The margin for Northwestern State’s young football team remains razor-thin.

A second straight matchup against a Top 20 team included a handful of turnovers, penalties and missed chances by the Demons in a 41-14 loss at the hands of No. 15 Lamar on Saturday at Turpin Stadium. The Cardinals broke open a tight game after halftime.

“We’ve played two top 20 teams in a row and a lot of our young guys found out what championship-level football at this level looks like,” Demons’ coach Blaine McCorkle said. “There are a lot of valuable lessons in that for them. A lot for us to learn as we build this thing.”

Down 3-0 after a 50-yard field goal from Lamar’s Ben Woodard, the Demons were poised to take the lead late in the first quarter after one of the eight chunk plays by the offense. 

A 59-yard catch from Jimmie Duncan set NSU up at the Lamar 5-yard line, but three plays later a 24-yard field goal was blocked.

“We had some missed opportunities today but the biggest might have been on our second drive,” McCorkle said. “Get the ball all the way down inside the five and come away with no points. That’s unacceptable. You’ve got to find a way to come away with points, three at the worst. It’s a whole different feel if we get a score there.”

The defense forced a punt on the ensuing possession to set up the Demons’ lone scoring drive of the first half.

Three straight explosive passing plays got the Demons into scoring position – a 14-yard reception from Duncan, 21-yard completion to Brendan Webb and 13-yard catch-and-run to Amaaz Eugene. The fourth big play of the drive went to Jeremiah James out of the backfield on a wheel route, with the redshirt freshman scampering 40 yard down to the Lamar 1-yard line.

Three plays later, quarterback Abram Johnston, with a little help from his center Caleb Billiot, lunged his way into the end zone to give the Demons a 7-3 lead early in the second.

The Cardinals responded with an eight-play touchdown drive of their own for a 10-7 edge. Lamar padded the lead  just before halftime, moving down the field on a 10-play trip to score with 21 seconds left and take a 17-7 lead into the break.

Lamar scored on five of its final seven possessions, and turned back-to-back turnovers into points, as part of four straight scoring drives to put the game away in the second half. 

A fumble and interception near midfield on consecutive possession set the Cardinals up with short fields which they converted into 10 points.

The Demons hit a handful more chunk plays in the second half including their longest of the year.

True freshman Brendan Webb beat press coverage at the line for a 78-yard touchdown grab on his second trip to the end zone this year,  securing the first 100-yard receiving game for a Demon since Myles Kitt-Denton against Prairie View A&M a year ago.

Webb (126) and Duncan (73), who both finished with career-best receiving days, combined for a pair of 50-plus yard receptions in the game, collecting 199 total receiving yards on six grabs.

“Those are two really good true freshmen receivers that are going to be incredible players here,” McCorkle said. “Didn’t surprise us what they did today, we’ve seen that coming for a while. They stepped up and made some plays and caught all their passes from a redshirt freshman quarterback who was protected by two redshirt freshmen and a sophomore up front.”

McCorkle noted while around the Southland, only five freshmen are starting elsewhere, and Saturday, the Demos had eight freshmen starting.

Johnston threw for 284 yards, a season best, but the scuttled rushing game managed 23 yards against a stout defensive front.

The Demons travel to McNeese next Saturday. Kickoff is set for 6 p.m. in Lake Charles.