Toledo Outlasts Western Michigan 45-38 Behind 595-Yard Offensive Night

After one quarter at the Glass Bowl, Toledo had 189 yards and 10 first downs. Western Michigan had 2 yards and zero first downs. If you turned the TV off right there and went to rake leaves, nobody would blame you. You also would have missed one of the wildest MAC games of the season.

Toledo built a 24-0 cushion, watched Western Michigan erase almost all of it, and then found just enough at the end to win 45-38 on Saturday. John Alan Richter threw for 391 yards and three touchdowns, CJ Miller ran for 183 yards and the go-ahead score, and Israel Petite picked off Broc Lowry in the final two minutes to finish it.

A first quarter that looked like a mismatch

The opening minutes did not look like a blowout in waiting. Richter threw an interception on just the fifth play of the game. Toledo's defense answered right away, as Andrew Zock forced a fumble on a strip sack and Julian Fox recovered. Six plays and 32 yards later, Richter ran it in from 4 yards out.

After a Western Michigan three-and-out, the Rockets put together their longest drive of the season, 92 yards in nine plays, and Autavius Ison finished it with a 3-yard run. Then Nicholas Thompson grabbed a first career interception, and Reice Griffith hit a 23-yard field goal on the first play of the second quarter. That was 17-0, and the yardage gap was absurd.

Toledo pushed it to 24-0 before Western finally found its footing. Lowry and the Broncos went 74 yards in 10 plays for a 13-yard touchdown pass, and later went 80 yards in five plays for a 2-yard touchdown run just under two minutes before the half. Between those, Richter hit Daryl Barnett Jr. for a 7-yard score.

The final drive of the half was a statement. Toledo went 82 yards in 10 plays and only 1:41, and Richter found Adjatay Dabbs for a 17-yard touchdown with 10 seconds left. It was 31-14 at the break, and the Rockets had 357 yards and 19 first downs in a single half.

Then the Broncos came roaring back

Western Michigan needed one play to change the mood. Joshua Franklin took the second-half kickoff 92 yards for a touchdown, and suddenly it was a 10-point game.

The Broncos' next score was pure grit. They went 55 yards in 11 plays, converting twice on third down and once on fourth down, and Lowry went airborne over the pile for a 2-yard touchdown. Just like that, a 24-0 game was 31-28.

Toledo had an answer, and it was a good one. Facing third-and-6, Richter connected with Bryson Hammer for 47 yards, and Dabbs caught a 5-yard touchdown two plays later to make it 38-28. Western shrugged that off too. On fourth-and-6, the Broncos hit a 41-yard touchdown pass, and the third quarter ended at 38-35. Western had won the quarter 21-7.

Early in the fourth, the Broncos drove deep into Toledo territory, but a false start at the 1 stalled things. Dieter Kelly's 23-yard field goal tied it at 38 with 9:19 to play. A game that looked over in the first quarter was now a coin flip.

The turning point: a 75-yard answer

This is where Toledo's offense earned its reputation. The Rockets came in leading the MAC in scoring and total offense, and with the game tied they went 75 yards. Miller finished it with an 11-yard touchdown run with 4:23 left, and Toledo led 45-38.

The two teams traded three-and-outs, and Western got the ball back at its own 23 with 1:52 left and a chance to tie. It did not last long. Petite intercepted a pass at midfield, and that was the ballgame.

Richter, Miller and a pair of 100-yard receivers

Richter went 29-of-41 for 391 yards and three touchdowns, and also ran for one. The early interception did not rattle the Toledo quarterback at all. The 47-yard strike to Hammer on third down in the third quarter might have been the most important throw of the night, because it stopped a run of 21 straight Western points.

Miller carried 33 times for 183 yards. That is a heavy workload, and it was 13 yards short of the career high of 196 Miller set against Ball State in Week 5.

Dabbs caught eight passes for 124 yards and two touchdowns, and Hammer added seven catches for a career-high 107 yards. According to Toledo, that gave the Rockets two 100-yard receivers in the same game for the first time since Diontae Johnson and Jon'vea Johnson did it in the 2017 MAC Championship Game.

On defense, Zock continued what Toledo is calling "Zock-tober," with five tackles, two tackles for loss and the strip sack. That makes four straight games with at least two tackles for loss, every game this month. Fox and Isaac Zay combined for 14 tackles, Thompson had a career-high nine stops to go with that interception, and Petite added four tackles and two pass breakups along with the game-sealing pick.

The numbers that matter

Toledo piled up 595 total yards, a season high. The Broncos finished with 351. That gap tells you Toledo controlled most of the game, and the final score tells you how many chances it gave back.

There were five turnovers in all, three by the Broncos, so Toledo won that battle too. What kept Western alive was big plays. Franklin's kickoff return gave Western seven points without the offense taking a snap. Lowry threw for 207 yards and two touchdowns with two interceptions, and both picks came at moments that hurt.

What makes the offensive output more impressive is who was blocking for it. Toledo's offensive line had just one player in the lineup who started on opening day. Miller averaged 5.5 yards per carry, and the Rockets kept moving the chains all night. Read the full box score (opens in a new tab) and Toledo's recap (opens in a new tab) for every snap.

What it means

Toledo is 6-2 overall and 3-1 in the MAC, with four straight wins, and it is bowl eligible for the 17th straight season. It is also the second straight week the Rockets have handed an opponent its first conference loss. That is how you get into a title race.

There was a milestone in it, too. The win was the 100th of Mike Jacobs's head coaching career and came in a first season at Toledo, and the school says that makes Jacobs the 17th-fastest coach in NCAA history to reach 100, in 125 games.

Western Michigan falls to 5-3 and 3-1 in the league. The Broncos showed plenty of fight, and nobody who watched the third quarter will think this team is going away. Next on the schedule was a home game against Bowling Green on Oct. 31. Toledo gets a week off before a midweek trip to Sacramento State on Wednesday, Nov. 4, the first meeting between the schools.

The last word

Jacobs framed the week exactly the way Toledo fans wanted to hear it. "I have a lot of respect for Lance Taylor and the job he's done building a championship-caliber program at Western," Jacobs said in the postgame press conference (opens in a new tab). "You talk all week, if you have aspirations to be the champion, you gotta beat the champion."

The coach also gave Western its due for the comeback and credited the people who answered it. "And Western, to their credit, did really well in the third quarter. And we weathered it a bit, and then when we needed points, we went down and scored and got them, and just kept it just out of reach," Jacobs said. "I thought CJ Miller had a lot of big boy yards today, man. He had 183 yards rushing against a really stout defense."

Big boy yards is the right phrase for it. Toledo needed every one of them.

Sources: Toledo Athletics recap, box score and press conference transcript, The Associated Press and ESPN. More college football coverage on Undrafted.

Photos: Daniel Miller/University of Toledo.