulting in points.
