Official Stats
Lebanon, TN-It was a rough afternoon on both sides of the ball for the Belhaven football team losing on the road at Cumberland Saturday 45-7. The Blazers offense was shut down and held to only 117 yards of total offense. The Bulldog offense racked up 401 total yards and had control of the ball for 37:07 in the game.

Cumberland (8-2, 4-1 MSC West), ranked 18th in the latest NAIA Top 25 Poll, set the tone on the first drive of the game going 56 yards on six plays to get on the board. Running back Da'Juan Manning capped the drive on a nine yard touchdown run to make it 7-0. The Bulldogs added another touchdown with 4:02 left in the first quarter this time on a Curt Bureau run of six yards to make it 14-0. That drive consumed 6:13 off the clock and went 84 yards on 13 plays.

Cumberland essentially put the game away with 11 more points in the second quarter on a pair of safeties and a Lemeco Miller 18 yard touchdown run. The safeties occurred on a blocked punt and then punter Jacob Chancellor was brought down in the end zone for another. Leading 25-0 at halftime, Cumblerand scored twice more in the third quarter on a Bureau two yard pass to Miller and a Christi Burnett 17 yard touchdown run. Ervin Young notched the other touchdown for the Bulldogs in the fourth quarter as he scampered in from four yards out to make it a 45-0 game with 8:07 left on the clock.

Belhaven (4-6, 1-5 MSC West) avoided the shutout on a four yard touchdown pass from Alex Williams to Kyle Henry with 5:58 to play. It was the best drive of the afternoon for the Blazers offense as Williams connected on five of his six pass attempts which moved the team 70 yards in six plays. However, Belhaven would not get another chance at points as Cumberland ran out the clock with their final drive to take home the 45-7 win.

Williams led the Belhaven offense completing 19 of his 34 pass attempts for 148 yards and a touchdown which gives him 20 on the season. He also threw an interception and was sacked four times as the Bulldogs defense kept the pressure on all afternoon. Kyle Henry made four catches for 52 yards and a touchdown to lead the Belhaven receivers followed by Harvey Mitchell with five catches for 35 yards. D'Ambro Chatman was the leading rusher carrying the ball twice for eight yards. Cumberland halted the Blazer running attack that had been very effective this season limiting them to negative 31 yards.

A bright spot on defense for Belhaven was linebacker Ricky Wadlington who registered 13 more tackles Saturday afternoon and now has 98 on the season. He is just 13 more tackles away from tying the school single season tackles record which was set by Reginald Lumpkin last season. Trevor Butts and Javian Johnson also notched 13 tackles each while Craig McDonald recorded 11 tackles.

Cumberland's offense was led by Miller who carried the ball 11 times for 92 yards and a touchdown. Young had 65 yards on eight carries and a touchdown followed by Kwamane Howard with 58 yards on nine carries. The Bulldog running game accounted for 321 of their total offensive yards. Bureau was 10 of 19 through the air for 80 yards and touchdown while Miller was the leading receiver as well making three catches for 27 yards and a score. Miller ended the game with 157 all purpose yards which included 38 yards in kickoff returns.

Allant McLemore and Ben Miller had six tackles each on defense for Cumberland and Miller also came up with an interception. Todd Holman had four tackles, one sack, and two tackles for a loss.

Belhaven will wrap up the season next week when they travel to Georgetown College for a Mid-South Conference cross divisional matchup beginning at 1:30 PM Eastern time. Cumberland will battle Cumberlands next weekend for the MSC West Division crown as both teams boast a 4-1 record in conference play after Cumberlands knocked off Faulkner 79-7 on Saturday afternoon.