INDIANOLA, Iowa – Simpson College scored two touchdowns in the final two minutes and had an attempt at the game-winning field goal but the 44-yard attempt was wide right as time expired to give Nebraska Wesleyan a 24-22 victory in a thrilling IIAC football showdown on Saturday afternoon (Oct. 29) at Buxton Stadium in Indianola, Iowa.
 
Simpson missed two extra points in the game, so they brought on backup kicker Travis Tupper to attempt the game-winner.  After two timeouts, Tupper hit the ball square and had the distance but it sailed just right to give NWU their second conference win of the season.
 
Nebraska Wesleyan led 10-9 at halftime as the two teams struggled to get anything going on offense in the first 30 minutes.
 
In the second half, the NWU offense took control putting together two impressive scoring drives.  On the opening drive of the second half for the Prairie Wolves, NWU marched all the way into the end zone then Coach Keller went to the bag of tricks.  Quarterback Ben Green appeared to be changing the play at the line of scrimmage, but the ball was snapped to running back Joel Wiedel who then tossed the ball of to Jackson Hinze on a reverse.  Hinze threw the ball to a wide open Ben Green in the end zone for a TD. 
 
Later in the quarter the Prairie Wolves marched down the field once again, this time in only three plays.  A big play action pass to Braxton Thais got the ball to the 13-yard line where Wiedel did the rest on a touchdown run.
 
NWU seemed to be putting the game away as they put together a 7:15 drive to eat up the clock setting up a Kramer Rath field goal attempt.  The kick was blocked and that gave life to the Storm.
 
Simpson scored on a 10-yard TD pass from Caleb Frye to Jackson Redmond with 1:54 remaining in the game to make the score 24-15.  The PAT was no good making the game a 2-score contest.  Simpson recovered the onside kick to keep the game going.  The Storm needed only eight plays to find the end zone again, this time with a 1-yard TD pass from Frye to Nathan Russel making the score 24-22 after the PAT.
 
For the second straight time, Simpson was able to recover an onside kick with under one minute remaining.  They completed a big pass inside the 40-yard line to setup the potential game-winning field goal.
 
Nebraska Wesleyan finished with 407 yards of total offense, led by senior running back Joel Wiedel.  Wiedel  ran for 170 yards on 26 carries with two touchdowns, including a big 59-yard TD run in the second quarter.
 
Ben Green bounced back after a rough first half to finish 16-33 for 178 yards, and ran for 37 yards on 10 carries.  Bryce Darner caught 5 passes for 31 yards and Ryan Schneider caught two passes for 46 yards.
 
The NWU defense held the Simpson offense in check for three quarters as they had only 129 yards of offense through the first three periods.  Simpson finished with 364 total yards, gaining 235 yards with two touchdowns in the final period.