The turnovers were terminal, and the big plays were brutal for Missouri Western on Saturday when the Griffons lost a 49-35 decision to Northwest Missouri State at Spratt Stadium.

The Griffons coughed up the ball seven times — Western coach Jerry Partridge calls them “giveaways,” while Northwest Missouri State coach Mel Tjeerdsma prefers to call them “takeaways” in accordance with their own team perspectives — in the loss.

“We’re not going to beat any high school team in St. Joe with seven turnovers. A 7-1 turnover ratio almost always ends up in a loss,” Partridge said.

But when Partridge put pencil to paper after the game, he discovered something equally upsetting. He realized that the Griffons gave up huge chunks of yardage on just eight big plays.

A big play is considered to be a gain of 20 yards or more, and one of Partridge’s goals has always been to minimize the big play.

“I figured up that of (Northwest’s) 517 yards of total offense, 292 of it was on eight plays,” Partridge said.

Although Northwest quarterback Blake Bolles shredded Western for 297 passing yards, Partridge wasn’t going to blame his secondary.

“I’m not concerned about the secondary,” Partridge said. “I’m not going to call out individuals.”

However, Partridge said the Griffons need to find a better way to “knock the ball out of the sky” on pass coverage.

Partridge blamed the defensive woes on playing four straight teams that have passed and thrown the ball better than he’s ever seen them do.

He said the fact that the Griffons finished within two touchdowns of the nation’s No. 6 team under such adverse conditions is a feather in the black-and-gold helmet.

“You play a team of that caliber and give it up seven times and give up eight plays for 292 yards and you probably should lose by 40 points,” Partridge said. “The fact that we were even kind of in it tells you probably what our talent level is.”

Injury scare

Ferrell McGhee gave Northwest Missouri State a scare, then he gave a scare to his own coach.

McGhee, Missouri Western’s senior wide receiver, caught four first-half passes for 67 yards including a touchdown to pull the Griffons to within 21-14 of the Bearcats with 4 minutes, 39 seconds remaining before halftime on Saturday.

But on that touchdown reception, McGhee sustained an injury. It was a big scare to Partridge, who had already been without McGhee for two games because of a sprained MCL.

“He really had a great first half,” Partridge said. “When we got in at halftime, somebody said it was a broken collarbone.”

Fortunately, further examination revealed that the injury was a strained ligament between between the sternum and clavicle, and the latest word is that McGhee will possibly play on Saturday when the Griffons tee it up at 2 p.m. at Truman State.

Vulnerable Hawks

Size isn’t everything, Western volleyball coach Cory Frederick asserts, and a much taller Rockhurst team is ripe for a fall when it plays the Griffons at 7 tonight in Kansas City.

The Griffons have lost eight straight matches and are 0-6 in MIAA play. But a 10-day hiatus to regroup and tonight’s foray outside the tough conference schedule could get Western back in the win column, Frederick believes.

“Rockhurst is a team we do have some possibilities to play well against,” Frederick said. “The only thing they have going for them is they have a bunch of girls that are about 6-foot-2 or 6-3. They’re bigger in size and stature than we are, but I think their ball control is suspect, and hopefully our strong serving is going to take them out of their system.”

The Rockhurst match is Western’s best hope in another tough week that includes back-to-back matches Friday and Saturday at Nebraska-Omaha and Central Missouri. Nebraska-Omaha is second in the conference standings at 5-1 (15-4 overall), while Central Missouri (19-3) is the conference leader at 6-0 and riding an 11-game winning streak.

“UNO has one of the best middle blockers I’ve seen anywhere across the conference,” Frederick said, “so we have our hands full this weekend.”

The Griffons will play six consecutive road matches before returning to MWSU Fieldhouse on Oct. 23 to face nationally ranked Emporia State.

Missed it by ‘that much’

Soccer coach Jeff Hansen must feel like the television character Maxwell Smart when he describes his team’s recent fortunes. In short, for the second straight game, the Griffons missed out “by that much.”

“We’re doing the right things; we’re that close,” Hansen asserted on Monday. “We don’t deserve the record we have, and that’s tough to take.”

His team lost its second straight double-overtime thriller Thursday on a free kick. He was livid when it happened last Saturday at Missouri Southern in a 2-1 loss. He was a bit more reserved Monday when he recalled Thursday’s 1-0 loss against Truman State, but it was clear that he was unhappy about the situation.

“All that I’ve got to say is that when the Truman coach (Mike Cannon) shook my hand, he said, ‘We didn’t deserve that. We deserved to have a tie,’” Hansen related.

Added Hansen, “We’ve had two games, back-to-back, where it was taken out of our hands. That’s two tough losses in a row.”

The Griffons didn’t respond well to the loss, coming back with a meager offensive effort in a 1-0 loss at Central Missouri on Saturday.

The bright spot in the week was goalkeeper Joyce Endicott, who made 11 saves in last week’s two games — six against Truman and five against Central.