Alva Review-Courier -

ALVA, Okla. – Freshman running back Tyson Gatewood continues to impress as he led the Northwestern Oklahoma State University football team to a 17-7 Homecoming win over East Central Saturday evening at Ranger Field.

Northwestern now has a three-game win streak over its long time in-state rival ECU. The Rangers improve their record to 2-4 this season, while the Tigers dropped to 2-4. All games on the schedule are Great American Conference contests.

The Rangers will be back in action at home next week when they host Arkansas Tech at 2 p.m. at Ranger Field.

Gatewood led all offensive players with 128 yards rushing and a touchdown on 26 rushing attempts, the most attempts by a Northwestern running back this season. Jalen Williams ran the ball well on the Tiger defense with 77 yards.

Cesar De Leon made his debut as the Northwestern signal caller as he threw for 99 yards and a touchdown. His touchdown came as time ran out in the first half when he connected with Gavin Garner slanting toward the end zone between the hash marks for an easy 25-yard touchdown.

Garner was the leading receiver for the Rangers with four catches for 59 yards. Horatio Smith finished with three catches for 18 yards, and Kentrez Bell had two for a total of 15 yards.

The Rangers got on the board first late in the first quarter with an efficient seven play, 50-yard drive, finished off by a 13-yard burst by Gatewood to put the Rangers on the board 7-0.

Desiree Malicoat

Northwestern played East Central Saturday afternoon for their homecoming game. Top: Ranger Gavin Garner receives the ball with East Central's Lynden Edwards (21) right behind him. Bottom left: Northwestern's Brian Holiday wraps up East Central's Tyson Jones. Bottom right: "Rowdy" the Ranger's mascot takes a knee, along with the rest of the team while a player was hurt on the field.

After Northwestern's touchdown as time ran out in the first half made it 14-0, the Tigers cut into the lead on their first drive of the third, highlighted by a sweep play that went 68 yards by Jeremiah Jefferson.

But the Rangers answered with one of their longest drives of the season as they kept possession of the ball for over seven minutes, taking it down field 77 yards on 20 plays. The series was capped by Zave Goodrich who drilled a 27-yard field goal to bring the score to the final outcome of 17-7.

On a day when Northwestern honored a member of one of the most dominating defense in program history, Lynn Scott, the 2018 version of the Black Cloud held the Tigers to just 86 yards passing, the lowest total by a Ranger opponent this season.

Starting quarterback David Cornwell and backup Ray John Austin-Ramsey split time for the Tigers, each finishing the game with 43 yards.

Maurice Wright Jr. led the Ranger defense with 11 tackles, nine solo. Sophomore defensive lineman Adrelan Brown made some big plays the past couple of weeks, coming up with two first half sacks on Saturday against the Tigers. Brown also assisted on another tackle for loss.