CALIFORNIA, Pa. – The Slippery Rock University football team claimed the outright Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference Western Division title with a 44-21 victory on the road at California University (Pa.) Saturday.
 
The Rock (8-1, 6-0 PSAC) locked up their fifth PSAC West title since 2011 and will host Eastern Division champion West Chester in the PSAC Championship game Nov. 10. California (5-4, 4-2) needed a win Saturday to keep its chances of winning the PSAC West alive and will now host Bloomsburg the final week of the season.
 
Slippery Rock fought off a sluggish first half performance that included five fumbles and eight penalties for 101 yards. The Rock scored with ease on their first possession after a long kickoff return from Eric Glover-Williams set up a short field. California answered before its offense even got the ball when Naszihr Taylor took the next kickoff 98 yards to tie it at 7-7.
 
The Rock offense scored again with ease on its second possession to take a 14-7 lead with 9:40 to play in the first quarter, but things unraveled from there for the offense. SRU took personal foul penalties on three straight possessions on the way to racking up 101 penalty yards in the first half. Those penalties allowed the Cal offense to move down the field and find its only offensive score of the half late in the second quarter to tie it at 14-14. Again, the offense struggled, taking a penalty and fumbling a snap that looked like it would end the half, but Roland Rivers III connected with Austin Scott on a 53-yard pass to set up first and goal on the one-yard line inside 30 seconds to play. The Rock fumbled the next play, their fifth fumble of the half, and ended up settling for a Jake Chapla chip shot field goal to lead 17-14 at halftime, despite Cal's offense finishing with less total yards (100) than SRU had penalty yards.
 
Slippery Rock cleaned it up in the second half and went to work on the ground with Wes Hills and Rivers leading the charge. California had no answer for the ground game as The Rock racked up 345 rushing yards in a steady rain and pulled away to put the game out of reach. The Rock ripped off 23 unanswered points, capped by a 34-yard interception return for a TD by Glover-Williams with 14:33 to play. Cal added a TD to cut it to 37-21 with 11:36 to play, but Hills busted off a 34-yard TD run to seal the deal.
 
SRU finished the game with 486 yards of total offense with 141 passing yards, while California was held to just 274 total yards with 184 passing yards and 90 rushing yards.
 
Hills was dominant all day and turned in one of the best performances by an SRU running back in program history. He finished with 33 carries for 248 yards and four touchdowns, averaging 7.5 yards per carry and finding the end zone for a collegiate career-high four times. He became the first SRU running back since 2007 to have back-to-back 200+ yard rushing games.
 
Rivers added 106 rushing yards and one score to become the first SRU quarterback to top 100 rushing yards in a game since 2013. He also completed 10-of-16 passes for 141 yards with no touchdowns and one interception.
 
Henry Litwin caught two passes for 38 yards, Austin Scott caught one 53-yard pass and Hills and Jermaine Wynn Jr. each caught two short passes on a day that was difficult to throw.
 
The Rock defense was dominant up front against one of the top offensive line units in the PSAC. Cal entered the game ranked first in the nation in fewest sacks allowed, giving up just three total sacks in eight weeks. The Rock tallied two sacks, four TFL and two additional credited QB hurries. Glover-Williams had one solo sack with a big hit off the corner blitz, while Zach Bader and Tim Soave combined for the other.
 
Glover-Williams had his best game in a Rock uniform, finishing with the interception return for a TD, a solo sack, two pass breakups and a 59 yard kickoff return that set up the opening SRU touchdown drive. Dalton Holt and Brad Zaffram finished with team-highs of six total tackles, while Kyle Hall and Rahdezz Henderson each had four total stops and Khadir Roberts recorded one interception in his first action after missing the last month with an injury.
 
California was paced by quarterback Noah Mitchell, who completed 19-of-48 passes for 184 yards with no touchdowns and two interceptions. Nelson Brown rushed for 90 yards and two touchdowns on just 14 carries and caught five passes for 39 yards to lead the ground attack. Chad Livingston caught five passes for a game-high 63 yards.
 
Slippery Rock will now turn its focus to closing the PSAC West next Saturday with a 1 p.m. home game against Gannon University. While the outcome of the game will have no impact on SRU winning the Western Division and hosting the league title game, a loss next week could significantly impact The Rock's NCAA playoff chances.
 

NOTES: Slippery Rock claims its fifth PSAC title since 2011 (2011, 2013, 2014, 2015, 2018) and the first in the tenure of third-year head coach Shawn Lutz … The Rock will play in the PSAC title game for the fifth time since 2010, three more than any other program in the PSAC West as SRU distances itself as the top program in the league over the last decade … Only Bloomsburg and West Chester in the PSAC East have reached three PSAC title games since 2010, while no other teams have played in more than two … SRU handed Cal its second straight home loss, marking the first time since the opening two weeks of the 2009 season that the Vulcans have lost two straight at home in the same season … Cal also lost the last game of 2010 and the first game of 2011 to mark the last time it had dropped two successive home games … Wes Hills rushed for a season-high 248 yards and four TDs to become the first SRU running back to top 200+ yards in back-to-back weeks since Ryan Lehmeier did it against East Stroudsburg and Clarion in 2007 … Hills has now rushed for 100 or more yards in all but one full game he has played in and he has rushed for 668 yards the last four weeks after returning from injury (167.0 yards per game) … the 248-yard effort is the 10th most rushing yards in a single-game in program history … the four TD rushes are the first time an SRU back has ran for four or more in a single-game since Akeem Satterfield ran for four against C.W. Post in 2010 … Roland Rivers III improved to 7-0 as the SRU starting QB … his 106 rushing yards mark the first time an SRU QB has topped 100 yards on the ground since Nigel Barskdale ran for 125  yards against Cal U in 2013 … Jake Chapla made his first four PAT kicks Saturday, but had his fifth kick blocked, snapping a streak of consecutive made PATs that spanned more than a year at 77 … he moved up to second all-time at SRU in career PATs with 139 and is closing in on the record of 161 set by Morgan Anderson in 2000 … he also moved up to seventh in career scoring at SRU and now has 235 points … his short FG was his 10th make of the year and his 32nd career made FG, which is now just three shy of the career record of 35 held by Anderson and CJ Bahr.
 
 
 
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