Budke Ties Program Record, Lakers Cruise Past Crusaders

LIVONIA, Mich. – Carson Budke tied a program-record with five touchdown passes in his first career start for Roosevelt as the Lakers cruised to a 42-7 win over Madonna in Livonia, Mich. on Saturday.

Budke, a junior from Beaverton, Oregon, completed 16 of his 23 passing attempts for 233 yards and the five scores, the most any quarterback has had since the merger with Robert Morris. He hit five different receivers for his five touchdowns, starting with a 29-yard connection with Tyler Tenner. Four of his five touchdown passes were at least 15 yards as the Lakers racked up 417 yards of total offense.

For the second straight week, however, the Lakers (2-1) fell behind as Madonna took advantage of a short field to take a 7-0 lead after the first quarter. From there, Budke led back-to-back scoring drives to take a 14-7 lead into halftime before adding four consecutive scoring drives in the second half to pull away.

Jerrell Calhoun jumpstarted the Roosevelt offense immediately after the Madonna score with a 20-yard kickoff return to near midfield. Tenner crossed over the 50-yard line with a 12-yard run on the first play of the possession then Budke threw an 11-yard pass to Keonta Nixon on third down to bring Roosevelt close enough to go for it on fourth down. Budke forced the Crusaders to jump offsides and on the next play found Tenner for the game-tying score.

After the Lakers took over again midway through the second quarter, Budke led a six-minute drive with a 21-yard third-down pass to Tenner followed two plays later by a 19-yard touchdown to Nixon. In the third quarter, Tenner broke off a 45-yard run to flip the field then Calhoun jetted into the end zone from 16 yards out to increase the lead.

Budke tosses a 2-yard touchdown to Calhoun in the early stages of the fourth quarter then threw an 18-yard touchdown to Troy White and an 18-yard score to Alex Tran. The throw to Tran was Budke's final pass of the day and tied Kenyatte Allen's program record of five touchdown passes in a game.

Although Tenner was unable to replicate his five-score performance from last week, he was just as dominant with the ball in his hands Saturday. The senior ran 18 times for 145 yards, an average of more than eight yards per carry, and added three catches for 62 yards. Tenner had five rushes of at least 10 yards in the game and set up the touchdown pass to Calhoun with consecutive runs of 19 and 21 yards.

Roosevelt's defense also dominated the game by limiting Madonna to just 133 total yards and an average of 2.7 yards per play. The Lakers forced five three-and-outs from the Crusaders and one four-and-out with only the first three drives of the game advancing more than 10 yards down the field. The Crusaders completed five passes for 29 yards with Jordan Pippion intercepting one of those 18 pass attempts.

Roosevelt also sacked Madonna's quarterbacks five times, led by Corties Draper, who had a pair of sacks for 17 yards among his team-best seven tackles. Jordan Payne had 1.5 sacks, teaming up with Jacob Wiggins for one of the sacks, and Charlie Brooks had the other sack for Roosevelt. Jaylen Olokun also had two tackles-for-loss in the game for the Lakers defense.

The Lakers will stay on the road next week as they travel to Indiana Wesleyan to take on the fifth-ranked Wildcats at 11 a.m. in Marion, Indiana.