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ALLIANCE - A banner tinged in purple and white hangs off the fence at the end of the south end zone at Mount Union Stadium.

It reads "Welcome to THE MACHINE," an homage to the classic Pink Floyd song, and on Saturday, the Raiders played to that mantra, substituting their typical home-run style offense for a conservative, yet effective style until the floodgates broke, resulting in a 62-14 victory over the Montclair State Red Hawks in the second round of the NCAA Division III playoffs.

"We just had to keep grinding," Terrance Morring said of the methodical first-half play. "Eventually, it's going to break and it showed in the second half."

Also atypical for a Purple Raiders game was that Montclair State did not just bow down after Mount Union scored on its first possession on an 18-yard connection to Judd Harold from Kurt Rocco with not even two minutes off the first-quarter clock.

"You get a little bit of rhythm and you always feel like you have a chance," Red Hawks coach Rick Giancola said. "This was a good experience overall and good playoff experience for us."

The Red Hawks continued to eat away at a Mount Union defense that just didn't seem to have the same swagger in the first half. The payoff for Montclair came at the end of the 1st quarter, when Red Hawks quarterback Tom Fischer connected on a huge 57-yard pass play to Dan Keegan.

Though the score was still 21-7 Raiders as play moved into the second quarter, the Red Hawks came out with seemingly more vigor on both ends of the ball with their crowd chanting loudly and kept pestering the Purple Raiders and forcing them to step up their game.

"(Montclair State) are conference champions in an outstanding conference," Raiders coach Larry Kehres said of the Red Hawks. "They're battle-tested and hit some big plays in the second quarter. They played like a championship team."

But as top-caliber teams like Mount Union usually do, it found and quickly shifted into that next gear to pull through. Even as the Red Hawks scored again on another Fischer-to-Keegan connection, the Purple Raiders put up scores on their first five possessions in the half to pull out to a comfortable 35-14 lead at the half.

Leading the way for tghe Purple Raiders on offense in the first two quarters was Rocco, who started the game on a 9-of-9 hot streak and ended the half 18-of-26 for 199 yards and two scores.

Also contributing in large amounts for Mount Union was heralded wide receiver Cecil Shorts, who made his presence known not as much for his impressive hands, but for his fast feet that carried him to two rushing touchdowns in the first half and one in the second out of a modified wildcat formation near the goal line.

"We practice (the wildcat formation) all week," Shorts said. "We had good blocks and a good push and it worked, and I get excited running the ball."

The Red Hawks came out firing in the third quarter, moving the ball deep into Mount Union territory before Drew McClain recorded his second interception of the game on a tipped pass that could have been a Montclair score.

From there, it was only a matter of time before the Purple Raiders pulled away as the Red Hawks stopped Mount Union nicely on their first drive of the game, but could not string together enough plays to produce the points needed to topple the Division III favorites. Montclair also lost a distinct advantage when Fischer, who ended his day 12-of-23 for 163 yards and two scores, was knocked out of the game after a massive and slightly late hit by Purple Raiders defensive end Joe Millings that started some extra-curricular and overaggressive play by both sides.

Kehres said it was part of the game.

"Emotions just started to run high," Kehres said. "This is not table tennis."

The Purple Raiders' defense stepped up in a big way in the second half, causing turnover after turnover, piling up for a total eight turnovers and three sacks for the game.

"We're always striving to get turnovers," McClain said. "Any time you can win the turnover battle, it's a big thing."

The game was sealed with two third-quarter scores on a wildcat run by Shorts and a run by Terrance Morring, who recorded his sixth 100-plus rushing game of the season. The fourth quarter saw Mount Union completely pull away with a number of late scores.

The Purple Raiders will face Albright College next week as they look to get one step closer to their 11th national championship and seventh in the decade.

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