Scots earn league high 16 honors
MONMOUTH, ILL. (11/14/2023) The Monmouth College football team put 11 players on the Midwest Conference First Team and five more on the Second Team as announced by the MWC on Tuesday. Senior center Derek Brown (Pekin, Illinois) was named Offensive Live MVP for the second straight season and sophomore Anthony Cikauskas (Oswego, Illinois) was named Defensive Line MVP.
The Monmouth offense had five first-team selections with quarterback Carter Boyer (Carthage, Illinois) and wide receiver Nate Thornton (Peoria, Illinois) joining Brown as repeat selections. Wide receiver Jackson Bergren (Monmouth, Illinois) along with linemen James Conner (Kewanee, Illinois) and Colby McMillan (Spring Hill, Florida) also made the first team.
Boyer started all 10 games, completing 61% of his passes for a career-high 2,752 yards and 25 touchdowns. He is second in the MWC in passing yards, touchdowns and efficiency while ranking third in completion percentage. Boyer also ran for 449 yards and six touchdowns on the season.
Thornton repeats as a first-team selection with 48 catches for 856 yards and 10 touchdowns. He posted two 100+ yard games on the season, scored in eight of the 10 games and had at last five receptions in five games.
Bergren caught 47 passes on the season for 835 yards and nine touchdowns. He topped 100 yards in four games and found the end zone in seven different contests.
Brown joins Joe Krall (2017, 2019) as a multiple Offensive Line MVP since the award was introduced by the conference. Brown was a first-team selection in all four years he played for the Scots (2019, 2021, 2022, 2023) and spent this season playing multiple positions on the offensive line due to injuries.
Connor played at right tackle for the Scots this season and McMillan manned left tackle. McMillan, a senior, was a second-team selection last year while Connor earns his first MWC honor as a sophomore. The Scots line allowed less than one sack per game this season.
DEFENSE ADDS MORE
On the defensive side of the ball, the Scots had four other first-teamers to join Cikauskas. Nick Harris (Winter Haven, Florida) repeats as a first-team choice while Tevin Baker (Kewanee, Illinois) and Michael Lord (Laharpe, Illinois) move up from second-team selections a year ago. Jermaih Glenn-Louis Charles (Bloomington) was selected for the first time.
Cikauskas ranks second among all Division III players with 15 sacks on the season, one off the school record. He also ranks second in the nation with 22 tackles for loss. Overall he has 51 tackles, five QB hurries, four forced fumbles, one recovery, one blocked kick and two pass breakups. This marks the third straight season and fourth time in five years the Scots have received the DL MVP. Korbyn Personett won the award the last two seasons and Thomas Lesniewski won for the second time in 2018.
Baker finished the season with 35 tackles in 10 games. He ranked second on the team and in the MWC with 10 sacks while finishing second on the team and sixth in the MWC with 13.5 TFL. Baker blocked a field goal against Lake Forest and finished the season with five pass break ups, six QB hurries, one fumble recovery and one forced fumble. During the season he was named both MWC Defensive Performer of the Week and Special Teams Performer of the Week.
Harris played in nine games and recorded 28 tackles with two interceptions, five pass break ups, one forced fumble and one fumble recovery. He recorded two takeaways against Lake Forest and was the MWC Defensive Performer of the Week to start November.
Lord also played in nine games, recording 26 tackles with three interceptions, four break ups, a fumble recovery and half a TFL. Lord also recovered a blocked punt in the Lake Forest game and his three interceptions are tied for second in the MWC.
Glenn-Louis Charles played in nine games and finished second on the team with 62 tackles. He had two TFL, one sack, one interception, four pass break ups and two QB hurries on the season.
SECOND TEAM SELECTIONS
In addition to the 11 first-team selections, the Scots also put five players on the MWC Second Team, three on offense and two on defense.
Junior running back McKade Brooks (Astoria, Illinois) leads the Scots with 860 yards on 184 carries this season. He scored 12 touchdowns and averaged 4.7 yards per carry. Brooks also caught 12 passes for 48 yards and a touchdown.
Dylan Bone (Jacksonville, Illinois) caught three passes for 71 yards as a fifth-year tight end this season. Last year, Bone was on the MWC first-team and this season he averaged 23.7 yards per catch with a long of 34.
Left guard Tyrek Tripp (Florida), a freshman, also earned second-team honors, playing in seven games and taking over as the starter down the stretch before an injury against Lake Forest.
Defensively the Scots have two second-teamers: Caleb Endicott (Saint Cloud, Florida) and Tanner Tomaschke (Greenville, Illinois).
Endicott, a senior linebacker, was also on the second team last season. This year he played in nine games and finished with 41 tackles, 27 solo. Endicott had one TFL and one pass break up on the season.
Tomaschke, a fifth-year linebacker, was a first-team selection in 2022. This season he played in all 10 games and led the Scots with 64 tackles, 34 solo. Tomaschke had two sacks, 8.5 TFL, two interceptions, three break ups, one fumble forced, one recovery and one blocked kick.
The Scots led the MWC in first-team selections with 11 and in overall selections with 16. Illinois College had eight first-team selections and 13 overall while Lake Forest had six first-teamers and 13 total selections. Monmouth’s 11 first-team selections are the most one-division first-team selections for the Scots since the 2015 team had 14 on the first-team.
The Scots will finish the season in the Cousins Subs Lakefront Bowl against St. Norbert. The game will kickoff at 11 a.m. Saturday at Raabe Field on the campus of Wisconsin Lutheran College in Wauwatosa, Wisconsin.
