Vander Laan chasing all-time record
Jason Vander Laan is no longer a best kept secret but the focal point of a top 10 offense and an unstoppable force. The only thing stopping him from reaching history is time.
The senior quarterback out of Chicago Christian is only 222 yards away from breaking the all-time NCAA rushing record for rushing yards by a quarterback in a career.
When he entered into the league in the 2012 season, Jason Vander Laan hit the ground running, literally. He has led the Ferris State Bulldogs in rushing every year since then and has achieved many accolades along the way including the Harlon Hill trophy after last year’s unbeaten regular season.
In his sophomore season (2013), he broke the single-season mark for quarterback rushing that was set by Shawn Graves out of Wofford all the way back in 1989. Vander Laan is chasing Graves once again for the career mark.
Coming into the year, the 2015 preseason All-American had already amassed 4,411 yards rushing. At this point, Vander Laan has rushed for over 100 yards in nine of the last 11 games including a pair of 200-yard games. Needing only 222 yards to reach the record mark of 5,128, he is two average performances (129.7 yards per game) away.
If the law of averages holds true, the record breaking game could be at home against Ohio Dominican, who knocked Ferris out of the playoffs last year on Oct 17. In an already exciting bout on paper, the spectators get a chance to witness both team redemption and personal accomplishment all at once.
Hockey plays Crimson and Gold game, followed by exhibition
This past Saturday, the Ferris State hockey team put their offseason work on display in the intrasquad Crimson and Gold game.
The game was separated into two 12-minute periods with a powerplay for each team at the end of the period. Team Crimson defeated Team Gold 2-0 with both goals coming after the first 12-minute period.
Combining for almost half of the Crimson’s shots was Kyle Schempp and Simon Denis with four shots and five shots respectively. Schempp earned an assist as well.
For the Gold team, Chad McDonald had far and away the most shots on goal with six.
The first goal was scored by Jared VanWormer a little over a minute into the second period off an assist from Simon Denis who scored later in a power play situation.
A big aspect of the game was that former Ferris goalie CJ Motte is no longer part of the team and spectators got a chance to see unfamiliar faces in goal.
This year’s expected starter, Charles Williams, started in goal for the Gold team and Darren Smith got the nod in net for the Crimson. This battle proved to be great to watch. Neither let in a goal and were relatively even in terms of saves with an unofficial tally of eight saves by Williams and seven by Smith.
The Bulldogs followed their intrasquad game with an exhibition against the University of Lethbridge (Canada) last Sunday. The Bulldogs won 4-2 in a game where McDonald had two goals for Ferris State, and was accompanied by Tyler Andrew and Kyle Schempp who had one goal each in the win. Williams saved 24 of 26 shots he faced in the win.
Now that the Bulldogs have gotten the cobwebs shaken out and got to go in live action, they’ll look to kick the regular season off right and rekindle a rivalry against Western Michigan on Friday, Oct. 9 at 7 p.m.